Pianist Vonsattel debuts at London’s Wigmore Hall

Pianist Gilles Vonsattel, assistant professor of Music, made his debut recital at London’s Wigmore Hall on April 5, performing music by Holliger, Ravel, Honegger and Beethoven.

 

Reviewing the recital on the website Classical Source, Peter Reed wrote, “The Sonatine was remarkable for its poise and elusive lyricism, and Gaspard de la Nuit was hugely impressive. Vonsattel’s fluid technique delivered an awesome command of tonal and emotional range that activated a total identification with the three pieces’ vivid pictures – a wonderfully veiled ‘Ondine,’ an impassive and implacable ‘Le gibet’ in which Vonsattel’s subtly limited palette was put to fine expressive use, and a triumphantly scuttling ‘Scarbo.’” 

 

During his time in London, Vonsattel also gave a performance and interview on the radio show “BBC In Tune” with host Sean Raafferty. The show can be heard online through April 12 via the following link (Vonsattel part begins at 49:25).

 

Winner of a 2008 Avery Fisher Career Grant, Swiss-born Vonsattel is an artist of uncommon breadth. He began touring after capturing the top prize at the prestigious 2002 Naumburg International Piano Competition. He made his Alice Tully Hall debut that same year and has since performed with the Warsaw Philharmonic; at Zürich’s Tonhalle, Warsaw’s Chopin Festival, and Tokyo’s Opera City Hall; and in the U.S. with the Utah, Santa Fe, Nashville and Grand Rapids symphonies and the Boston Pops Orchestra. In 2010, he made his Boston Symphony Orchestra and Tanglewood debuts in the Brahms First Piano Concerto under Herbert Blomstedt, and in 2011 he made his San Francisco Symphony debut.  

 

A former member of the Chamber Music Society Two, Vonsattel is an artist member of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center for the 2012-13 season.

 

His recent recitals include performances at the Library of Congress, the Gilmore, La Roque d’Anthéron, Musée d'Orsay, Davos Festival, Warsaw’s National Philharmonic Hall, La Jolla Music Society, the Munich Gasteig and Atlanta’s Spivey Hall.

 

The top prize winner at the 2006 Geneva International Music Competition, Vonsattel was a laureate of the 2009 Honens International Piano Competition in Calgary and is also a laureate of the Cleveland and Dublin piano competitions. He has been heard frequently on NPR’s “Performance Today,” Radio France Musique, CBC, ARD, and the BBC.

 

Vonsattel’s recording of Liszt solo works and Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 1 with L’Orchestre de Chambre de Genève was released in 2007 on the Pan Classics label to critical acclaim. His recording of Bartók’s Contrasts on Deutsche Grammophon with members of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center is available for download on iTunes. In 2011, a new recording was released on the Honens label featuring the music of Ravel, Debussy, Honegger, and Holliger.



 

After studying with pianist David Deveau in Boston, Vonsattel received his B.A. in political science and economics from Columbia University and his M.M. from The Juilliard School, where he worked with Jerome Lowenthal. He joined the Music and Dance faculty in 2010.