Guest artist Isabelle Demers will present the Donia Organ Recital at Hope College on Tuesday, March 1, at 7:30 p.m. in Dimnent Memorial Chapel.

The public is invited.  Admission is free.

"Les amis de l'Orgue" of QuébecCity has described Demers as "Daring and fresh," noting that her "mind-blowing Toccata confirmed her tremendous talent. With her idiomatic style and her solid technique, Isabelle Demers is an artist outside the norms, or dare I say, beyond any competition."

Demer began piano studies at age six and was admitted to the Montréal Conservatory of Music at age 11 in the fields of both piano and organ. After graduation in 2003, she studied on scholarship for a year in Paris at the École Normale de Paris-Alfred Cortot. She received her master's degree from The Juilliard School in New York, where she is currently completing doctoral studies with Paul Jacobs.

Isabelle Demers was a featured performer at the 2008 national convention of the American Guild of Organists in Minneapolis, and her performance was later broadcast to a national radio audience. She was also a featured artist at the 2009 national convention of the Royal Canadian College of Organists in Toronto, and at the 2010 national convention of the American Guild of Organists in Washington, D.C.  She has been a prize-winner and finalist in several international performance competitions in the United States, Canada and Europe, and performs widely throughout the United States and Canada.  She performed all seven of Max Reger's Chorale Fantasies in the 2008 Regerfest held at St. Mary's Cathedral in San Francisco.

In the spring of 2010 she released her first recording, which contains music by Bach, Prokofiev and Reger.  She has three additional recordings in production.

She also tours with organist Daniel Sullivan as a two-organ duo.

The recital at Hope has been made possible through the generous support of the college's Tom Donia Memorial Organ Fund. The fund was created in 1990 by family and friends of Tom Donia, a 1971 Hope graduate who died in 1990. A director of communications for the American Red Cross, Donia had a life-long interest in music.

Dimnent Memorial Chapel is located at 277 College Ave., on College Avenue at 12th Street.