CAL PERFORMANCES PRESENTS PROGRAM
Sunday, February 12, 2012, 3pm Robert Schumann (1810–1856) Carnaval, Op. 9 (1834–1835) Hertz Hall Préambule — Pierrot — Arlequin — Valse noble — Eusebius — Florestan — Coquette — Réplique — (Sphinxes) — Papillons — Lettres dansantes — Kirill Gerstein, piano Chiarina — Chopin — Estrella — Reconnaissance — Pantalon et Columbine — Valse allemande — Intermezzo: Paganini — Aveu — Promenade — Pause — PROGRAM Marche des Davidsbündler contre les Philistins
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750) English Suite No. 6 in D minor, bwv 811 Prélude Funded by the Koret Foundation, this performance is part of Cal Performances’ Allemande 2011–2012 Koret Recital Series, which brings world-class artists to our community. Courante Sarabande and Double Cal Performances’ 2011–2012 season is sponsored by Wells Fargo. Gavotte I — Gavotte II — Gavotte I Gigue
Ferruccio Busoni (1866–1924) From An die Jugend (1909) Giga, Bolero e Variazione (Study after Mozart)
Oliver Knussen (b. 1952) Ophelia’s Last Dance (2009–2010) Commissioned for Kirill Gerstein by the Gilmore International Keyboard Festival.
Carl Maria von Weber (1786–1826) Invitation to the Dance, Op. 65 (1819)
INTERMISSION
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Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750) conjecture: “Between the Anglo-Hanoverian achieved the dignified manner in which it was ambassador was unable to offer aid to a citizen English Suite No. 6 in D minor, BWV 811 court [of England] and the petty German prin- known to Bach by 1700. Bach’s example here ex- of a hostile nation. He had little choice but to cipalities, conventions were not infrequent. A ists with a “Double,” or variation, for each of its move to neutral Switzerland, where he waited From 1717 to 1723, Bach was director of music military commission perhaps visited Cöthen, two strains. Next comes a delightful pair (one out the war in Zurich. Though he had earlier at the court of Anhalt-Cöthen, north of Leipzig. was entertained by the Prince, and received from minor, one major) of Gavottes, a dance of mod- regarded Switzerland as something of a cultural He liked his job. His employer, Prince Leopold, his Kapellmeister the compliment of a compo- erate liveliness whose ancestry traces to French backwater, Busoni liked Zurich and he devel- was a well-educated man, 24 years old at the sition specially dedicated.” To further honor peasant music. The closing Gigue was derived oped rewarding associations there among both time he engaged Bach. (Bach was 32.) Leopold this hypothetical British dedicatee, Bach bor- from an English folk dance, and became popu- the Swiss and the many refugees who made the was fond of travel and books and paintings, but rowed for the Gigue of the First Suite a theme by lar as the model for instrumental compositions city an international haven. In Switzerland, he his real passion was music. (Reports had it that Charles Dieupart, then one of the most popular by French, German and Italian musicians when conducted, gave recitals, read voraciously, ac- Leopold spent a whopping 20 percent of the harpsichordists in London. TheBrandenburg it migrated to the Continent. quired as a companion a St. Bernard dog (which court’s annual budget on his musical establish- Concertos followed a not dissimilar gestation, he named “Giotto”), and composed, most no- ment.) The Prince was an accomplished musi- when Bach collected together six of his finest tably the one-act opera Arlecchino, premiered in cian who not only played violin, viola da gamba concerted pieces and sent them to Christian Ferruccio Busoni (1866–1924) Zurich with good success on May 11, 1917. He and harpsichord well enough to join with the Ludwig, Margrave of Brandenburg, who was a Giga, Bolero e Variazione (Study after Mozart), came to be regarded locally with such high re- professionals in his household orchestra, but he guest at Cöthen in 1718. from An die Jugend (“For the Youth”) gard that the University of Zurich conferred an also had an exceptional bass voice. He started the The English Suites, works of imposing scale honorary Doctorate of Philosophy degree upon court musical establishment in 1707 with three and expansive expression, adopt the convention- Composed in 1909. Premiered on October 16, 1909, him in July 1919. He considered making the city players (his puritanical father had no use for al Baroque model for the form: a large opening in London by the composer. his permanent residence, but a lucrative appoint- music), and by the time of Bach’s appointment, movement followed by a series of stylized danc- ment to the faculty of the Prussian Academy of the ensemble had grown to nearly 20 perform- es. Each of the Suites (except No. 1) begins with Ferruccio Busoni was perhaps the most cosmo- Arts the following year lured him back to Berlin, ers equipped with a fine set of instruments. It a Prélude in quick tempo employing the ritornel- politan musician of the early 20th century. The where he lived until his death in 1924. was for these musicians that Bach wrote many of lo form (orchestral refrain with solo episodes) of son of an Italian virtuoso clarinetist father and Busoni codified his progressive views on his outstanding instrumental works, including the Italian concerto. In the D minor Suite, this a German pianist mother (he was fluent in both the cultural and stylistic evolution of the art in the Brandenburg Concertos, Orchestral Suites, music is prefaced by a stately introduction. Bach Italian and German from infancy), Busoni was his Outline of a New Aesthetic of Music of 1907, Violin Concertos and much of his chamber and thereafter followed the standard succession of born in 1866 near Florence, raised in Austria, which British critic and music scholar Richard keyboard music. Leopold appreciated Bach’s ge- dances, established in German practice with the studied in Leipzig, taught in Helsinki (where his Whitehouse characterized as “a then-controver- nius, and Bach returned the compliment when works of Johann Jakob Froberger around 1650: students included Jean Sibelius) and Moscow sial manifesto for the continuing development he said of his Prince, “He loved music, he was Allemande, Courante, Sarabande, Gigue. An ad- (where he married the daughter of a Swedish of musical creativity in a future of unlimited well acquainted with it, he understood it.” ditional dance of differing character Bourrée( , sculptor) and Bologna and Weimar and Boston possibility, a future to be achieved not by dis- The six English Suites were probably com- Gavotte, Passepied, Menuet) is inserted before and New York, toured extensively in Europe owning the past but by rendering its essential posed at Cöthen, though ideas and perhaps even the Gigue. The moderately paced Allemande, and America, and chose Berlin as his residence. qualities anew, as a catalyst to composition in complete movements for them may date from if its French name is to be trusted, originated Such internationalism, coupled with his prob- the present.” Busoni distilled his objective in as early as 1715, when Bach was serving as or- in Germany in the 16th century. French com- ing intellectualism, gave Busoni a breadth of the visionary quotation from his own libretto ganist and chamber musician to Duke Wilhelm posers found it useful for displaying their most vision as composer, conductor and pianist that for the 1905 opera Der Mächtige Zauberer (“The Ernst of Weimar. (It is from the early Weimar elaborate keyboard ornamentations, and passed few musicians of his time could match, but it Mighty Sorcerer”) that he placed at the head period [1708–1717] that most of Bach’s organ it back to German musicians in that highly also meant that he was something of an outsider of the treatise: “I want to attain the unknown! works date.) The origin of the English Suites’ decorated form. The Courante was an old court everywhere, not unequivocally belonging to any What I already know is boundless. But I want name is unknown. An early copy of the First dance genre accompanied by jumping motions single land. He therefore became a man with- to go even further. The final word still eludes Suite (none of the composer’s autographs sur- that was frequently paired with the smoothly out a comfortable country during World War I, me.” Nurturing future generations of musicians vive) bears the words, “Fait pour les Anglois” flowing Allemande. When the Sarabande emi- since the Germans regarded him as a foreigner was a fundamental element in Busoni’s philoso- (“Made for the English”), though this designa- grated to Spain from its birthplace in Mexico living in Berlin (despite his having resided there phy, and to that end he created four small vol- tion does not appear to have originated with in the 16th century, it was so wild in its mo- for almost two decades) and the Italians felt umes of pieces for solo piano in the summer of Bach. Johann Nikolaus Forkel, in the first bi- tions and so lascivious in its implications that that he had long since abandoned the country 1909 that seek to synthesize past and present as ography of the composer (1802), speculated that Cervantes ridiculed it and Philip II suppressed of his birth. When he approached the German a vector for future developments. He titled them these works were created “for an Englishman it. The dance became considerably more tame Embassy in Washington, D.C., about arranging collectively An die Jugend (“To the Youth”). of rank.” In 1933, Charles Sanford Terry made when it was taken over into French and English concerts or finding a teaching post in America, Volume I (Preludietto, Fughetta ed Escercizio), a further pleasing but entirely unconfirmed music during the following century, and it had he was coldly refused with the excuse that the original with Busoni, couches its avant-garde
12 CAL PERFORMANCES CAL PERFORMANCES 13 PROGRAM NOTES PROGRAM NOTES harmonic language in the venerable forms of Grant Memorial Composition Prize in 1971. of these evolved into the ensemble piece Ophelia by Chopin and others.) In its organization, the the baroque; Volume II (Preludio, Fuga e Fuga Knussen’s creative catalog includes three sym- Dances, Book 1 (1975), but not this one—which Invitation to the Dance is a compact, continuous figurata) is a study based on the D major Prelude phonies, concertos for horn and violin, several nonetheless continued to haunt me from time suite of waltz melodies pleasingly balanced in and Fugue from Book I of Bach’s The Well- orchestral works, a Requiem (in memory of his to time over the years. After the death of Sue tempo, character and key in which the opening Tempered Clavier; Volume IV (Introduzione e wife, who died of a blood infection in 2003), Knussen [the composer’s wife] in March 2003, strain returns, in the manner of a rondo, to but- Capriccio [Paganinesco]; Epilogo) draws its the- songs (among which is the Vocalise with Songs it strongly reminded me of happier times and tress the form (Weber subtitled the piece Rondo matic substance from the Caprices Nos. 11 and of Winnie-the-Pooh), chamber pieces, piano eventually, on the occasion of Paul Crossley’s Brillante); thoughtful passages at beginning and 15 by Nicolò Paganini. Volume III of An die compositions and the companion fantasy op- 60th birthday recital in 2004, I decided to give end serve as the expressive frame for the prin- Jugend (Giga, Bolero e Variazione), a “Study after eras based on texts by noted children’s author it a tiny frame of its own so it could be shared cipal waltz section. In its mood, the composi- Mozart,” begins with an almost literal transcrip- Maurice Sendak, Where the Wild Things Are and with listeners other than the one in my head. tion evokes subtleties of emotion that had been tion of Mozart’s imitative Eine kleine Gigue in Higglety Pigglety Pop!. Knussen has also pursued “It still remained a fragment at that time, little broached in earlier music in dance idioms. G major, K. 574, which he composed in April an active career as a conductor, appearing fre- because although the melody will never find the The style and structure of the Invitation to the 1789 during a visit to Leipzig to meet Friedrich quently with the London Sinfonietta and the form for which it was originally conceived, the Dance established the plan that served as the Doles, an aging pupil of Sebastian Bach and his Philharmonia Orchestra, and guest conducting new frame suggested the possibility of continu- model for the wondrous flood of waltzes pro- successor as Kantor at the Thomaskirche. The widely in Europe, Japan, Australia and America; ing the dance in various ways. The present work duced by Josef Lanner, the Strauss clan and even next section is a free treatment of the courtly he has led more than 200 world and local pre- (written at my home in Suffolk in 2009–2010) Maurice Ravel (La Valse) during the following Fandango from Act III of The Marriage of Figaro, mieres. He served as Principal Guest Conductor is the result, in which a number of other ‘home- century. “Weber was the first founder of the with a reference in the bass near the end to the of The Hague’s Het Residentie Orkest from 1992 less’ dance-fragments—related more by history dance-music expressive of deep feeling,” wrote theme of the Giga. The brief closing Variazione, to 1996, the Aldeburgh Festival’s Co-Artistic and mood than by anything more concrete—are the 19th-century scholar Wilhelm Riehl. “He which follows without pause, takes a metrically Director from 1983 to 1998, and the London bound together by means of variously wrought showed how profoundly he was imbued with transformed version of the Giga subject as its Sinfonietta’s Music Director from 1998 to 2002; transitions to and from rondo-like recurrences the spirit of the age. This composition has deep thematic material. he is now the Sinfonietta’s Conductor Laureate. of the original melody.” historical significance.” He has also been Composer-in-Residence with Though the Invitation to the Dance may be the Philharmonia Orchestra, Co-Coordinator of heard simply as a brilliant evocation of the 19th- Oliver Knussen (b. 1952) Contemporary Music Activities at Tanglewood, Carl Maria von Weber (1786–1826) century’s most popular dance form, the compos- Ophelia’s Last Dance Artist-in-Association with the Birmingham Invitation to the Dance, Op. 65 er provided the following scenario to elucidate Contemporary Music Group, and holder of the relationship of the slow introduction and Composed in 2009–2010. Premiered on May 3, the Elise L. Stoeger Composer’s Chair with Composed in 1819. postlude of the work to its lilting main central 2010, in Kalamazoo, Michigan by Kirill Gerstein. the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. section: “First approach of the dancer to whom Knussen’s many awards include Honorary The mania for the waltz first spread across Europe the lady gives an evasive answer. His more press- Oliver Knussen is one of today’s leading British Memberships in the American Academy of Arts when the delegates to the Congress of Vienna re- ing invitation; her acceptance of his request. musicians. Born on June 12, 1952, in Glasgow and Letters and the Royal Philharmonic Society, turned home from that music-mad city in 1814. Now they converse in greater detail; he begins; into a musical family (his father was Stuart honorary doctorates from the Royal Scottish A motley of Ländler, German Dances and origi- she answers him with heightened expression; she Knussen, Principal Double Bassist of the Academy of Music and Drama and Birmingham nal waltz melodies was used to accompany the responds more warmly; now for the dance! His London Symphony Orchestra for many years), City University, the 2004 Association of British newly popular dance, and Schubert, Hummel remarks concerning it; her answer; their com- he showed a remarkable precocity that recalls Orchestras Award, and the 2006 Michael and even Beethoven devised some delightful tri- ing together; their going forward; expectation the early maturation of Benjamin Britten, play- Ludwig Nemmers Prize from Northwestern ple-meter confections that would not have been of the beginning of the dance. The Dance. End: ing piano very young and composing by the age University. He was made a Commander of the out of place in the ballroom. The first important his thanks, her reply and their parting. Silence.” of six. On April 7, 1968, when he was 15, he con- Order of the British Empire (C.B.E.) in 1994. step in elevating the waltz into a concert vehicle, ducted the London Symphony in the premiere Ophelia’s Last Dance was commissioned by however, was taken by that pioneer of German of his own First Symphony, and led the work the Gilmore International Keyboard Festival musical Romanticism, Carl Maria von Weber, Robert Schumann (1810–1856) again later that year in New York’s Carnegie for 2010 Gilmore Artist Kirill Gerstein, who with his infectious Invitation to the Dance, com- Carnaval, Op. 9 Hall. He attended the Central Tutorial School premiered the work at the Festival on May 3, posed for piano during the summer of 1819, for Young Musicians in London as a composi- 2010, in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Knussen wrote, when he was easing his way back into creative Composed in 1834–1835. tion student of John Lambert from 1963 to “Ophelia’s Last Dance is based on a melody dat- work after a difficult period of ill health and be- 1969, and from 1970 to 1973 studied on fel- ing from early in 1974, which was among sev- reavement. (The Polacca Brillante for piano that Early in 1834, Baron von Fricken of Asch in lowship with Gunther Schuller at Tanglewood, eral ideas intended for—but ultimately excluded he wrote at the same time also proved to be his- Bohemia heard little Clara Wieck play a recital where his Second Symphony won the Margaret from—my Third Symphony (1973–1979). Some torically significant as the model for later works in Plauen. So impressed was the Baron with the
14 CAL PERFORMANCES CAL PERFORMANCES 15 PROGRAM NOTES PROGRAM NOTES results of Papa Friedrich Wieck’s method of Franz Liszt assessed as “one of the greatest works Pierrot, stolid and hesitant, and Arlequin, coy A general Promenade for all the dancers piano tutelage that he determined to send his I know.” Carnaval was conceived in the heat and mocking, descend from the stage of the and a breathless Pause, borrowed from an epi- daughter, Ernestine, to Leipzig to study with of Schumann’s ardor for Ernestine during the French pantomime to join the fête. TheValse sode in the Préambule, lead to the grand finale the noted pedagogue. Ernestine duly presented summer of 1834, but not completed until, ap- noble is an elegant realization of the dance form of Carnaval, the March of the League of David herself as a student and boarder at the Wieck propriately, carnival season the following winter, that was still considered deliciously risqué in Against the Philistines. During the early 1830s, household in April, and immediately became by which time his affection had swung round the 1830s. Schumann next introduces himself before his infatuation with Clara had settled acquainted with Robert Schumann, the gifted to Clara. Part of the inspiration for Carnaval with the contrasting elements of his personality: fully upon him, Schumann found companion- 24-year-old pianist, composer and writer who came from the coincidence that each letter of Eusebius, dreamy and romantic, and Florestan, ship in a group of fellow admirers of Jean Paul was Wieck’s chief protégé at the time. When Ernestine’s hometown—Asch—had a musi- impetuous and mercurial. Coquette, flirtatious and E.T.A. Hoffmann, who banded themselves Fricken inquired about Schumann, he was told cal equivalent in traditional German notation: and teasing, draws a reply (Réplique) from a suit- together into the Davidsbund—the League of by Wieck, “There is no limit to the number of A–E-flat (Es)–C–B-natural (H). This succession or or imitator. Papillons (“Butterflies”) evokes David—to do battle against the enemies of all things I could write you about this rather fan- of pitches offered Schumann a theme of sorts the nattily dressed single men whose dancing true art, the “Philistines.” The principal weapon tastic person; headstrong he may be, but also that became the seed from which the individ- is more enthusiastic than graceful. Schumann of these would-be warriors of artistic rectitude noble, splendid, enthusiastic, wonderfully gift- ual movements grew as free variations. He was grouped his portraits of Ernestine (A.S.C.H.— was the pen, and to further their aims they es- ed, highly cultured and a writer and musician of fond of cryptic musical messages (his Op. 1, the S.C.H.A., her hometown and the letters of his tablished the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik (“New genius.” Ernestine, then 17, also found much to Abegg Variations, took as its subject the letters of name that could be rendered musically) and Journal for Music”) in 1833, and issued the first admire about the dashing Robert, an affection a friend’s name), and he devised permutations Clara (Chiarina) together. The awkward, grace- number on April 3, 1834. The purpose of the returned by Schumann, who had been advised that juggled the order of the notes and allowed note treatment of Ernestine’s movement leaves periodical was to stem the rising tide of empty by his physician that to fully recover from his the inclusion of A-flat (As) as an alternative to little doubt that by the time he wrote this mu- virtuoso pieces and simple Biedermeier musical nervous breakdown of the previous year, “You the A–E-flat leading. He inserted these tiny sic, his affection had shifted to Clara, whom he confections for home consumption while cham- need a wife. Medicine is no good here.” In July, collections of pitches in unplayably long notes portrays with the most impassioned episode in pioning the works of the great Classicists and Schumann described to his mother in Zwickau between the eighth and ninth movements of the entire work. A piece of luxuriant counter- the emerging generation of young Romantics, the many virtues of Ernestine, and then con- Carnaval (they are not usually performed), and feit Chopin follows. (Chopin resented having his including Chopin, Berlioz, Mendelssohn and, fided that she was “just such a one as I might labeled them “Sphinxes,” a term he borrowed name and style borrowed by Schumann, and of course, Schumann. Schumann took over wish to have for a wife.” The affair proved se- from the title of a poem by Jean Paul, his favorite could find nothing better to say aboutCarnaval the editorship of the journal soon after it was rious enough that he presented Ernestine with author, called Love, a Sphinx. “Not since the bass than that he “enjoyed the charming mise-en- founded, and became one of the most impor- a ring in September and presumably proposed theme of the Eroica have four notes yielded such scène.”) Schumann bids a rather curt farewell tant and respected music critics in Europe dur- marriage, though the engagement was never a vast canvas of ideas,” wrote Bálint Vázsonyi. to Ernestine in the darkly colored waltz titled ing his decade in that position. This closing announced publicly. The following month, her The 21 movements ofCarnaval , “Vignettes on Estrella. The composer described Reconnaissance March flies in the face of convention with its course of study with Wieck apparently com- Four Notes,” as the composer subtitled them, de- as “a lovers’ meeting.” The commedia dell’arte triple meter, and portrays the League’s enemies pleted, Ernestine was summoned back to Asch pict characters at a masked ball, some real, some figure Pantalon is usually a gullible old mer- with the Grandfather Dance, a mundane 17th- by the Baron. In the wake of her departure, stock figures from the pantomime and comme- chant who is deceived in amorous matters, century German tune traditionally used to sig- Schumann’s ardor began to cool, and it was fur- dia dell’arte, though Schumann admitted to the perhaps, this time, by the sweet-tongued but nal the conclusion of an evening’s festivities. The ther chilled when he learned that the girl was pianist Ignaz Moscheles that he added the titles sly Columbine. The Valse Allemande (“German Préambule is again recalled to close this musical not Fricken’s daughter but rather his ward. This only after the music was completed. Carnaval is Waltz”) is interrupted by a brilliant reminis- sortie against the Philistines with total victory amatory adventure was pretty well spent by the a quintessential document of Romanticism— cence of Paganini, whose dazzling Caprices for the forces of Schumann. end of the year, when Schumann began to turn colorful, evocative, virtuosic, varied, melodious, Schumann arranged for piano as his Opp. 3 and his attention to Clara Wieck, with whom he was daring, stirring. It is the first music in which 10. Aveu is a tender avowal of love. © 2012 Dr. Richard E. Rodda to create one of the great love stories of the 19th Schumann’s full genius blossomed, and the century. He remained friends with Ernestine, work which offers the most rounded view of him however, and dedicated to her the Allegro for as creator, musician and person. “The more one Piano, Op. 8, and the Three Songs, Op. 31. penetrates Schumann’s ideas, the more power Schumann’s brief fling with Ernestine von and vitality one finds in them,” wrote Liszt. Fricken helped to inspire two of the most impor- “The more one studies them, the more one is as- tant piano compositions of his early years: the tonished by their richness and fertility.” Symphonic Etudes, a splendid set of variations he Carnaval begins with a heraldic Préambule erected upon a theme composed by Baron von in the manner of a fanfare, the only one of the Fricken; and Carnaval, which the redoubtable movements not based on the ASCH theme.
16 CAL PERFORMANCES CAL PERFORMANCES 17 ABOUT THE ARTIST ABOUT THE ARTIST
Mr. Gerstein’s recent engagements in North attend the Berklee College of Music. However, America include performances with the Los he also continued working on the classical pia- Angeles Philharmonic, Cleveland Orchestra, no repertoire. Following his second summer at and the Chicago, Atlanta, St. Louis, Dallas, the Boston University program at Tanglewood, Indianapolis, Baltimore, Milwaukee and he decided to focus mainly on classical mu- Vancouver symphonies; festival appearances at sic and moved to New York City to attend the Chicago’s Grant Park, the Mann Music Center Manhattan School of Music, where he studied and Saratoga with the Philadelphia Orchestra, with Solomon Mikowsky and earned Bachelor Tanglewood with the Boston Symphony and Master of Music degrees. He continued his and Blossom with the Cleveland Orchestra; studies with Dmitri Bashkirov in Madrid and and recitals in Boston, New York’s Town Ferenc Rados in Budapest. Hall, Cincinnati, Detroit and Washington’s Mr. Gerstein was awarded First Prize at the Kennedy Center. 2001 Arthur Rubinstein Piano Competition Internationally, Mr. Gerstein has worked in Tel Aviv, received a 2002 Gilmore Young with such prominent European orchestras as the Artist Award, and was chosen as Carnegie Hall’s Munich, Rotterdam and Royal philharmonics, “Rising Star” for the 2005–2006 season. He be- London’s Philharmonia, the City of Birmingham came an American citizen in 2003 and is current- Marco Borrgreve Marco Symphony Orchestra, Staatskappelle Dresden, ly a professor of piano at the Musikhochschule ussian pianist kirill gerstein has Zurich Tonhalle, the Finnish and Swedish radio in Stuttgart. Rquickly proven to be one of today’s most orchestras, WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne Kirill Gerstein appears by arrangement with intriguing young musicians. His masterful and the Deutsches Symphonie Orchester Berlin, CM Artists. His recordings are available on the technique, musical curiosity and probing inter- as well as with the NHK Symphony Orchestra in Myrios Classics label. pretations have led to explorations of classical Tokyo and the Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra music and jazz, advanced degrees by age 20, a in Caracas with Gustavo Dudamel. He has also professorship in piano by age 27, and a full per- performed recitals in Paris, Prague, Hamburg, formance schedule at the world’s major music London’s Queen Elizabeth Hall and at the Liszt centers and festivals. Academy in Budapest. He made his Salzburg In January 2010, Mr. Gerstein was named Festival debut playing solo and two-piano works the recipient of the 2010 Gilmore Artist Award. with András Schiff, and he has also appeared Only the sixth pianist to have been so honored, at the Verbier, Lucerne and Jerusalem chamber the Gilmore Award is made to an exceptional music festivals. pianist who, regardless of age or nationality, Named one of the ten best recordings of possesses broad and profound musicianship and 2010 by The New York Times, his first record- charisma and who desires and can sustain a ca- ing for Myrios Classics of recital works by reer as a major international concert artist. He Schumann, Liszt and Oliver Knussen was re- was also honored by being awarded a 2010 Avery leased in October 2010, following by a duo re- Fisher Career Grant in April 2010. cital disc with Tabea Zimmermann. In March Highlights of Mr. Gerstein’s 2011–2012 2012, he records Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue in season include debuts with the New York its original jazz-band version with students and Philharmonic and Seattle Symphony and at faculty members at the Berklee College of Music the Aspen Music Festival and London’s Proms; in Boston. re-engagements with San Francisco, Detroit Born in 1979 in Voronezh, Russia, Kirill and Atlanta symphonies, as well as with the Gerstein attended one of the country’s special St. Paul Chamber Orchestra; a three-week music schools for gifted children and taught Rachmaninoff concerto cycle with the Houston himself to play jazz by listening to his parents’ Symphony; and recitals at Cal Performances, extensive record collection. He came to the New York’s 92nd St. Y, London’s Wigmore Hall, United States at age 14 to continue his studies and in Vancouver, Miami and Sarasota. in jazz piano as the youngest student ever to
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