Unstoppable IU pianist fueled by strong passion for music

A pianist with a broken hand is like a hurdler with an injured leg -- both are brought to a halt until fully healed. \nBut for Maxim Bernard, an IU graduate student working toward his artist diploma in piano performance, a broken hand from a bicycle accident did not present a crisis, but an opportunity.\n"Instead of just taking the time off, he decided to prepare an entire program with his left hand," said Bernard's friend and fellow pianist Melinda Baird, who added that Bernard not only voluntarily prepared the program in two months, but performed it in a recital.\nBernard's passion for the piano began at a young age, playing his first notes at 13. \n"It's always been music since I started to play," Bernard said. "When I was young, nobody forced me to practice."\nBernard's piano career started in his hometown of Quebec City. He said his mother had bought an electronic keyboard so she could learn to play, and Bernard eventually became familiar with the instrument.\n"Finally I started to play a little and started to take lessons," Bernard said. "And I discovered a passion for that."\nNow, as an accomplished performer, Bernard has made the lessons and practicing worthwhile. He has won concerto competitions in Quebec and at IU, and in June, he took home first prize at the prestigious 2006 Canadian Music International Stepping Stone Competition. \nBernard currently studies with distinguished professor Menahem Pressler, a world-renowned piano virtuoso and the founding member of the Beaux Arts Trio. The two first met at a summer music program in Quebec in 2001.\n"Just one week with him … it left me a very strong impression," Bernard said. "The way he feels music and his way of approaching the music (is) so human and so sensitive. … It's rare nowadays."\nSensitivity manifests itself in Bernard's playing as well. Suzanne Beaubien, who instructed Bernard in piano at the Conservatory of Music in Quebec City for seven years, said a sense of curiosity and honesty can be heard when Bernard plays the instrument.\n"As a human being he's quite a special young man," Beaubien said. "He's very kind, and that can be heard in his piano playing."\nAlthough Bernard said he is focusing this year on learning a repertoire with his teacher, he will also spend time performing. Besides playing in a recital at IU, he will travel back to Quebec three times. In March and May he plans to play solo recitals there, and in November he will play with the Orchestre Symphonique de Quebec.\nBernard is no stranger to symphony performances. In 1999, he was chosen to perform Beethoven's Fourth Concerto with the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra, and he has played with the Orchestre du Conservatoire de Musique de Quebec and the IU Philharmonic Orchestra. \nThe performances are valuable practice for Bernard, who plans to make a career performing and said he had no idea what he would be doing with his life if he wasn't playing the piano.\n"If someone doesn't know me that much, like if they don't know music for example," Bernard said, "then it's kind of like (they don't know) half of myself or more"