Radu Lupu
Pianist
Born
in Rumania, Radu Lupu started piano lessons with Lia Busuioceanu at the age of
6. At the age of 12 he made his
public debut with a complete programme of his own music.
He continued his studies for several years with Florica Muzicescu and
Cella Delavrancea before winning a scholarship in 1961 to the Moscow
Conservatoire where he studied with Galina Eghyazarova, Heinrich Neuhaus and
later with Stanislav Neuhaus. He won
first prize in three competitions: the
1966 Van Cliburn, the 1967 Enescu International, and the 1969 Leeds
International.
Mr
Lupu has performed with all the great orchestras of the world, including the
Berlin Philharmonic (with whom he made his Salzburg Festival debut in 1978 with
Karajan), the Vienna Philharmonic (with whom he opened the 1986 Salzburg
Festival with Muti), the Royal Concertgebouw, all the major London orchestras,
and all the great American orchestras. In the USA his first significant
appearances were in 1972 with the Cleveland Orchestra and Barenboim in New York,
and with the Chicago Symphony and Giulini. He has played at most of the notable
music festivals and has been a regular guest at the Salzburg and Lucerne
Festivals.
His
recordings for Decca include the Beethoven Piano Concertos, Brahms Concerto No
1, Grieg and Schumann Concertos, the complete Mozart Violin and Piano Sonatas
with Szymon Goldberg, Debussy and Franck Violin and Piano Sonatas with Kyung Wha
Chung, and solo works by Beethoven, Brahms, Schumann and Schubert. In 1995 he
won 2 awards in the category “Best Instrumental Record of the Year”: a
Grammy for Schubert’s Sonatas in A major D664 and B flat major D960, and an
Edison Award for Schumann’s Kinderszenen, Kreisleriana and Humoresque. He has
also made two records with Murray Perahia (CBS), two albums of Schubert Lieder
with Barbara Hendricks (EMI), and a disc of pieces for four hands by Schubert
with Daniel Barenboim (Teldec).
In
the 2012/13 season Mr Lupu’s concerto engagements will include the London
Symphony Orchestra and Sir Colin Davis (for his 85th birthday
celebrations), the Luxemburg Orchestra (Emanuel Krivine), Santa Cecilia
Orchestra (David Afkham), Chicago Symphony (Riccardo Muti), St Louis Symphony
(David Robertson), Boston Symphony (Christoph von Dohnanyi), Orchestre de Paris
(Thomas Hengelbrock), Berlin RSB (Marek Janowski), and the Mozart Orchestra
Bologna (Claudio Abbado). He will
continue his cycle of the Beethoven Piano Concertos at the new concert hall in
Helsinki with the Finnish Chamber Orchestra (Jukka-Pekka Saraste).
His recitals will include Paris,
Geneva, Genova, Turin, several cities in the US including New York’s Carnegie
Hall, Aix-en-Provence, Vicenza, and the Brescia and Bergamo Festival.
He will undertake his 10th tour of Japan, and will also perform in Seoul,
Korea.
In 2006 Mr Lupu was presented with 2 awards: the Premio Internazionale Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli, and, for a second time, the Abbiati prize (conferred by the Italian Critics’ Association). He had previously won this in 1989.