A popular and critical favorite described by one reviewer as a “poet of the keyboard,” Nakamatsu performs works by Joseph Woelfl, Schubert, Mendelssohn, Rachmaninoff, Debussy and Liszt in his Bates program.

A California native and former high school German teacher, Nakamatsu became the 10th Van Cliburn gold medalist in 1997. A Los Angeles Times reviewer later wrote that “Nakamatsu has everything he ought to have: a solid, effortless and comprehensive technique, wide dynamics and a spectrum of tone colors, exquisite good taste, a commanding musical authority, a searching interest in different styles and a poet’s imagination.”

Nakamatsu records for the prestigious harmonia mundi usa label. He is equally comfortable in solo recital, chamber ensembles and as an orchestral soloist, and his repertoire runs from Bach through Beethoven to such contemporary composers as Lukas Foss. He performed Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue” at the Clinton White House, and has appeared with the Deutsches Symphonie Orchester-Berlin, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the San Francisco and Cincinnati symphony orchestras and the Boston Pops, among other major organizations.

The program for Nakamatsu’s Maine debut includes Joseph Woelfl’s Sonata in E Major (Op. 33); a series of four Schubert impromptus (D. 899); Mendelssohn’s Fantasy in F-Sharp Minor (Op. 28); three preludes by Rachmaninoff (Op. 32, No. 1, and Op. 23, Nos. 4 and 7); Debussy’s “Suite bergamasque” and “Apres une lecture du Dante (Fantasia quasi Sonata),” from Liszt’s “Annees de pelerinage,” Book II.

A connoisseur’s choice of jazz and classical musicians, the five-concert 2002-03 Bates College Concert Series continues on Oct. 5 with a performance by jazz trumpeter Tiger Okoshi and his band. Later concerts in the series feature pianist Frank Glazer and violinist Curtis Macomber (Nov. 9; free admission); jazz guitarist Pat Martino (Jan. 18); and the Brentano String Quartet with Maine pianist Yuri Funahashi (March 8).

For more information about the Bates College Concert Series, please call 207-786-6135.

With some 1,700 students back on campus, Bates College is geared up for an autumn packed with public events in the arts and humanities. Events at Bates in September include appearances by outspoken journalist Christopher Hitchens, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Carl Dennis and pianist Jon Nakamatsu.

In an event of regional interest, the iconoclastic Hitchens presents a lecture at 4:10 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 25 in Pettengill Hall. Hitchens is a contributor to such British newspapers as The Guardian and to a variety of American publications, including Vanity Fair, The Atlantic and The Nation, for which he is the longtime Washington correspondent. “Well-travelled, hyper-educated . . . [and] always funny,” wrote the Village Voice Literary Supplement, “Christopher Hitchens has no equal in American journalism.”

Later that day, at 8 p.m. in Chase Hall Lounge, poet Carl Dennis reads from his work. Dennis won this year’s Pulitzer Prize in poetry for Practical Gods (Penguin, 2001), his eighth collection of verse and one that seeks to explore ordinary life in terms of religious mythology both biblical and pagan. A recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts, Dennis teaches at the State University of New York in Buffalo. In 2000 he received the Ruth Lilly Prize from Poetry Magazine and the Modern Poetry Association for his contribution to American poetry.

In music, September’s biggest music story at Bates is a performance by pianist Jon Nakamatsu, opening the five-concert 2002-2003 Bates College Concert Series at 7:30 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 29. A California native and former high school German teacher, Nakamatsu became the 10th gold medalist in the prestigious Van Cliburn International Piano Competition in 1997 — the only American gold medalist since 1981. A popular and critical favorite whom one reviewer called a “poet of the keyboard,” Nakamatsu performs works by Joseph Woelfl, Schubert, Mendelssohn and Brahms in his Maine debut (admission: $7/$5).

Also among Bates’ musical offerings in September is the diverse, free-admission Noonday Concerts series, held at 12:30 p.m. every Tuesday (resuming Sept. 10), and a concert featuring wind players from Maine’s own Midcoast Symphony Orchestra at 8 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 21, also free of charge. All concerts listed here will be held in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall.

Three art exhibitions open in September, with one featuring work by a Maine resident. Transforming Silence/Translating Light comprises photographs by Will Richard, who owns Outdoor Ventures North, Inc., and teaches at the University of New England and the University of Southern Maine. Richard, a Mellon Fellow in residence in the Bates environmental studies program this semester, shows images of Maine, the Arctic and the Antarctic in the Lower Gallery of the Bates College Museum of Art from Sept. 6 through Oct. 16. He’ll talk about his images at 7 p.m. Friday, Sept. 13, just prior to the opening reception for the exhibit.

In the museum’s Upper Gallery through the same period is Dirt Piles, encompassing works on paper and sculptures inspired by earthen mounds. The artist, Grace Knowlton, lives in Rockland County, N.Y., and has worked since the 1960s as a painter, sculptor and photographer. Her work is in the collections of Bates College, the Victoria and Albert Museum, in London, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, among others, and she has exhibited nationally. Knowlton discusses her work at 7 p.m. Friday, Sept. 6, just prior to the opening reception for the exhibit.

Finally, Oregon painter-printmaker Betty LaDuke shows giclée prints at the Bates College Chapel in an exhibit titled Surviving War, Dreaming Home: Images of War, Displacement, and Peace from Eritrea and Ethiopia. An accomplished activist and teacher as well as artist, LaDuke’s images encompass themes of war and peace in the African nations of Eritrea and Ethiopia, which she visits annually. “Giclée” is a digital process with great advantages in beauty, quality and durability. Surviving War, Dreaming Home shows Sept. 23-Nov. 15.

Beginning with a performance by Jon Nakamatsu, the only American gold medalist in the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition since 1981, the 2002-2003 Bates College Concert Series is a connoisseur’s choice of jazz and classical players. Nakamatsu’s concert, scheduled for 7:30 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 29, in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall opens a series that includes jazz trumpeter Tiger Okoshi, jazz guitarist Pat Martino and such classical artists as Maine pianists Frank Glazer and Yuri Funahashi, violinist Curtis Macomber and the renowned Brentano String Quartet.

All five concerts take place in the college’s Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St. Admission to four of the concerts is $7 for adults and $5 for seniors. Admission to the Glazer-Macomber program on Nov. 9 is free, through the support of the Florence Pennell Gremley Fund at Bates.

Here’s a summary of the 2002-2003 Bates College Concert Series:

Jon Nakamatsu (7:30 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 29): A California native and former high school German teacher, Jon Nakamatsu became the 10th Van Cliburn competition gold medalist in 1997. He records for the prestigious harmonia mundi usa label, and is a popular and critical favorite described by one reviewer as a “poet of the keyboard.”

Nakamatsu is equally comfortable in solo recital, chamber ensembles and as an orchestral soloist, and his repertoire runs from Bach through Beethoven to such contemporary composers as Lukas Foss. The program for his Maine debut includes works by Woelfl, Schubert, Mendelssohn and Brahms.

Tiger Okoshi & Co. (8 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 5): Toru “Tiger” Okoshi took up trumpet as a teen-ager after hearing a concert in his native Japan by Louis Armstrong. After graduating summa cum laude from the Berklee College of Music, in Boston (where he is now an associate professor), he toured with such jazz greats as vibraphonist Gary Burton and drummer Buddy Rich. A JVC recording artist and clinician for Yamaha Corporation, Okoshi is known for such recordings as Color of Soil (1998), Two Sides to Every Story (1996) and 1993′s Echoes of a Note, a tribute to Armstrong.

Pianist Frank Glazer and violinist Curtis Macomber (8 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 9; free admission): Colleagues in the New England Piano Quartette, one of Maine’s best-loved chamber groups, Macomber and Glazer have performed together since the mid-1990s. For this concert, they will play three Beethoven sonatas.

A faculty member at Juilliard, Macomber belonged to the New World String Quartet from 1982 to 1993 and is a founding member of the Apollo Trio. He is an influential champion of new music whose CRI disc Songs of Solitude, a compilation of contemporary repertoire, was named one of the best solo instrumental recordings of 1996 by the New York Observer.

Maine’s best-known pianist and a resident artist at Bates, Glazer is an artist of international stature who taught at the Eastman School of Music, in Rochester, N.Y., before retiring to Maine with his wife, Ruth, in 1980. The couple founded the popular Saco River Festival, held in Cornish every summer. A student of pianist Artur Schnabel, Glazer is one of the few surviving proteges of that great musician. His long career has included numerous recordings, his own television program in the 1950s and countless solo recitals and performances.

Jazz guitarist Pat Martino (8 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 18): Musical insiders know Martino from his larger-than-life technique, intrepid improvisations and a stylistic breadth that spans bop, R&B and funk. (He is also celebrated for his hard-fought recovery from a life-threatening brain aneurysm in the 1980s.) A veteran of three decades in jazz, Martino has made more than 20 albums and is currently signed with the esteemed Blue Note label. Pianist Gil Goldstein accompanies him in this appearance at Bates.

Brentano String Quartet with pianist Yuri Funahashi (8 p.m. Saturday, March 8): Founded in 1992, the Brentano String Quartet received three major awards within its first year and went on to become the first (and current) quartet-in-residence at Princeton University. The quartet has performed at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Library of Congress, Lincoln Center and other important venues. Distinguished by technical brilliance and musical insight, the group is equally convincing with the established repertoire and new music. The Bates program includes Bach, Webern and Dvorak.

Particularly acclaimed for her solo work and sonata recordings with violinists Joseph Swenson and Arturo Delmoni, Yuri Funahashi has performed in major concert settings around the world. In her adopted home state, where she is an adjunct professor at the University of Maine at Farmington, she is known for her performances at the Sebago-Long Lake Chamber Music Festival and with the Maine Music Society. For the Bates date, she joins the Brentano String Quartet for Shostakovich’s Piano Quintet, Op. 57.

For more information about the Bates Concert Series, please call 207-786-6135.