Michael Lewin, piano, is one of America’s foremost concert pianists, winning over audiences in 30 countries with playing of “majestic power and searing emotion” (the London Times). His career was launched with victories in the Liszt Utrecht International Competition, the American Pianists Association Award, and the University of Maryland’s William Kapell International Piano Competition. His numerous recordings have won a Grammy Award and a Roundglass Music Award.
He has appeared as orchestral soloist with the Netherlands Philharmonic, Cairo Symphony, China National Radio Orchestra, Bucharest Philharmonic, Youth Orchestra of the Americas, State Symphony of Greece, Moscow Chamber Orchestra, the Boston Pops, and the Phoenix, Indianapolis, Miami, North Carolina, West Virginia, Nevada, New Orleans, Colorado, Guadalajara, and Puerto Rico symphonies. Solo appearances include New York’s Lincoln Center, London’s Wigmore Hall, Boston’s Symphony Hall, Taiwan’s National Concert Hall, Hong Kong’s City Hall Theatre, Holland’s Muziekcentrum, Moscow’s Great Hall, the Athens Megaron, the National Gallery of Art, the Newport, Ravinia, and Spoleto festivals, and PBS Television. His extensive repertoire includes over 40 piano concertos, and he is particularly praised for his performances of Beethoven, Brahms, Chopin, Liszt, Debussy, and a host of American and Latin American composers.
Lewin’s award-winning discography on Sono Luminus, Naxos, and Centaur includes a pair of popular Debussy recordings entitled Beau Soir and Starry Night; the complete piano music of Charles T. Griffes; a collection of Scarlatti Sonatas; his acclaimed all-Liszt debut recording; a Russian album of Scriabin, Balakirev, and Glazunov; Bamboula!, a disc of Louis Moreau Gottschalk’s piano music; If I Were a Bird (piano bird pieces); Piano Phantoms (ghost/phantom–inspired works); and the four violin/piano sonatas by William Bolcom with violinist Irina Muresanu.
Lewin is professor and head of piano at Boston Conservatory at Berklee. He gives master classes worldwide, directs the Boston Conservatory Piano Masters Series, and has taught and mentored many prize-winning and successful pianists. He is a Juilliard School graduate and a Steinway Artist. His teachers included Leon Fleisher, Yvonne Lefebure, Adele Marcus, and Irwin Freundlich. Learn more about Lewin.
