Inon Barnatan kicks off his complete Beethoven piano concertos cycle with this double album, together with the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields and maestro Alan Gilbert. Ranging from the classical First and romantic Third to the experimental Fourth Piano Concerto, and closing with the festive Triple Concerto, Barnatan and his colleagues display the exceptional expressive range and stylistic diversity of Beethoven’s musical language. For the Triple Concerto, Barnatan joins forces with violinist Stefan Jackiw and cellist Alisa Weilerstein. This recording project bears the fruit of longstanding and profound musical friendships, and surprisingly offers the first studio recording of Beethoven piano concertos by the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields, one of the most-recorded ensembles in the world of classical music.
Inon Barnatan is now making his PENTATONE debut. This will be followed by Beethoven Piano Concertos Part 2 in 2020, which will complete the cycle. The Academy of St. Martin in the Fields has built a consistent repertoire with the label throughout the years, whereas Alisa Weilerstein presented the first result of her exclusive collaboration with PENTATONE in 2018 with Transfigured Night. Stefan Jackiw and Alan Gilbert make their PENTATONE debut.
“I’ve been getting to know the Beethoven concertos since childhood. Hearing them was one of my earliest musical memories, and they have been a constant in my life as both listener and player. Every time I return to one of them there are further discoveries to be made, greater depths to be mined, and more conversations to be had with the music. For me, this is the most rewarding aspect of exceptional music; it warrants an ongoing relationship, to which there is always a next level ahead.
As with exceptional music, so, too, with exceptional musicians. I’ve cherished every occasion I’ve had to play with extraordinary orchestras and conductors, and it is especially fulfilling when the first artistic collaboration develops into a long-standing musical relationship, where you know one another well enough that the power of your shared experience allows you to go further. When I decided to record the Beethoven concertos, I knew it would be the perfect opportunity to work with people I could engage with as a musical family, all of us advancing our collective conversation with the music.”
– Inon Barnatan
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- Alisa Weilerstein Photo: Marco Borggreve
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- Alan Gilbert. Photo: Peter Hundert
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- Photo: Benjamin Ealovega
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- Inon Barnatan Photo: Marco Borggreve
ABOUT INON BARNATAN
Inon Barnatan is celebrated for his poetic sensibility, musical intelligence, and consummate artistry. He inaugurates his tenure as Music Director of California’s La Jolla Music Society Summerfest in July 2019. The coming season brings the release of a two-volume set of Beethoven’s complete piano concertos, which he recorded for Pentatone with Alan Gilbert and London’s Academy of St. Martin in the Fields.
Highlights of the 2019/20 season include debuts with Orquesta Sinfonica de Tenerife, Tiroler Landestheater und Orchester, Stuttgarter Philharmoniker, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, Orquestra Sinfònica de Barcelona i Nacional de Catalunya, Dresdner Philharmonie and Tokyo Symphony Orchestra. He will also be performing extensively throughout the United States, with orchestras such as the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, Charlotte Symphony Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, Grand Rapids Symphony, Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra and San Diego Symphony. Inon also makes his solo recital debut at Carnegie’s Zankel Hall, returns to Alice Tully Hall with Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, and reunites with his frequent recital partner, cellist Alisa Weilerstein, for tours on both sides of the Atlantic. The first takes them to Wigmore Hall (London), Royal Concertgebouw (Amsterdam) and Sala Verdi Auditorium (Milan), while the second sees them celebrate Beethoven’s 250th anniversary with performances of his complete cello sonatas in San Francisco and other U.S. cities.
Last season, Inon performed worldwide with orchestras including NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra, Ulster Orchestra, Houston Symphony Orchestra, Australian Chamber Orchestra, Tonhalle Zurich, Israel Philharmonic and Pittsburgh Symphony, as well as making his International Piano Series debut at London’s Southbank Centre and touring Europe and USA with ‘Transfigured Nights’ alongside Alisa Weilerstein and Sergey Khachatryan. During summer 2019, Barnatan took on the role of Artistic Director of La Jolla Music Society SummerFest. This year, the festival is centered around a theme of transformation and evolution in music, featuring collaborations with Grammy-winning jazz vocalist Cécile McLorin Salvant, visionary director and visual artist Doug Fitch, the Mark Morris Dance Group, and other artistic luminaries in a series devoted to cross-disciplinary exploration.
Since giving his first concerto performance at the age of eleven, Inon has performed with the Baltimore Symphony, BBC Symphony Orchestra at the BBC Proms, Chicago Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Leipzig Gewandhausorchester, Philadelphia Orchestra, Royal Stockholm Symphony, and San Francisco Symphony. He has built strong relationships with conductors such as Gustavo Dudamel, James Gaffigan, Manfred Honeck, Susanna Mälkki, Rafael Payare, Thomas Søndergård, Michael Tilson Thomas and Jaap van Zweden. He served as the New York Philharmonic’s inaugural Artist-in-Association for three years during Alan Gilbert’s tenure.
A passionate advocate for contemporary music, he has premiered works by Matthias Pintscher, Sebastian Currier and Avner Dorman; music by Thomas Adès and Ronald Stevenson featured alongside Ravel and Debussy on his critically acclaimed “Darknesse Visible” album, which made The New York Times’ “Best of 2012” list.
Inon recorded the complete Beethoven Piano Concertos with the Academy of St Martin-in-the Fields, and most recently released a live recording of Messiaen’s 90-minute masterpiece Des canyons aux étoiles (“From the Canyons to the Stars”), in which he played the exceptionally challenging solo piano part at the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival.
Born in Tel Aviv in 1979, Inon went on to study at London’s Royal Academy of Music. He is a recipient of both the Avery Fisher Career Grant and Lincoln Center’s Martin E. Segal Award, and currently resides in New York.
