“A brilliant musician and an extraordinary visionary” (Wall Street Journal), Pierre-Laurent Aimard is widely acclaimed as an authority in music of our time while recognised also for shedding fresh light on music of the past. His international schedule of creatively conceived concerts, broadcasts and recordings is complemented by a career-long commitment to teaching, giving concert lectures and workshops worldwide.
Pierre-Laurent Aimard has had close collaborations with many leading composers including Helmut Lachenmann, Elliott Carter, Harrison Birtwistle, György Kurtág, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Marco Stroppa, Pierre Boulez, and Olivier Messiaen. During the 2023/24 season he celebrates the music of György Ligeti with projects throughout Europe, North America, Japan and China. Guest Concerto appearances include Czech Philharmonic, Staatskapelle Dresden, Teatro alla Scala Milan, Orchestre National de France, Danish National Symphony Orchestra and New York Philharmonic. Aimard’s extensive recital touring takes in Southbank Centre London, Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Musikverein Wien, Philharmonie Luxembourg and Concertgebouw as well as Philadelphia, Chicago and San Francisco. At Paris’ Theatre des Champs Elysees he collaborates with French actor Denis Podalydès for an exploration of Fateless with music by Ligeti, Kurtag, Schoenberg and Cage. Aimard also continues his association with long-standing chamber music partners, most notably Tamara Stefanovich at the Tonhalle Zürich and Madrid’s Centro Nacional de Difusión Musical, and jazz pianist Michael Wollny at Frankfurt Alte Oper.
Upcoming world premieres include Clara Iannotta’s Piano Concerto for the Acht Brucken Festival in Cologne and the Portuguese premiere of Klaus Ospald’s Se da contra las piedras la libertad, a work co-commissioned by Casa da Musica, Porto and Cologne’s WDR Symphony Orchestra. Past premieres by Aimard include Carter’s last piece Epigrams; Sir Harrison Birtwistle’s works Responses; Sweet disorder and the carefully careless and Keyboard Engine for two pianos.
The season begins with the September release of a new recording of the complete Bartók piano concertos with Esa-Pekka Salonen and San Francisco Symphony Orchestra. This record is the latest in a series of critically acclaimed collaborations with Pentatone, following Visions de l’Amen (2022) recorded with Tamara Stefanovich; Beethoven’s Hammerklavier Sonata & Eroica Variations(2021), and Messiaen’s magnum opus Catalogue d’oiseaux (2018) which garnered multiple awards including the prestigious German music critic’s award “Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik.”
An innovative curator and uniquely significant interpreter of piano repertoire from every age, Aimard has been invited to direct and perform in numerous residencies including recently for Musikkollegium Winterthur where over the season he celebrated different composers and opened with the complete cycle of Beethoven Piano Concertos. Elsewhere, he has performed ground-breaking projects at Porto’s Casa da Musica, New York’s Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center, Konzerthaus Vienna, Alte Oper Frankfurt, Lucerne Festival, Mozarteum Salzburg, Cité de la Musique in Paris, Tanglewood Festival, the Edinburgh Festival, and as Artistic Director of the Aldeburgh Festival from 2009 to 2016.
Aimard is the recipient of many prizes, receiving the prestigious International Ernst von Siemens Music Prize in 2017 in recognition of a life devoted to the service of music and the Leonie Sonning Music Prize, Denmark’s most prominent music award in 2022.
A member of the Bayerische Akademie der Schönen Künste, Aimard has held professorships at the Hochschule Köln and was previously an Associate Professor at the College de France, Paris. In spring 2020, he re-launched a major online resource ‘Explore the Score’ in collaboration with the Klavier-Festival Ruhr, which centres on the performance and teaching of Ligeti’s piano music.
Photo: Julia Wesely