Grant Mack, Pianist

Praised for his “standout” performances (Honolulu Advertiser), Grant Mack has established himself as a top collaborative pianist in Hawaii and Oregon.  With over 40 years of experience in the Art of Collaboration, Grant has explored a large range of repertoire for Winds, Strings, Brass, Percussion, and Voice.

     As the pianist for the Honolulu Symphony from 1991-2015, Grant performed most of the repertoire for orchestra with piano. Highlights include Stravinsky’s Petrouchka, Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 1, Appalachian Spring by Copland, Nixon in China by Adams, Saint-Saëns Carnival of the Animals, and a recording of Copland’s Clarinet Concerto with principal clarinetist Scott Anderson.

            Grant performed with many of the principal players in the Honolulu Symphony as well as guest artists: violinist Eugene Fodor and cellists Robert LaMarchina and I-Bei Lin, professor of cello at the University of Hawaii.  Grant was a frequent performer in the “Music at Atherton” chamber recitals at Hawaii Public Radio.  

     Grant also enjoyed exploring the lighter side of music as a performer of light classical, popular, and Hawaiian music at many venues in Waikiki.  He is a featured soloist with the Honolulu Symphony on the sound track for the movie “Princess Kai’ulani” produced in 2009.

     Grant is a specialist in the art of vocal collaboration.  As a singer himself, he has explored most of the vocal repertoire as well as vocal diction and vocal pedagogy.  In 1984, Grant received the Gramma Fischer Scholarship for the study of lieder and opera coaching at the American Institute of Musical Studies (AIMS) in Graz, Austria.  He continues to work as a collaborator for vocal studios and has been a repetiteur with Hawaii Opera Theater, Opera at the University of Hawaii, and the University of Oregon.  He has sung as a baritone with Hawaii Vocal Arts Ensemble and was a member of the Adelphian Concert Choir at the University of Puget Sound during his undergraduate years.  Grant also has a passion for liturgical music, having been a cantor at Temple Beth-El in Tacoma, Washington and a cantor at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Honolulu.

     Grant enjoys teaching both privately and in the classroom.  He has been an adjunct Professor of Piano and Chamber Music at Hawaii Pacific University.  For several years he was a Graduate Teaching Fellow at the University of Oregon, specializing in collaboration, teaching and coaching, while earning a Doctor of Musical Arts degree, which he received in 2022.

      Encouraging todays composers is something Grant is very much involved with.  He has premiered works by Joseph Wayne Vranas, Dan Daly, Daniel Delay, and has participated in the University of Oregon’s biennial Composer’s Symposium under Robert Kyr.  He has collaborated often with soprano and multiple Grammy winner Estelí Gomez, during her frequent workshops at UO where she mentors young composers writing for voice and instruments.  He has performed the world premier of “Suite of the Earth” for piano, percussion and flute by Portland composer David S. Bernstein.

    Grant is a 1977 graduate of R. A. Long High School, studying piano with Betty Staub and flute with Tom Hall.  He received a Master of Music degree from the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa in 2014 and moved to Oregon to attend the University of Oregon.  He earned a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Collaborative Piano in 2022 and now lives in Eugene where he works freelance, performing with musicians such as the highly esteemed music faculty at the U of O.