Roger Robinson "Trey" Wright III (born April 1, 1974

Harris County, Texas Harris County is a county located in the U.S. state of Texas. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 4,731,145, and was estimated to be 5,009,302 in 2024, making it the List of counties in Texas, most populous cou ...

births database
/ref>) is an American classical concert

pianist A pianist ( , ) is a musician who plays the piano. A pianist's repertoire may include music from a diverse variety of styles, such as traditional classical music, jazz piano, jazz, blues piano, blues, and popular music, including rock music, ...

. He is also a ''

Scrabble ''Scrabble'' is a word game in which two to four players score points by placing tiles, each bearing a single letter, onto a Board game, game board divided into a 15×15 grid of squares. The tiles must form words that, in crossword fashion, re ...

'' player who won the United States

National Scrabble Championship The Scrabble Players Championship (formerly the North American Scrabble Championship, and earlier the National Scrabble Championship) is the largest ''Scrabble'' competition in North America. The event is currently held every year, and from 2004 t ...

in 2004.

Early life and musical training

Roger Wright was born in

Houston, Texas Houston ( ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in the U.S. state of Texas and in the Southern United States. Located in Southeast Texas near Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, it is the county seat, seat of ...

, the son of Roger Wright, Jr., and Christy (Schmidt) Wright. He began piano study at age 12. During high school he studied with Houston teacher John Weems. At 18 Wright made his

concerto A concerto (; plural ''concertos'', or ''concerti'' from the Italian plural) is, from the late Baroque era, mostly understood as an instrumental composition, written for one or more soloists accompanied by an orchestra or other ensemble. The ...

debut with the

Houston Symphony Orchestra The Houston Symphony is an American orchestra based in Houston, Texas. The orchestra is resident at the Jesse H. Jones Hall for the Performing Arts. History The first concert of what was to become the Houston Symphony took place on June 21, 1 ...

. Wright entered the piano program at the

University of Houston The University of Houston (; ) is a Public university, public research university in Houston, Texas, United States. It was established in 1927 as Houston Junior College, a coeducational institution and one of multiple junior colleges formed in ...

, where he continued his studies with Nancy Weems, Ruth Tomfohrde, Abbey Simon, and Horacio Gutiérrez, and earned his

Bachelor of Music A Bachelor of Music (BMus; sometimes conferred as Bachelor of Musical Arts) is an academic degree awarded by a college, university, or conservatory upon completion of a program of study in music. The degree may be awarded for performance, music ed ...

degree. During this time he won second prize in the 1996 (U.S.)

Music Teachers National Association Music Teachers National Association (MTNA) is an American nonprofit professional organization for the support, growth, and development of music-teaching professionals, with more than 17,000 members in 50 states, and more than 500 affiliated loca ...

Piano Competition, College Division. Wright remained in Houston for graduate study, earning his

Master of Music The Master of Music (MM or MMus) is, as an academic title, the first graduate degree in music awarded by universities and conservatories. The MM combines advanced studies in an applied area of specialization (usually performance in singing or i ...

degree as a student of John Perry at

Rice University William Marsh Rice University, commonly referred to as Rice University, is a Private university, private research university in Houston, Houston, Texas, United States. Established in 1912, the university spans 300 acres. Rice University comp ...

's Shepherd School of Music; he would later do doctoral work with Perry at the

University of Southern California The University of Southern California (USC, SC, or Southern Cal) is a Private university, private research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Founded in 1880 by Robert M. Widney, it is the oldest private research university in ...

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

.World Concert Artist Directory (lin

, retrieved 11/28/2007

Piano career

Wright has been a prizewinner in several international competitions, including first prizes in the 1998 Frinna Awerbuch International Piano Competition and the 2003 San Antonio International Piano Competition. His performances in the 2000 Sydney International Piano Competition led to a debut recording with the

Australian Broadcasting Corporation The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) is Australia’s principal public service broadcaster. It is funded primarily by grants from the federal government and is administered by a government-appointed board of directors. The ABC is ...

. He has performed as a soloist in North America, Australia, Europe, and Africa. He has issued several recordings (see "Discography"). Wright has been the featured performer on national radio broadcasts by ABC Australia and CBC Radio Canada, as well as local programs on 105.1 K-Mozart in Los Angeles and WQXR in New York City. He has appeared with numerous orchestras including the

Houston Symphony The Houston Symphony is an American orchestra based in Houston, Texas. The orchestra is resident at the Jesse H. Jones Hall for the Performing Arts. History The first concert of what was to become the Houston Symphony took place on June 21, 1 ...

, the Calgary Philharmonic, the

San Antonio Symphony The San Antonio Symphony was a full-time professional symphony orchestra based in San Antonio, San Antonio, Texas. Its season ran from late September to early June. Sebastian Lang-Lessing, its music director from 2010 to 2020, was the last to ser ...

, Mission Chamber Orchestra, Glacier Symphony, and Brussels Chamber Orchestra. Critical praise for Wright's piano playing has appeared in publications including ''

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'', locally known as ''The'' ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'' or ''WP'', is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the national capital. It is the most widely circulated newspaper in the Washington m ...

'', ''Clavier'', ''

American Record Guide The ''American Record Guide'' (''ARG'') is a classical music magazine. It has reviewed classical music recordings since 1935. History and profile The magazine was founded by Peter Hugh Reed in May 1935 as the ''American Music Lover''. It chan ...

'', and the ''

Houston Chronicle The ''Houston Chronicle'' is the largest daily newspaper in Houston, Houston, Texas, United States. it is the third-largest newspaper by Sunday circulation in the United States, behind only ''The New York Times'' and the ''Los Angeles Times''. ...

''. In addition to his solo performances, Wright has toured internationally with the comedian harmonists Hudson Shad and appeared with them on

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly funded nonprofit organization and the most prominent provider of educat ...

, and has co-produced a recording of

Richard Strauss Richard Georg Strauss (; ; 11 June 1864 – 8 September 1949) was a German composer and conductor best known for his Tone poems (Strauss), tone poems and List of operas by Richard Strauss, operas. Considered a leading composer of the late Roman ...

's ''Enoch Arden'', a setting of Tennyson's poem for narrator and piano, collaborating with actor

Michael York Michael York (born Michael Hugh Johnson; 27 March 1942) is an English film, television, and stage actor. After performing on stage with the Royal National Theatre, he had a breakthrough in films by playing Tybalt in Franco Zeffirelli's ''Romeo ...

and pianist John Bell Young. Wright resides in the

Los Angeles, California Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

, area, where he performs as a soloist,

chamber music Chamber music is a form of classical music that is composed for a small group of Musical instrument, instruments—traditionally a group that could fit in a Great chamber, palace chamber or a large room. Most broadly, it includes any art music ...

ian, and

accompanist Accompaniment is the part (music), musical part which provides the rhythmic and/or harmony (music), harmonic support for the melody or main themes of a song or instrumental piece. There are many different styles and types of accompaniment in di ...

, teaches both collegiately and privately, and composes.

Scrabble career

Wright began playing Scrabble at 17 and has competed in U.S. national tournaments (under his nickname, Trey Wright) since 1992. He won the $25,000 first prize in the

of the United States in 2004, defeating former champion David Gibson by winning the first three games in a best-of-five final. During the 2004 finals a controversy arose as the result of a Scrabble play by Wright. He placed the word "LEZ" (slang for ''

lesbian A lesbian is a homosexual woman or girl. The word is also used for women in relation to their sexual identity or sexual behavior, regardless of sexual orientation, or as an adjective to characterize or associate nouns with female homosexu ...

'') on the board but was compelled by tournament officials to retract the move and play a different word, because the finals were being run with a list of over a hundred forbidden words (allowed during the preliminary rounds), instituted as a precondition to

ESPN ESPN (an initialism of their original name, which was the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by the Walt Disney Company (80% and operational control) and Hearst Commu ...

's plan to televise the finals at a later date. The incident was widely reported in the media, including on the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

and in ''

Slate Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous, metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade, regional metamorphism. It is the finest-grained foliated metamorphic ro ...

''. As of January 2017, Wright ranked 13th in career money winnings, with $41,584.North American Scrabble Leaders (lin

, retrieved 01/21/2017

Discography

*''Piano Masterpieces''. Music of Frédéric Chopin, Chopin,

Debussy Achille Claude Debussy (; 22 August 1862 – 25 March 1918) was a French composer. He is sometimes seen as the first Impressionism in music, Impressionist composer, although he vigorously rejected the term. He was among the most influe ...

Schumann Robert Schumann (; ; 8 June 181029 July 1856) was a German composer, pianist, and music critic of the early Romantic music, Romantic era. He composed in all the main musical genres of the time, writing for solo piano, voice and piano, chamber ...

, Liebermann,

Rachmaninoff Sergei Vasilyevich Rachmaninoff; in Russian pre-revolutionary script. (28 March 1943) was a Russian composer, virtuoso pianist, and conductor. Rachmaninoff is widely considered one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, one of ...

, Sculthorpe, Elisenda Fábregas, and

Haydn Franz Joseph Haydn ( ; ; 31 March 173231 May 1809) was an Austrian composer of the Classical period (music), Classical period. He was instrumental in the development of chamber music such as the string quartet and piano trio. His contributions ...

. Eloquence 461 657–2. (2000). Radio airplay of one selection on this CD,

Peter Sculthorpe Peter Joshua Sculthorpe (29 April 1929 – 8 August 2014) was an Australian composer. Much of his music resulted from an interest in the music of countries neighbouring Australia as well as from the impulse to bring together aspects of Aborigi ...

's "Between Five Bells," earned Sculthorpe the

Australasian Performing Right Association APRA AMCOS consists of Australasian Performing Right Association (APRA) and Australasian Mechanical Copyright Owners Society (AMCOS), both copyright management organisations or copyright collectives which jointly represent over 100,000 songwri ...

’s (APRA) Award for the Most Performed Contemporary Classical Composition of 2001. *''

Enoch Arden ''Enoch Arden'' is a narrative poem by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, published in 1864 during his tenure as British poet laureate. The story on which it was based was allegedly provided to Tennyson by Thomas Woolner. The poem lends its name to a ...

'' by

and

Alfred, Lord Tennyson Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson (; 6 August 1809 – 6 October 1892) was an English poet. He was the Poet Laureate during much of Queen Victoria's reign. In 1829, Tennyson was awarded the Chancellor's Gold Medal at Cambridge for one of ...

, with

, narrator, and John Bell Young, piano. Co-produced by Wright. Americus Records AMR20021025. (2002) *''Miniatures''. Music of Soler, Liebermann, Schumann, and William Mason. Wright Sounds. (2002) *''Rzewski & Schubert''. Music of Rzewski and

Schubert Franz Peter Schubert (; ; 31 January 179719 November 1828) was an Austrian composer of the late Classical period (music), Classical and early Romantic music, Romantic eras. Despite his short life, Schubert left behind a List of compositions ...

. Wright Sounds. (2002) *''Roger Wright in Concert''. Music of Schumann, Haydn, Rzewski, and Schubert. Wright Sounds. (2004) *''Evocations''. Music of J. S. Bach,

Levitzki Levitzki or Levitsky ( ''Łevyćkyj'', ''Levickij'', , ) is a surname, which is derived from the Hebrew name Levi meaning "joined to" in Hebrew. Notable people with the surname include: * Alexander Levitzki (born 1940), Israeli biochemist * Jacob ...

, Schubert, Chopin, Poulenc, and

Liszt Franz Liszt (22 October 1811 – 31 July 1886) was a Hungarian composer, virtuoso pianist, conductor and teacher of the Romantic period. With a diverse body of work spanning more than six decades, he is considered to be one of the most pro ...

. Wright Sounds. (2007) *''Piano Favorites''. Music of Schumann, Soler, Mason, Chopin, and Schubert. Wright Sounds. (2009) *'' Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No. 2''. With the Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional de Costa Rica, conducted by Chosei Komatsu. Wright Sounds. (2010) *''At the River''. Music of

Ravel Joseph Maurice Ravel (7 March 1875 – 28 December 1937) was a French composer, pianist and conductor. He is often associated with Impressionism in music, Impressionism along with his elder contemporary Claude Debussy, although both composer ...

, Rachmaninoff, Poulenc, Rzewski, and Balakirev. Wright Sounds. (2011)

References

External links

Roger Wright
Official website
An interview with Roger Wright
on Texas Public Radio, June 28, 2007. * {{DEFAULTSORT:Wright, Roger American male classical pianists American male pianists Musicians from Houston Musicians from Los Angeles 1974 births Living people American Scrabble players University of Houston alumni Rice University alumni Classical musicians from Texas Classical musicians from California 21st-century American classical pianists 21st-century American male musicians