Kirill Gerstein

Kirill Gerstein’s heritage combines the traditions of Russian, American and Central European music-making with an insatiable curiosity. These qualities and the relationships that he has developed with orchestras, conductors, instrumentalists, singers and composers, have led him to explore a huge spectrum of repertoire both new and old. From Bach to Adès, Gerstein’s playing is distinguished by its clarity of expression, discerning intelligence and virtuosity, and an energetic, imaginative musical presence that places him at the top of his profession.

Born in the former Soviet Union, Gerstein is an American citizen based in Berlin. His career is similarly international, with solo and concerto engagements taking him across Europe and the United States, to China and Australia. Highlights of the new season include the launch of Gerstein’s Helsinki Philharmonic Artist-in-Residence season with both Brahms’ Piano Concertos played in one evening under John Storgårds; performances of Schumann’s Piano Concerto at home and in Vienna’s Musikverein with Sakari Oramo and the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic; and a return to the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra for music by Ravel and Busoni conducted by Susanna Mälkki. In recital, Gerstein will present the twelve études of Debussy and twelve Transcendental Études of Liszt at Berlin’s Pierre Boulez Saal as well as on tour in Japan, Portugal and Belgium. With close colleagues Tabea Zimmermann and the Hagen Quartett, he will be heard at London’s Wigmore Hall, the Berliner Philharmonie and Vienna’s Konzerthaus.

Over the last year, Gerstein’s decade long relationship with Thomas Adès came to the fore with the world and European premières of Adès’s Concerto for Piano and Orchestra written especially for Gerstein. Deutsche Grammophon’s world première live recording release of the new work captured in Boston – nominated for three 2021 GRAMMY Awards – was followed shortly by Gerstein’s own release on myrios classics of Adès compositions, recently announced winner of a 2021 International Classical Music Award. Alongside further premières of the Piano Concerto over the 2020-21 season in Vienna, Seoul, Hamburg and Chicago, Gerstein will this season première another new concerto written especially for him, this time by Thomas Larcher. Co-commissioned by the Berlin, Czech and Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestras and Vienna Konzerthaus, Gerstein will present Larcher’s new work first in Prague, Vienna and Bratislava with Semyon Bychkov and the Czech Philharmonic; and then at Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw with the Karina Canellakis and the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic. Gerstein has worked with Bychkov since 2007, and, in addition to making his debuts with the Berlin Philharmonic, Vienna Philharmonic and Royal Concertgebouw under Bychkov’s baton, was invited by the conductor to record Tchaikovsky’s three Piano Concertos live in Prague with the Czech Philharmonic as part of their Tchaikovsky Project boxset released by Decca Classics. For the start of the Royal Concertgebouw’s new season this autumn, Gerstein will once again join Bychkov for Shostakovich’s First Piano Concerto.