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Pianist Kigawa presents two recitals in Greencastle this week
Virtuoso pianist Taka Kigawa returns to Greencastle from his home in New York and a recent series of concerts in Japan to perform two 7:30 p.m. recitals as the Greencastle Summer Music Festival continues this week.
On Wednesday, he performs music by Beethoven (the “Pathetique” sonata) and Chopin (the 24 Preludes). On Thursday, he presents the complete Etudes by György Ligeti (1923-2006) in a special bonus concert of approximately 45 minutes.
Both programs are offered without an admission charge. The GSMF is self-funded by pay-what-you-can “love offerings” at performances, individual donors, an endowment (funded by GSMF audience members, including a major gift from the late Ellie Ypma) at the Putnam County Community Foundation and local business sponsors, The Inn at DePauw, the Doc’s Inn, First National Bank, North Salem State Bank, Old National Bank and Tri County Bank and Trust.
The GSMF 2024 season continues for the next three weeks. On July 31, Him and Her (Joel and Tosh Everson) share a program with pianist/composer Cathie Malach and Friends; on Aug. 7, Percussion Group DePauw with I-Jen Fang; and the season finale on Aug.14 with the Tad Robinson Band.
“We are thrilled to have Taka back with us this week,” GSMF founding artistic director Eric Edberg said. “Beethoven and Chopin are, obviously, favorites among classical music lovers. Many of us are less familiar with the brilliant composer György Ligeti. Pianist Jeremy Denk has written that Ligeti’s Etudes, composed between 1985-2001, ‘are a crowning achievement of his career and of the piano literature; though still new, they are already classics.’
“Taka is one of the few pianists in the world who performs the complete set of these highly-challenging works; he played several of them for us last year, and we are grateful that he’s performing the entire set for us this week.”
Critically acclaimed pianist Kigawa has earned outstanding international recognition as a recitalist, soloist and chamber music artist since winning first prize in the prestigious 1990 Japan Music Foundation Piano Competition in Tokyo, and the Diploma Prize at the 1998 Concurs Internacional Maria Canals De Barcelona in Spain, with such accolades from The New York Times as “Phenomenon, there’s no denying that he is something special,” “The extraordinary pianist.” And from The New Yorker, “Unbelievably challenging program. Kigawa is an artist of stature.” His New York City recital in 2010 was chosen as one of the best concerts of the year by The New York Times. His New York City recital in August 2011 was picked as one of the most notable concerts in the 2011-12 season by Musical America. Also his Buenos Aires recital in April 2014 was chosen as one of the best concerts of the year by Argentina’s leading paper, La Nación.
His repertoire is extremely large and varied, ranging from the baroque to avant-garde compositions of today. He has collaborated closely with such renowned musicians as the late Pierre Boulez, Myung-Whun Chung and Jonathan Nott. Also, he premiered the last solo piano piece of late Yusef Lateef, the jazz legend, in New York City in 2013.
Kigawa grew up in Nagano, Japan, where he began piano studies at the age of three, winning his first competition at seven. During both his undergraduate and graduate years, he also studied composition and conducting, receiving high honors in both disciplines. He furthered his studies in the United States at The Juilliard School in New York, where he earned his Master of Music degree.
Kigawa currently lives in New York City.