Alexander Melnikov

Looking for a diversion in the genre of piano recital? Come and listen to one of the most exciting and original pianists of our time, Alexander Melnikov, who will guide you through the music of three centuries on five keyboard instruments from different historical periods. A descendant of Lev Naumov, a pupil of the legendary Heinrich Neuhaus, Melnikov follows in the line of great Russian pianists such as Emil Gilels and Sviatoslav Richter, with whom Melnikov even shared a personal friendship and artistic collaboration. He will open the evening at the Rudolfinum on a two-manual harpsichord, playing Johann Sebastian Bach’s Chromatic Fantasia and Fugue. With music by Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Felix Mendelssohn and Fryderyk Chopin, he will then move on from the Hammerklavier and the French Romantic instrument made by Ignaz Pleyel to the modern piano on which he will conclude this unique concert with compositions by Alexander Scriabin and Alfred Schnittke. When he recorded this programme for the harmonia mundi label, critic Ivan Hewett, writing for The Daily Telegraph, described the recording as “dazzling” and called it “the most engrossing thing he has heard in months”. Alexander Melnikov has lived outside Russia since 2014 and has turned down all offers to perform in his native country. He was one of the first Russian artists to openly condemn the incursion of Russian troops into Ukraine.