Edinburgh Royal Mile International Piano Series 2024 - The Beethoven Sonatas

St Giles Cathedral plays host to the inaugural Edinburgh Royal Mile International Piano Series. This exciting and prestigious new concert series will feature all 32 of Beethoven's Piano Sonatas throughout 2024. Featuring exceptional performances from leading UK and international pianists, these concerts will be an unrivalled opportunity to enjoy some of the world's greatest piano repertoire, as curated by our guest performers. Set in the stunning candlelit venue of St Giles Cathedral, with it's newly installed Steinway Grand Piano, this will be a musical experience to remember! St Giles is situated in the heart of the Royal Mile with many bars and restaurants nearby to complete your evening. Featuring Andrew Zolinsky (piano) Programme Brahms: Four pieces from Six Piano Pieces Op.118 - Intermezzo in A minor Op.118 No.1 - Intermezzo in A major Op.118 No.2 - Ballade in G minor Op.118 No.3 - Intermezzo in E flat minor Op.118 No.6 Beethoven: Sonata No.30 in E major Op.109 Liszt: Les Jeux d’eau à La Villa d’Este (from Années de Pèlerinage, Troisième Année) Debussy: L’isle joyeuse Andrew Zolinsky’s unique style of programming and his individual interpretations have secured worldwide performances at many prestigious venues and festivals. His work with living composers brings a vivid freshness, energy and passion to his interpretations of music from previous eras. Though a noted performer of contemporary and lesser-known repertoire, Andrew enjoys performing a wide range of music spanning several musical periods. He has performed with major orchestras, including the BBC Symphony Orchestra, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, BBC National Orchestra of Wales, London Sinfonietta, Philharmonia Orchestra, London Concert Orchestra and the Orchestre National de Lorraine, and has worked with many distinguished conductors including, Stefan Asbury, Miguel Harth-Bedoya, Jonathan Bloxham, Martyn Brabbins, Baldur Brönnimann, Diego Masson, Jamie Philips, Andre De Ridder, David Robertson, Ryan McAdams and Pascal Rophe. Andrew has given World and regional premieres of many of David Lang’s works, including the world premiere in New York of the complete set of Memory pieces. Lang’s beautiful piano piece ‘This was written by hand’ was written especially for Andrew; he has recorded both this and the Memory Pieces on the Cantaloupe label. Andrew is also very closely associated with the music of Unsuk Chin. He has performed her complete Etudes for solo piano on many occasions, including the French (Festival Musica in Strasbourg), London (Wigmore hall) and Italian (Venice Biennale) premieres. Andrew also gave the London première of her Piano Concerto with the BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Miguel Harth-Bedoya. As part of the BBC’s ‘Total immersion’ series in 2011, Andrew gave the UK premiere of the Double Concerto with percussionist Owen Gunnell and the London Sinfonietta conducted by Stefan Asbury at the Barbican Centre. In addition to Lang and Chin, Andrew has been closely associated with and, on many occasions, performed works by Laurence Crane, Michael Finnissy, Michael Zev Gordon, Simon Holt, Valentin Silvestrov and Diderik Wagenaar; Finnissy, Zev Gordon, Lang and Holt have written and dedicated pieces to him. The music of women composers has been a central part of Andrew’s repertoire for his whole career to date. In addition to Unsuk Chin, he has premiered and performed works by, among others, Carla Bley, Deirdre McKay, Anna Meredith, Linda Catlin Smith, Karen Tanaka, Anna Thorvaldsdottir, Judith Weir and Julia Wolfe. As a chamber musician, Andrew has worked with the Belcea Quartet, the Vanbrugh Quartet, Emily Beynon, Krzysztof Chorzelski, Michael Collins, Benjamin Marquise Gilmore, Andrew Haveron and Daniel Hope. Andrew has performed at most of the major UK venues, and at Merkin Hall, Brooklyn Academy of Music and Le Poisson Rouge in New York, the Venice Biennale, International Piano series at London’s Southbank Centre, Piano Rarities Festival in Husum, Germany and in China, the Czech Republic, Iceland, Ireland, Japan, Lithuania, Spain, Taiwan and Canada. Last season’s highlights included a BBC Radio Three recording with the BBCNOW conducted by Jonathan Bloxham of a previously un-recorded Piano Concerto written in 1938 by Johanna Senfter, a former student of Max Reger. During the 2022/23 season, among other concerts, Andrew performed at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, New Music Dublin and Dark Music Days, Iceland; these three major festivals were all co-commissioners of two new major solo piano pieces written for him by the Irish composer Linda Buckley and the Icelandic composer Lilja María Ásmundsdóttir. Also included in these concerts were works by Anna Thorvaldsdottir and Anna Meredith. Future engagements include a tour of North America, and performances of concertos by Bernstein and the Irish premiere of Unsuk Chin’s Piano Concerto with the National Symphony Orchestra conducted by Olari Elts at the New Music Dublin festival 2025. Andrew is professor of piano at the Royal College of Music, London and takes an advanced piano class at Morley College. April 2024. Edinburgh Royal Mile International Piano Series 2024 - The Beethoven Sonatas banner image