Mitsuko Uchida

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Mitsuko Uchida is a performer who brings a deep insight into the music she plays through her own search for truth and beauty. She is renowned for her interpretations of Mozart and Schubert, both in the concert hall and on CD, but she has also illuminated the music of Berg, Schönberg, Webern and Boulez for a new generation of listeners, and her recording of the Schönberg Piano Concerto with Pierre Boulez and the Cleveland Orchestra won four awards, including The Gramophone Award for Best Concerto. During recent seasons she has been giving performances of Beethoven’s last three piano sonatas, and Opus 101 and 106 (Hammerklavier). Her Royal Festival Hall performance of Op109, 110 and 111 was described by John Allison, The Times critic, as ‘one of the most transporting concerts London has heard all year’. Her recording of Beethoven’s Op101 and Op106 was described by Michael Church in BBC Music Magazine as ‘Beethoven in all his grandeur and with all his capacity to express spiritual agony (the slow movement) and heroic struggle and triumph (the first and last movement) revealed with shattering directness ….This disc is of a calibre that I count myself lucky to encounter once in a decade.’ Uchida recently won BBC Music Magazine’s award for ‘Instrumentalist of the Year’ and ‘Disc of the Year’ for this recording. Mitsuko Uchida performs throughout the world with many different partners. Some highlights have been her Artist-in-Residency at the Cleveland Orchestra, where she directed all the Mozart concerti from the keyboard over a number of seasons. She has also been the focus of a Carnegie Hall Perspectives series entitled ‘Mitsuko Uchida: Vienna Revisited’. She has featured in the Concertgebouw’s Carte Blanche series where she collaborated with Ian Bostridge, the Hagen Quartet, Chamber Orchestra of Europe and the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra as well as directing from the piano a performance of Schönberg’s Pierrot Lunaire. These concerts were also the focus of series at the Philharmonie in Cologne and the Barbican in London. In January 2006 Mitsuko Uchida took part in the Mozart birthday celebrations in Salzburg with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Riccardo Muti, as well as performing with the Hagen Quartet and appearing in recital. This season, Uchida is artist-in-residence with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. Her residency will include performances of Schumann’s Piano Concerto with Sir Simon Rattle, and a series of four chamber music concerts. She is also artist-in-residence at the Konzerthaus Vienna and at the Salzburg Mozartwoche. Uchida will open the London Symphony Orchestra’s season with Sir Colin Davis. She will also work with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra and Jansons; the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra and Ozawa; tour with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe and the Philharmonia Orchestra; play/direct the Cleveland Orchestra; perform with Muti and the New York Philharmonic; give recitals in Carnegie Hall, the Royal Festival Hall and Vienna’s Konzerthaus; and perform at the Salzburg Festival with Clemens Hagen and Mark Steinberg, and with Magdalena Kožená, amongst much else. Mitsuko Uchida records exclusively for Decca and her recordings include the complete Mozart piano sonatas and piano concerti; the complete Schubert piano sonatas; Debussy’s Etudes; the five Beethoven piano concerti with Kurt Sanderling; a CD of Mozart Sonatas for Violin and Piano with Mark Steinberg; Die Schöne Müllerin with Ian Bostridge for EMI; and the final five Beethoven piano sonatas. Recently released is a recording of Berg’s Chamber Concerto with the Ensemble Intercontemporain, Pierre Boulez and Christian Tetzlaff. Mitsuko Uchida has demonstrated a long-standing commitment to aiding the development of young musicians and is a trustee of the Borletti-Buitoni Trust. She is also Co-director, with Richard Goode, of the Marlboro Music Festival.