Carson Hayes will be a second-year Master’s student at Florida State University in the fall, studying piano performance with Dr. Joel Hastings. He received his bachelor’s degree in piano performance from the University of Tennessee at Knoxville, where he studied with Dr. David Northington. His prior teachers include both Kathy Spaargaren and Dorothy Mahaffy. In 2013, Carson was selected as the winner of the Tennessee MTNA Young Artist piano competition, and went on to be selected as the alternate in the Southern Division in Louisville, KY. In April, 2014, he had the honor of performing in the Interharmony International Music Festival’s concert series “Rite of String” in Carnegie Hall. While at the University of Tennessee, he was selected as a winner of the UT Concerto Competition, and also twice as the winner of the Celebration of Excellence Competition. In his first year at Florida State University he was named the winner of the school-wide Young Artist Concerto Competition, and performed Rachmaninoff’s First Piano Concerto with the University Sinfonia Orchestra. An active music festival participant, he has attended the Sewanee Summer Music Festival, Tennessee Governor’s School for the Arts, Indiana University Piano Academy, and the Interharmony International Music Festival in Hinterzarten, Germany; Arcidosso, Italy; and Sulzbach-Rosenberg, Germany.