The 2014 Arthur Poister Competition took place March 29 at St. Paul’s Cathedral, Syracuse, New York, on the Quimby organ. The winner was Amanda Mole, a DMA candidate at Eastman studying with David Higgs. Second prize was awarded to Robin Jenkins, an MM candidate at Mercer University, Macon, Georgia, where she studies with Jack Mitchener. The other finalists were Brent Neuenschwander (University of North Carolina School of the Arts, studying with Timothy Olsen), Mitchell Miller (Oberlin, studying with James David Christie), Josiah Hamill (University of Denver, studying with Joseph Galema), and Joseph Peeples (Indiana University, studying with Janette Fishell). Judges were Christopher Marks of the University of Nebraska–Lincoln; Patricia Snyder of Storrs Congregational Church, Storrs, Connecticut, and Kola Owolabi of Syracuse University.
Amanda Mole holds a BM from Eastman and the MM from Yale; she will play her winner’s recital this fall in Setnor Auditorium (on the Crouse Holtkamp, 1950) at Syracuse University. Robin Jenkins holds a BM in piano and in organ from Oberlin, studying with Jack Mitchener. She will play in the Malmgren Concert Series at Hendricks Chapel, Syracuse University, in 2015.
