Garrick Ohlsson Since winning the 1970 Chopin International Piano Competition, American pianist Garrick Ohlsson has established himself worldwide as a musician of interpretive and technical prowess. He made his Cleveland Orchestra debut in March 1975, and most recently appeared with the Orchestra in October 2010. A native of White Plains, New York, Garrick Ohlsson began piano studies at age 8, attended the Westchester Conservatory of Music, and at 13 entered the Juilliard School. His teachers include Claudio Arrau, Olga Barabini, Sascha Gorodnitzki, Rosina Lhévinne, Tom Lishman, and Irma Wolpe. Among Mr. Ohlsson’s honors are first prizes at the 1966 Busoni Competition and 1968 Montreal Piano Competition, the 1994 Avery Fisher Prize, and the 1998 University Musical Society Distinguished Artist Award in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Regarded as a leading exponent of Chopin, Mr. Ohlsson performed in celebrations of the bicentenary of Chopin’s birthday in 2010, including a gala concert at Chopin’s birth house in Warsaw and all-Chopin recitals in Berkeley, La Jolla, New York, and Seattle. For the bicentenary of Franz Liszt’s birth last season, Garrick Ohlsson played recitals in Chicago, Hong Kong, London, and New York. Garrick Ohlsson commands a repertoire of some eighty concertos. He has appeared as soloist with orchestras throughout the world, including the Deutsche Symphony Berlin, Czech Philharmonic, Halle Orchestra, Russian National Orchestra, Salzburg Mozarteum, Sydney Symphony, and Warsaw Philharmonic, among many others. In recent seasons, his engagements in this country have included concerts with the orchestras of Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Dallas, Houston, New York, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, and San Francisco. In recital, Mr. Ohlsson has presented the music of Scriabin and the composer’s Russian contemporaries in the United States and Europe, and the complete Beethoven piano sonatas at the Ravinia, Tanglewood, and Verbier festivals. As a chamber musician, Garrick Ohlsson’s performances have included collaborations with the Cleveland, Emerson, Takács, and Tokyo string quartets. Along with violinist Jorja Fleezanis and cellist Michael Grebanier, Mr. Ohlsson is a founding member of the San Francisco-based FOG Trio. A prolific recording artist, Garrick Ohlsson can be heard on the Angel, Arabesque, BMG, Delos, Hänssler, Hyperion, Nonesuch, RCA Victor Red Seal, Telarc, and Virgin Classics labels. One of his ten Bridge Records recordings of the complete Beethoven sonatas was granted a Grammy Award.
Severance Hall 2012-13
Soloist
51