Maria Cisyk, concert pianist

Maria Cisyk of 76 Minuteman Road, a concert pianist, died at Danbury
Hospital on Dec. 6 after a 15-year battle with breast cancer.
Ms. Cisyk was born in 1945 in a Displaced Persons camp near Bayreuth,
Germany of Ukrainian parents and emigrated to the United States when she
was  four years old. Her father, Wolodymyr Cisyk, a concert violinist,
provided early music studies at their home in Brooklyn, which led to
enrollment at the High School of Performing Arts, Juilliard Preparatory
College, and Juilliard College.
Ms. Cisyk also held postgraduate degrees from both Yale
 University and Juilliard, where she was also a teaching
fellow in Music History and Literature and Materials of Music. During
her undergraduate career, she was a student of M. Munz and Rosinna
Lhevine and as such could trace her musical lineage directly to Franz
Liszt.
Ms. Cisyk was a former director of the Preparatory and Extension
Divisions of the San Francisco Conservatory and served at various times
on the faculties of Juilliard, Yale, SUNY Binghamton, New York
University, Lone Mountain College, and Western Connecticut State
University.
For the past 25 years Ms. Cisyk maintained private teaching studios in
The Carnegie Hall Building in New York City, and at her home in
Ridgefield. She was known among her colleagues and students for her work
as a teacher, performance coach, and performing arts medicine
consultant.
An active soloist and chamber artist, Ms. Cisyk performed by invitation
both abroad, such as in Lviv and Kiev, Ukraine; and in numerous places
in the United States, including Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland, Hartford,
Boston, Washington, Baltimore, and quite frequently in New York City. In
1993 she appeared in a recital at the Dag Hammarskjold Auditorium at the
United Nations.
Ms. Cisyk was also in demand by professional teaching
associations as a lecture-recitalist in piano pedagogy, piano
literature, and performing arts medicine. Some of her more popular
lecture-recitals included The Color Theories and Music of Scriabin,
researched and first performed during her time at Yale University; from
Bach to Schoenberg: Passion and Reason Through the Centuries, given at
Vassar College in 1999; and The Impressionist Aesthetic in Music and
Art, the subject of a 1997 lecture-recital at The Metropolitan Museum of
Art.
She is survived by her daughters, Samantha Merley of Redding, and
Alexandra Merley of Northampton, Mass., and Jeffrey Baker, her companion
of 20 years.
Donations may be made in Ms. Cisyk's name to Because Life is Beautiful,
a breast cancer awareness program that is purchasing mammography
equipment for Ukraine. Checks should be made out to Public Education
International, for account number 101303-000 and mailed to Self-Reliance
Ukrainian Federal Credit Union, 2332 W. Chicago Avenue, Chicago, IL
60622. Please note with your donation that it is being made in memory of
Maria Cisyk.
Friends will be received, Sunday, Dec. 14, at Kane Funeral Home, in
Ridgefield from 1 to 4 p.m.