Koroliov plays Bach, Haydn, Mozart, Handel

Evgeni Koroliov turns 70! Evgeni Koroliov, born October 1st 1949, is known to be an extraordinary phenomenon on the international piano scene. Without disposing spectacular attitudes, Koroliov convinces his public through an enormous spiritual understanding of the works he performs and in whose service he puts the wide range of his artistic and interpretatory abilities. His repertoire ranges from Bach, the Wiener Klassik and the works of Schubert, Chopin and Debussy to the modern classics, Messiaen and Ligeti. He has a special affinity to Bach and performed the complete Well-Tempered Clavier in Moscow at the age of seventeen. Since then Koroliov has often performed Bach’s greatest works in cycles, including the Clavierübung and the Art of the Fugue, which he recorded. The latter recording provoked a memorable reaction from the composer György Ligeti: “If there was only one musical work I could take with me to an uninhabited island, I would choose Koroliov’s recording of Bach, because even when left pining away with hunger and thirst, I would still listen to this recording again and again, even to my last breath.” Especially his interpretations of Bach elicited an enormous response from the international music press. Numerous critics not only gave him a prominent place among the new recordings of the Bach Year 2000, but count his amongst the most important Bach recordings in history.