Martino Tirimo

Martino Tirimo's extensive discography of over 50 recordings for EMI, BMG, Regis and other companies includes the piano concertos of Brahms, Chopin, Rachmaninov, Tippett (with Tippett conducting), the complete solo works of Mozart, Beethoven, Debussy, Janáček and the first complete set of Schubert's 21 Sonatas (for EMI). For his recording of Rachmaninov's Second Concerto and Paganini's Rhapsody, one of EMI's best sellers, he received a Gold Disc.

Tirimo was born into a musical family in Cyprus and as child prodigy appeared both as pianist and conductor, at 12 conducting La Traviata seven times with soloists from La Scala, Milan. At 16 he won the Liszt Scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music, later completing his studies in Vienna. He came to world attention in 1971/72 when he won the international competitions in Munich and Geneva and has since appeared with many of the world's great orchestras, with conductors such as Barbirolli, Boult, Masur, Sanderling and Rattle. He has a repertoire of 70 Concertos and in 2004 he performed at the Athens Festival, during the Olympic period, with the Vienna Philharmonic.

The Daily Telegraph has described him as 'a pianist of vision' and 'an inspiring poet of the piano'. More recently Music and Vision declared that 'Tirimo's playing belongs to a past generation of 'greats'. Listening to him I conjure up aural images of Solomon, Arrau, Kempff, Serkin, Schnabel, Backhaus and Rubinstein. Throughout the evening one was consistently aware that this supreme musician placed himself entirely at the service of the composer'.

Read more about Martino Tirimo at his official website.