SAN JOSE, California — The Ira F. Brilliant Center for Beethoven Studies at San Jose State University will feature a presentation from Dr. Grant Cook, professor of music and director of choral activities at the University of Mount Union, on Saturday, April 13 at 2 p.m. 

Cook’s presentation is titled, “Dwight's 'Diarist,' Alexander Wheelock Thayer: Searching for Beethoven in Paris and London.” The lecture chronicles the travels of Alexander Wheelock Thayer, the famed American biographer of Beethoven who in the 1860s sought out and interviewed Beethoven's still-living contemporaries in Europe. 

The presentation is the grand opening presentation for “The Art of Biography: Beethoven and Steinbeck Exhibit” at the Beethoven Center that will run through July 31. Dr. Theodore Albrecht, professor of musicology at Kent State University, will also present at the event. 

For more information or full abstracts from both Cook and Albrecht, visit sjsu.edu/beethoven/collections_exhibit/current_exhibitions.