Italian pianist and expert on American music Emanuele Arciuli will discuss and preview two programs he’ll perform this spring at the Italian Academy under the auspices of Carnegie Hall’s 2021 festival called “Voices of Hope: Artists in Times of Oppression”: the first program is Black and Native American Composers and the second is “The People United Will Never Be Defeated” Variations by Fredric Rzewski.
Emanuele Arciuli has established himself as one of the most original and interesting performers on today's classical music scene. His repertoire ranges from Bach to contemporary music, with a strong affinity for composers from the United States.
Arciuli continuously develops new projects and is in constant pursuit of new ideas and innovative programs. Round Midnight Variations, a group of 16 compositions that were written expressly for Arciuli by composers such as Crumb, Babbitt, Kernis, Rzewski, Torke, Daugherty, Bolcom and Harbison, has recently sparked the interest of international critics. The variations, which were released by Stradivarius on CD under the title 'Round Midnight - Hommage to Thelonious Monk in May 2011, have been celebrated by the international press.
Emanuele Arciuli regularly performs at major concert halls and festivals, such as the Berliner Festwochen, Wien Modern, La Scala Milano, Biennale di Venezia, Miami Piano Festival, Miller Theater New York, Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Brescia and Bergamo International Piano Festival. He has collaborated with internationally renowned orchestras such as the Indianapolis Symphony, Saint Paul Chamber, Saint Petersburg Philharmonic, Orquestra Sinfônica Brasileira RAI National Symphony, Rotterdam Philharmonic, Brussels Philharmonic and many others. Conductors with whom he has worked include Roberto Abbado, John Axelrod, Dennis Russell Davies, Yoel Levi, James MacMillan, Kazushi Ono, Zoltan Pesko, Arturo Tamayo, Wayne Marshall, Andrey Boreyco and Mario Venzago. Recent highlights include Teatro alla Scala.
His new comprehensive book on American piano music, Piano music in the United States, was recently published in Italy.
In May 2011, Emanuele Arciuli was awarded with the most important Italian critic's prize, the Franco Abbiati Award. In winning this prize, Emanuele Arciuli follows in the footsteps of Maurizio Pollini, Radu Lupu, and Zubin Mehta. The jury stated, "This pianist from Bari has been an authoritative figure on the multifaceted horizon of all things modern for years, all the while preserving a connection to tradition."
He teaches Contemporary Music at Accademia di Pinerolo, is a professor at the Conservatory in Bari, and a frequent guest professor at many American universities.
Among the orchestras with which he has played internationally, we remember Rotterdam Philharmonic, Brussel Philharmonic, Residentie Orkest Den Haag at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, RTSI in Lugano, Brucknerorchester Linz, Tonkünstler in Vienna (at the Musikverein, for Wien Modern), St. Petersburg Philharmonic, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra and many more.
Alongside the more traditional repertoire, which he continues to attend regularly, Emanuele plays a lot of music of our time. He premiered over fifteen new concertos for piano and orchestra, many of which were written for him. Finally, more than fifty piano pages composed for him by authors such as George Crumb, Milton Babbitt, Frederic Rzewski, Michael Nyman, Michael Daugherty, William Bolcom, John Harbison, Aaron Jay Kernis to name but a few. The 'Round Midnight project, performed at the Miller Theater in New York, among others, and commissioned by CCM of Cincinnati, has garnered huge international attention.
His interest in American music has materialized in some books: Intermediate Refuge (Monfalcone Theater), Piano Music in the United States (EDT) and Leonard Bernstein's Piano (ETS); also in some lectures, both radio and television, for Sky Classica, Rai Radio3 and Swiss Radio in Lugano.
He records for Stradivarius, Chandos, Vai, Innova Records, Bridge, Wergo. Recent Walk in Beauty, a rich anthology of American music.
He teaches contemporary piano at the Pinerolo Academy. Piano teacher at the “Piccinni” Conservatory in Bari, he regularly holds workshops for numerous universities in the United States, where he has been going since 1998 and has held over forty tours.