ANTHONY DE MARE: LIAISONS — RE-IMAGINING SONDHEIM FROM THE PIANO
Porto Pianofest
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'Porto Pianofest closes its 11th edition with a recital by Tamara Stefanovich at Museu de Serralves. The program moves through five centuries of piano writing built around Bach, whose counterpoint and architecture run through the evening, set against Kurtág, Debussy, Liszt, Ligeti, Scriabin, Abrahamsen, and contemporary composers in constant dialogue.
Tamara Stefanovich is one of the leading interpreters of contemporary piano repertoire today, known equally for her close collaborations with living composers and her ability to place their work in deep conversation with the canon. Among her closest artistic relationships is that with György Kurtág, whose music runs as a thread throughout this program. 'Dialogues' is precisely what its title promises, a program structured around listening and response across centuries. Bach is a point of departure but also a persistent presence: his counterpoint, his architecture, his sense of music as ordered thought animate the entire evening, surfacing explicitly in the Capriccio that opens the recital and in the monumental closing pages of the Art of Fugue. Between those anchors, Kurtág, Debussy, Liszt, Ligeti, Scriabin, Abrahamsen, and living composers respond, refract, and push back. The program moves not in a straight line but as a conversation does: doubling back, interrupting itself, arriving at unexpected intimacies. In Stefanovich's hands, five centuries of piano writing reveal themselves as an ongoing argument
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One of the leading interpreters of contemporary piano repertoire today, Tamara Stefanovich dedicates herself to making the classical modern works as well as countless new compositions very much her own, captivating audiences worldwide with her uniquely tailored recital programmes and as soloist with the world’s leading orchestras. She partners with orchestras such as The Cleveland Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, London Symphony and Philharmonic orchestras, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Chamber Orchestra of Europe and Mahler Chamber Orchestra, amongst others. Stefanovich performs at the world’s major concert venues including Suntory Hall Tokyo, London’s Royal Albert and Wigmore halls, Philharmonie Berlin, Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Philharmonie de Paris, Muziekgebouw Amsterdam and Tonhalle Zürich. A welcome guest at international festivals, she appears at Salzburger Festspiele, Schwetzinger SWR Festspiele, Musikfest Berlin, Klavier-Festival Ruhr, Musikfest Hamburg, Musikfest Berlin, Flagey Piano Days, London Piano Festival and the BBC Proms. Following her celebrated debut with Israel Philharmonic under Kirill Petrenko and the German première of Magnus Lindberg’s Piano Concerto No.3 with NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester under Esa-Pekka Salonen, Stefanovich continues to present a large range of piano concertos from Liza Lim’s World as Lover, World as Self to Ravel, Abrahamsen, Bartók and Szymanowski, and enthralls audiences with her recital marathons of 50 Études and 20 Sonatas. The 2025/2026 season sees Tamara Stefanovich premiere a new piano concerto by Lisa Streich with Kansas City Symphony and Matthias Pintscher alongside returns to Frankfurt Radio Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra, NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester, Belgrade Philharmonic and Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks. Recitals will take her to Boulez Saal Berlin, Barbican Centre London and Grande Auditorio Calouste Gulbenkian amongst others. Breaking new grounds, Tamara Stefanovich collaborates with Christopher Dell, Christian Lillinger and Jonas Westergard for the innovative band SDLW. After its’ astounding premiere at Kölner Philharmonie, the quartet performed in Berlin, Hamburg, Munich and at Klangspuren Festival Schwaz. They released two albums on bastille musique in 2022 and in 2024, which have both been praised for their inventive and exciting sound - the most recent album winning the German Record Critics’ Award 2024. Tamara Stefanovich has worked with composers such as Pierre Boulez, Sir George Benjamin, György Kurtág and Hans Abrahamsen. She works with chamber music partners such as Matthias Goerne, Pierre-Laurent Aimard, and conductors such as Esa-Pekka Salonen, Vladimir Jurowski, and Joana Mallwitz. Her award-winning discography includes a recording of Kurtág’s Quasi una Fantasia and his double concerto with Asko|Schönberg Ensemble, Reinbert de Leeuw and Jean-Guihen Queyras for ECM which received the Edison Award. Her recording of Bartók’s Concerto for two pianos, percussion and orchestra with Pierre-Laurent Aimard and the London Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Pierre Boulez (Deutsche Grammophon) was nominated for a Grammy Award. Tamara’s album Influences was dedicated to the works of Ives, Bartók, Messiaen and Bach on Pentatone. Her most recent album Organised Delirium on Pentatone is devoted to Pierre Boulez’s Second Sonata. Tamara regularly leads educational projects at London’s Barbican Centre, Kölner Philharmonie and Klavier-Festival Ruhr. She was co-founder and curator of the Portland International Piano Festival ‘The Clearing’ and Visiting Professor at the London Royal Academy of Music and Accademia di Musica Pinerolo. She studied in Belgrade, at Curtis Institute and at Kölner Musikhochschule under Claude Frank and Radu Lupu.