Francesco Piemontesi is a pianist of exceptional refinement of expression, which is allied to a consummate technical skill. Widely renowned for his interpretation of Mozart and the early Romantic repertoire, Piemontesi’s pianism and sensibility has a close affinity too with the later 19th century and 20th century repertoire of Brahms, Liszt, Dvořák, Ravel, Debussy, Bartók and beyond. Of one of his great teachers and mentors, Alfred Brendel, Piemontesi says that Brendel taught him “to love the detail of things”.
The 2024/25 season leads the “Wizard of Sound” (Neue Zürcher Zeitung) to orchestras such as Chicago, Cleveland, Pittsburgh and San Francisco symphony orchestras, Oslo and Helsinki philharmonics, Orchestre National de France, HR-Sinfonieorchester, Filarmonica della Scala and l’Orchestra Sinfónica della RAI. Praised by Sir Antonio Pappano for the “wonderful combination of head and heart in his playing”, Piemontesi returns to the Orchestra Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia for concerts in Rome and on tour with Gianandrea Noseda, and brings Brahms’s towering second piano concerto to NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester and Leipzig Gewandhausorchester with Manfred Honeck. He reunites with the Budapest Festival Orchestra and Robin Ticciati, and also with Ticciati, he performs Schumann’s piano concerto – the first significant piano concerto of early Romanticism – on tour with the London Philharmonic. In recital, Piemontesi delivers pure piano poetry to Rudolfinum Prague, Tonhalle Zürich, Lyon, Valladolid and Alicante, as well as to the Wigmore Hall, where he was celebrated for the Mozart Odyssey of complete piano sonatas performed throughout previous seasons. He also collaborates with Augustin Hadelich in recitals across Europe, weaving the sonatas for violin and piano of Debussy, Poulenc and Franck with works by de Grigny, Rameau and Kurtág.
Piemontesi appears alongside the world’s leading orchestras from the Berliner Philharmoniker to the New York Philharmonic and from London to NHK Symphony Orchestras and is regular guest at festivals such as the Salzburg, Lucerne, Schleswig-Holstein Musk festivals, as well as the BBC Proms. Recent highlights include appearances with the Boston Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, Chicago Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Israel Philharmonic, Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, Swedish and Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestras, St Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestre de Paris, Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich. He has performed with conductors such as Vladimir Ashkenazy, Herbert Blomstedt, Karina Canellakis, Ivan Fischer, Fabien Gabel, Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla, Daniel Harding, Manfred Honeck, Marek Janowski, Paavo Järvi, Ton Koopman, Joana Mallwitz, Zubin Mehta, Roger Norrington, Gianandrea Noseda, Thomas Søndergård, and Yuri Temirkanov. As adept on the concerto stage as he is in smaller chamber combinations, Piemontesi appears with a variety of partners including Leif Ove Andsnes, Renaud and Gautier Capuçon, Leonidas Kavakos, Stephen Kovacevich, Heinrich Schiff, Christian Tetzlaff, Jörg Widmann, Tabea Zimmermann, Janine Janssen, Augustin Hadelich and the Emerson Quartet. In the past he has appeared in many prestigious venues including Amsterdam Concertgebouw, Carnegie Hall and David Geffen Hall in New York. He has performed at the Edinburgh, Verbier and Aix-en-Provence Festivals, La Roque d’Anthéron, and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festivals and at New York Mostly Mozart.
The Wall Street Journal commented upon Schubert’s last three sonatas recorded by Piemontesi for Pentatone in 2019: “His deep affinity for the music is evident in the way he captures the ebb and flow of each movement, the pearlescent tone he delivers when appropriate and the abundance of telling details”. Other recordings include a 2022 recording for Pentatone of Ravel’s Piano Concerto, Messiaen’s Oiseaux exotiques and Schönberg’s Piano Concerto with Orchestre de la Suisse Romande as part of his residency there, which was to become the first residency the Orchestra has ever named, Liszt’s Années de Pelerinage for Orfeo, Mozart’s Piano Concertos with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and on Linn. Piemontesi also demonstrated his deep affinity with Debussy’s Impressionist world in his recording of the “Préludes” for Naïve.
Born in Locarno, Francesco Piemontesi studied with Arie Vardi before working with Alfred Brendel, Murray Perahia, Cécile Ousset and Alexis Weissenberg. He rose to international prominence with prizes at several major competitions, including the 2007 Queen Elisabeth Competition. Since 2012, Piemontesi has been the Artistic Director of the Settimane Musicali di Ascona.
