Telluride Musicfest: Pianist Adam Neiman

26 Jun Telluride Musicfest: Pianist Adam Neiman

“What makes Adam Neiman a genuine rarity is that he plays with imagination and authority, not just an extra helping of technique. He was clearly born to be a pianist and is carrying out a destiny written in his genes,” Chicago Tribune

Like the Telluride Playwrights Festival, Telluride Musicfest is not a high-profile event on Telluride’s summer Festival calendar: except like the heavies – Mountainfilm in Telluride and Telluride Film Festival – both attract world-class talent.

Pianist Adam Neiman

The gravitational center of the Telluride Musicfest, this year, June 25, June 29, July 2 and July 6 – is The Trio Solisti: founder, artistic director, violinist Maria Bachmann; cellist Alexis Pia Gerlach; pianist Adam Neiman. The group is renowned worldwide for sterling technical chops and no-holds-barred passion and lyricism. They play as one with perfect complicity.

“Trio Solisti’s performance was nothing short of incredible, the sort of experience that is rare and memorable. When the final statement of the chorale came, its sound was like a mighty wind, sweeping all in its path, leaving behind only joy,” raved one critic about a recent performance.

The 12th annual Telluride Musicfest concerts take place this year June 25, June 29, July 2 and July 6. Bachmann’s theme for Musicfest’s 2014 season is “From Russia With Love,” the titled obviously borrowed from the second James Bond movie featuring Sean Connery as the suave trained killer.

Equally suave and a killer on piano, Adam Neiman captured the attention of audiences and critics alike since his concerto debut at 11 in Los Angeles’ Royce Hall. Today he is hailed as one of the premiere pianists of his generation, praised for possessing a truly rare blend of power, bravura, imagination, sensitivity, and technical precision. With a burgeoning international career and an encyclopedic repertoire that spans nearly 60 concertos, Neiman has performed as soloist with the symphony orchestras of Belgrade, Chicago, Cincinnati, Dallas, Detroit, Houston, Indianapolis, Minnesota, Saint Louis, San Francisco, Umbria, and Utah, as well as with the New York Chamber Symphony and the National Symphony Orchestra of Washington D.C.

Neiman’s 2013-2014 season highlights include a monumental solo recital tour of North America performing Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations, Op.120, and “Hammerklavier” Sonata, Op. 106. Plans are underway to record the complete cycle of the 32 Beethoven Piano Sonatas over the next several years. Neiman premiered his new Concerto for Piano and String Orchestra (commissioned and composed in 2012) with the Manchester String Orchestra and conductor Ariel Rudiakov on tour throughout Vermont and New York. Wednesday, July 2, the Telluride Musicfest audience is treated to a Colorado premiere of the work.

Among Neiman’s recent recording include the piano quartets of Saint-Saens and Faure with Bachmann.

Neiman’s live recording presence extends to the Internet via his own YouTube channel featuring high definition footage from recent concert tours: http://www.youtube.com/user/adamneiman

Neiman’s connection to Telluride Musicfest dates back to 2000, when he appeared in Festival producer/award-inning documentary filmmaker Josh Aronson’s PBS documentary, “Playing for Real.”  Bachmann’s choice of Neiman to pinch hit for the Trio’s former pianist on the 2010 program was timely and apt: in November 2009, Neiman released a cd of solo piano music by Anton Arensky, one of the Russian composers featured in the “From Russia with Love, part 1” and again at this year’s encore of the Russians.

Telluride Musicfest concerts, all 7:30 p.m., take place in a private home located on the site of the former Skyline Guest Ranch.

To learn more about Adam Neiman, click the “play” button and listen to our chat.