Clifton Williams Performs in Vienna and Paris

Pianist and Jack Kent Cooke Young Artist Clifton Williams has had an extraordinary year. After performing on From the Top in March 2009, he was profiled in the Washington Post and attended summer programs at Indiana University, Berklee College of Music, and Princeton University.

Clifton with the Ambassador's family.

This winter, Clifton experienced another set of amazing opportunities. He was invited to play at a house party in Washington, D.C., where he met Donna Eacho, the wife of the U.S. Ambassador to Austria (William Eacho), who invited him to join her family in Vienna and Paris during his spring break.

In Vienna, Clifton slept and dined at the Ambassador’s residence and attended concerts at the opera and the Vienna Philharmonic with the Ambassador’s family. He gave four recitals in Vienna, two of them at the America House. At the first concert he performed a Rachmaninoff Etude, Prokofiev’s Diabolique Suggestion, and two jazz pieces, and afterwards he spoke with the 100 high school students in the audience. His second performance at the America House was for a general audience. He also performed at the Ambassador’s residence and at a local church.

Watch an interview with Clifton and performance clips here.

He also visited Paris, where he performed at UNESCO and met David Killion, the U.S. Ambassador to UNESCO.

Clifton will attend Berklee College of Music on a Presidential Scholarship in the fall. We are so proud to see Clifton’s success and look forward to having him just down the street from our offices.