Pianist Carlo Grante Performs Brahms Variations at Lincoln Center Tonight

Italian pianist Carlo Grante will present the last of three concerts in his series "Masters of High Romanticism" tonight, February 10, 2015, at Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall in New York City. He will devote this concert to variations by Johannes Brahms, including two monumental works in this genre: those on themes by Handel and Paganini.

"In his Variations, we hear the personal, private Brahms," Mr. Grante says, "introspective, intimate, and in conversation with the great composers of the past. Hearing these works in a single evening allows us to follow as Brahms transforms the art of piano writing into a personal language that, while firmly rooted in the classical tradition, reveals a new musical grammar of expressive possibilities.

"I never get tired of playing these works, with their endless invention and variety," he continues. "I like to give each variation its own character, its own 'orchestration,' as if each is one of a group of people, telling his or her own version of a familiar story, the theme. The slow variations, especially, are sublime meditations."

The "Masters of High Romanticism" series is also being presented in Vienna at the Musikverein's Brahms-Saal and in Berlin at the Philharmonie's Kammermusiksaal.

DETAILS:

Carlo Grante, piano

"MASTERS OF HIGH ROMANTICISM"

Alice Tully Hall, Lincoln Center

Broadway and 65th Street, New York, NY 10023

PROGRAM III -- Tuesday, February 10, 2015 at 7:30 p.m.

JOHANNES BRAHMS (1833-1897)

Variations for Piano

Variations on a Hungarian Melody in D major, Op. 21, No. 2 (1854)

Variations on a Theme of Paganini, Op. 35 (1863)

Variations on a Theme of Schumann in F-sharp minor, Op. 9 (1854)

Variations and Fugue on a Theme of Handel, Op. 24 (1861)

TICKETS -- $45, $35, $25

Available at the Alice Tully Hall box office, by calling CenterCharge, 212/721-6500 or at http://lc.lincolncenter.org/shows/210938?show_date=2015-02-10 19:30:00

Program subject to change.

About Carlo Grante - "Carlo Grante is one of the most astonishing artists I have ever known and worked with," says Fabio Luisi, Principal Conductor of the Metropolitan Opera and General Music Director of the Zurich Opera. "A challenging collaborator, his artistry is permeated with the deepest knowledge in many fields, not just the arts. Interesting for me as a musician and conductor is the way he approaches a musical work: considering it as expression of time, environment, and the composer's own personal, social and cultural experience. With Carlo's fantastic technical and analytical skills, the music comes alive in a way which sounds new, sometimes unexpected, but always both logical and natural. Working with Carlo Grante is for me an enrichment in musical experience and understanding, as it is for his audiences."

Carlo Grante is one of the most active pianists performing and recording today. His concert repertoire is one of the largest among contemporary pianists; it includes masterpieces by core composers as well as important works by lesser-known ones. His discography runs to more than fifty CDs and ranges from Domenico Scarlatti (the complete sonatas, a 40-CD project under the auspices of Bösendorfer and Badura-Skoda in Vienna), to Platti, Clementi, Liszt and Schumann, to twentieth-century composers such as Godowsky, Busoni and Sorabji. Recent recordings include works by Vlad (Opus Triplex) and Finnissy (Bachsche Nachdichtungen), both dedicated to Mr. Grante and inspired by Bach and Busoni, and Flynn (Glimpses of our inner lives), also dedicated to him; Franz Schmidt's two piano concertos, with the MDR Leipzig under Fabio Luisi; three Mozart piano concertos with Orchestra of St. Cecilia, and the Concerto K.271, recorded live in Vienna with Concertino Wien; the Busoni Concerto, recorded live in Vienna with the Vienna Symphony under Fabio Luisi; Robert Schumann's three piano sonatas; and works by Debussy, Ravel, Rachmaninov, Bloch, Liszt and Godowsky (whose complete works he is recording). In 1995 Carlo Grante gave the world premiere of 53 Studies on the Études of Chopin by Godowsky at the Newport Festival.

Carlo Grante is one of Europe's foremost concert artists, having performed in such major venues and prestigious halls as the Grosser Saal of the Konzerthaus and the Goldener Saal of the Musikverein in Vienna; Wigmore Hall and Barbican Hall in London; the Sala Santa Cecilia in Rome; Leipzig Gewandhaus; Dresden Semperoper; Stuttgart Opera; and in New York, Chicago, Milan, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Singapore, Hanoi, Zagreb, Bucharest, Lima and Rio de Janeiro. In May 2014 he made his Washington, D.C. debut at the Terrace Theater of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. He has performed at the festivals of Vienna, Istanbul, Husum, Newport, Miami, Tallin, Ravello, and MDR Musiksommer, and the "Neuhaus Festival" in Saratov. He has appeared as soloist with major orchestras including the Dresden Staatskapelle, Royal Philharmonic in London, Vienna Symphony, Orchestra of St. Cecilia, Pomeriggi Musicali di Milano, MDR Leipzig, Capella Istropolitana, Chamber Orchestra of Europe, and Concertino Wien.

In 1996, on the occasion of two recitals at Wigmore Hall in London, the reviewer of Musical Opinion wrote, "the discs of Grante had shown astonishing qualities...his live performances have then proved him to be the first-rate pianist that his discs suggested." In 1997, after a series of six recitals in New York, Bernard Holland of The New York Times wrote, "Carlo Grante...systematically demonstrated technical ability, but it was a prowess that went beyond muscle and speed. Here was not just attractive color but color with a purpose." Eminent author and critic Harold Schonberg said that Grante demonstrated "real, stylish virtuoso playing, nimble and confident, backed by a splendid piano tone. Fingerwork is impeccable...[The] playing has color and imagination."

Mr. Grante's recitals and concerto performances have been greeted with enthusiasm; a reviewer described Grante's Mozart Fantasia as "a small, quiet miracle" (Leipziger Volkszeitung); another dubbed Grante "a knight of the piano, without blemish and without fear..." (Schmidt, Die Presse, Vienna); another praised "Grante's meticulous, thoughtful virtuosity and stylistic insights...like Horowitz, Grante is a master at creating a multicolored portfolio of legato shadings through fingers alone, pedaling ever so discreetly" (Gramophone).

Carlo Grante graduated from the Conservatory S. Cecilia in Rome, studying with Sergio Perticaroli, after which he studied in the U.S. with Ivan Davis at the University of Miami and at The Juilliard School in New York with Rudolf Firkušný; he then studied intensively in London with Alice Kezeradze-Pogorelich.

A Bösendorfer artist, Carlo Grante is also a widely-published writer on the piano literature. He lives in Rome.