The Program

Schumann:  Fantasiestücke, Op. 12
Janácek:  On an Overgrown Path, Books I and II [Selections]
Berg:  Piano Sonata, Op. 1
Schumann:  Davidsbündlertänze, Op. 6

The Artist

American pianist Jonathan Biss is widely regarded for his artistry and deeply felt interpretations, winning international recognition for his orchestral, recital, and chamber music performances and for his award-winning recordings. The New Yorker describes him as playing with “unerring sophistication”. He is a frequent performer at leading international music festivals and gives recitals in major music capitals both at home and abroad. In January 2012 Onyx Classics will release the first CD in a nine-year, nine-disc recording cycle of Beethoven’s complete sonatas. Mr. Biss’s previous recordings include an album of Schubert Sonatas in A Major, D. 959 and C Major, D. 840 and two short Kurtág pieces from Játékok on the Wigmore Hall Live label, and Schumann and Beethoven recital discs released by EMI Classics which were recognized with a Diapason d’Or Award and an Edison Award, respectively. Jonathan Biss represents the third generation in a family of professional musicians that includes his grandmother, cellist Raya Garbousova, for whom Samuel Barber wrote his Cello Concerto, and his parents, violinist Miriam Fried and violist/violinist Paul Biss. Mr. Biss studied at Indiana University with Evelyne Brancart and at The Curtis Institute of Music with Leon Fleisher. Mr. Biss is now himself a member of the piano faculty at Curtis. In December 2011 Mr. Biss’s 19,000-word essay Beethoven’s Shadow was published by RosettaBooks as a Kindle Single on Amazon online stores and subsequently became a top-selling Music e-book in the U.S. and the U.K. Mr. Biss blogs about his life as a musician at jonathanbiss.com.