"What an intelligent program, and what a satisfying pianist. It will be good to hear him again."
The Boston Globe
Michael Lewin enjoys a distinguished worldwide reputation as one of the most exciting concert pianists of his generation. Acclaimed for his virtuosity, passion and intelligence, his career was launched with victories in the 1986 International Liszt Competition in the Netherlands and the 1983 American Pianists Association Beethoven Fellowship. In 1982, he won top prize in the William Kapell International Competition at the University of Maryland, just two weeks after returning from the Tchaikovsky Competition in Russia, where his playing generated great public excitement and international media attention. Both the Rockefeller Foundation and National Endowment for the Arts have awarded him prestigious career grants.
Mr. Lewin made his successful New York recital debut in Lincoln Center in 1984. He now performs annually throughout the United States and Canada, and regularly tours Europe and Asia. Recent orchestral engagements include the Netherlands Philharmonic, Cairo Symphony Orchestra, Bucharest Philharmonic, the Boston Pops Orchestra, the Symphonies of Phoenix, Indianapolis, New Orleans, Colorado Springs, Nevada, and West Virginia, the Chamber Orchestra of Puerto Rico, and New York's Jupiter Symphony. He performs over 30 different piano concertos. His concerts have taken him to such important venues as New York's Alice Tully Hall, Boston's Symphony Hall, Pasadena's Ambassador Auditorium, the Great Hall in Moscow, Hong Kong's City Hall Theater, Taipei's National Concert Hall, Wilmington's Grand Opera House, the American College of Greece, the Opera House of Cairo, the Muziekcentrum Vredenburg in Holland and the Spoleto Festival. His popular PBS Television recital hosted by Victor Borge has been aired often throughout the United States. In addition, Mr. Lewin appears actively as a chamber musician.
Michael Lewin's recordings have won extraordinary critical praise, and reflect the great breadth of his musical interests. His most recent release initiates the first-ever complete recording of the piano music of American composer Charles Tomlinson Griffes, on the Naxos American Classics series. A collection of 19 Sonatas by Domenico Scarlatti will be available on Naxos in fall 1999. Mr. Lewin's first two recordings, "Michael Lewin plays Liszt" and "A Russian Piano Recital" (featuring music of Scriabin, Glazunov and Balakirev), are available on the Centaur label. The concluding Volume Two of Griffes piano music on Naxos will be released in Feb.2000 and a collection of pieces by Louis Moreau Gottschalk will come out on Centaur CD later in the year.
Born in New York, Michael Lewin studied at the Juilliard School of Music, earning Bachelor's and Master's Degrees. His teachers have included Irwin and Lillian Freundlich, Adele Marcus, Yvonne Lefebure and Leon Fleisher. He lives in Boston, where he is Chairman of the Boston Conservatory Piano Faculty and Artistic Director of the Boston Conservatory Chamber Players.
Highlights of the 1999-2000 season include his third recital tour of Taiwan and his third consecutive year of concerts in Greece, the world premiere of the David Kocsis Concerto for the New Millennium (which was written for him), the release of three new compact discs (Griffes Vol.2, Scarlatti Sonatas, and Gottschalk), and a busy schedule of concerto, recital and chamber music appearances.
"His technique and ability qualify him eminently for success."
The New York Times
Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No.1 (with Hugh Wolff and the Maryland Festival Orchestra)
"Tchaikovsky's rhapsodic phrases surged in and out with ease, the melodic and harmonic sweep assured. There was remarkable clarity of detail combined with massive sonorities- no mean trick in the same piece"
Washington Post
For further details, see Michael Lewin's home page