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Pianistic Poetry: Nikolai Lugansky in Recital

22 Feb 2017

Presented by Cultural Management Office, HKU

Sunday, 26 March 2017, 3PM
Grand Hall, Lee Shau Kee Lecture Centre, The University of Hong Kong

“… a pianist who has absolute intellectual control, staggering technical ability, delicate poeticism and a piratical spirit all in magical harmony.” - The Herald

Award-winning pianist Nikolai Lugansky is acclaimed for his elegant virtuosity, blazing energy, artistic refinement, and strikingly individual musicianship. Having just made his highly anticipated debut with the Berliner Philharmoniker, Lugansky will be coming to Hong Kong on 26 March. His interpretation of Tchaikovsky’s The Seasons, hailed by The New York Times for its entrancing mix of ‘roomy expressive freedom’ and ‘textural clarity’ will be presented together with a rich selection of characterful Chopin.

Lugansky was born in Moscow in 1972. At the age of seven, he entered the Central School of Music in Moscow and studied with Tatiana Kestner and then with legendary pianist Tatiana Nikolaeva. Nikolayeva, once said he would become ‘the pianist of tomorrow’, and today he is arguably one of the most influential pianists of his generation.

Winner of the 10^th International Tchaikovsky Competition, Lugansky’s performance ‘blazes with conviction, a propulsion and energy finely complemented with an innate sense of poetry.’ (Gramophone). This sense of poetry makes him a perfect interpreter of Tchaikovsky and Chopin’s music. Please join us on a sensational journey through the seasons, singing with his fingers the music written by the poet of the piano.

Programme
TCHAIKOVSKY     The Seasons, Op. 37b
CHOPIN                Polonaise-fantasie in A-flat major, Op. 61
CHOPIN                Mazurka in B major, Op. 56, No. 1
CHOPIN                Mazurka in D-flat major, Op. 30, No. 3
CHOPIN                Mazurka in A-flat major, Op. 41, No. 4
CHOPIN                Mazurka in C-sharp minor, Op. 50, No. 3
CHOPIN                Barcarolle in F-sharp major, Op. 60
CHOPIN                Ballade No. 4 in F minor, Op. 52

Programme Enquiries
3917 8165 | www.muse.hku.hk

Press Photos Download
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ja27rcoimi5lcp2/AABsSIfpDJSXPwjqhB-o45XPa?dl=0

Tickets are available from URBTIX:
2111 5999 | www.urbtix.hk

Media Enquiries
For more information and interview arrangements, please contact:
Ms June Lui | Manager, Cultural Management Office, HKU
Tel: 3917 7753 | Email: junelch@hku.hk

Biography:
Described by Gramophone as ’the most trailblazing and meteoric performer of all’ Nikolai Lugansky is a pianist of extraordinary depth and versatility.

Concerto highlights for the 2016/17 season include his debuts with both the Berliner Philharmoniker and Wiener Symphoniker; return engagements with the Philharmonia Orchestra, St Petersburg Philharmonic, Orchestre National de France, Philadelphia Orchestra, St Louis Symphony, and the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony. Lugansky continues his cycle of all of Prokofiev’s piano concertos with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra to celebrate the 125^th anniversary of the orchestra and birth of the composer.

Upcoming recital performances include the Alte Oper Frankfurt, London’s Wigmore Hall, Paris’ Théâtre des Champs-Elysées, Geneva, Budapest, the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatoire, and the Great Hall of the St Petersburg Philharmonia. Lugansky regularly appears at some of the world's most distinguished festivals, including in the coming season, La Roque d’Anthéron, Verbier, Tanglewood, and Ravinia.

An award winning recording artist, Nikolai Lugansky’s recital CD featuring Rachmaninov's Piano Sonatas won the Diapason d’Or and an ECHO Klassik Award while his recording of concertos by Grieg and Prokofiev with Kent Nagano and the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin was a Gramophone Editor’s Choice. His earlier recordings have also won a number of awards, including a Diapason d'Or, BBC Music Magazine Award and ECHO Klassik prize. Lugansky’s most recent disc of Schubert C minor sonata and Impromptus D.935 was released in 2016. A new recording of Tchaikovsky’s Grande Sonata and The Seasons is due for release in early 2017.

Lugansky is Artistic Director of the Tambov Rachmaninov Festival and is also a supporter of, and regular performer at, the Rachmaninov Estate and Museum of Ivanovka.

Nikolai Lugansky studied at Moscow’s Central Music School and the Moscow Conservatoire where his teachers included Tatiana Kestner, Tatiana Nikolayeva and Sergei Dorensky. He was awarded the honour of People’s Artist of Russia in April 2013.

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