Piano Concerts at the Pitti Palace. Here the history of the piano began

Palazzo Pitti opens to classical music: in fact, from May 25 to 28, 2022, the Pitti Piano Festival, a collaboration between the Uffizi Galleries and theAssociazione Musica con le Ali, will make its debut in the Sala Bianca of the grand ducal palace. On the program are five concerts by young performers and leading international names that will be held in the place where the history of the piano began five centuries ago, thanks to the invention of the fortepiano by Bartolomeo Cristofori, a Paduan craftsman active in the court of the Grand Duke of Tuscany Ferdinando I de’ Medici. The event aims to offer the public at the Pitti Palace a listening experience of the highest level, where great music and great art coexist.

All concerts will be freely accessible to the public by presenting the entrance ticket to the Pitti Palace Museums. It will start on Wednesday, May 25 at 4 p.m. with a concert by Antonio Faraò, an international composer with an unmistakable style that combines technical brilliance, impetuous emotional charge and a remarkable compositional vein. In the field of jazz, he is among the European musicians who have achieved an expressive standard on the level of American ones. On this date he will offer some of his original compositions brought together under the title No borders. On Thursday, May 26 at 4 p.m., young musician Greta Lobefaro, class of 2000, a student of the “Incontri col maestro” Academy in Imola and the Accademia di Santa Cecilia in Rome, will perform, with many awards to her credit that tell a lot about her talent: first place in Italy at the Steinway piano competition in the final in Verona in 2016, third in 2018 in Spoleto and at the XXXV Premio Venezia, to name but a few among the more than 30 awards she has won to date. on the occasion of Pitti Piano Festival Lobefaro will offer a program full of internal references that explores the work of three key German-area composers linked together: Johann Sebastian Bach, Johannes Brahms and Alban Berg. Following this, on Friday, May 27, also at 4 p.m., will be a recital by Elia Cecino, a young pianist who graduated with top marks from the Cesena Conservatory in 2018 and later specialized with Elisso Virsaladze at the Scuola di Musica di Fiesole. Since 2019, he has been artist-in-residence at the “Luigi Bon” Foundation in Colugna di Tavagnacco. He will perform music by Robert Schumann, Felix Mendelssohn and Sergei Prokofiev. As many as two concerts are scheduled for Saturday, May 28: at 11:30 a.m. with the very young pianist Monica Zhang, who at only fourteen years of age can boast as many as 25 first prizes at international competitions of excellent prestige, not least of which was the first prize overall among all categories at the Italian Finale of the Steinway Competition. On this occasion he will perform a program with romantic atmospheres that revolves around the music of Chopin and Liszt and will revive some of the most intense pages of 19th-century pianism, while at 4 p.m. the festival will conclude with a concert by Roberto Prosseda, who is appreciated worldwide as a soloist and for his performances with some of the most important orchestras, including the London PhilHarmonic, New Japan Philharmonic, Moscow State Philharmonic, Santa Cecilia, La Scala Philharmonic and Brussels Philharmonic. He will perform a monographic program devoted to Mozart and in particular some of his finest sonatas.

“The Music with Wings Association is an old friend of the Pitti Palace, to which it has given concerts of the highest level since 2017, with young musicians who are prominent on the international scene. There was an agonizing silence during the pandemic, but now the Sala Bianca, which was created precisely for music and courtly festivities, is back to its full function, giving Florentines and visitors to the Uffizi Galleries a wonderful experience,” commented Uffizi Galleries Director Eike Schmidt. “After the extraordinary success of the festival Da Firenze all’Europa,” added Carlo Hruby, president of the Associazione Musica con le Ali, “the multi-year collaboration between our Association and the Uffizi Galleries is renewed today with Pitti Piano Festival. We are therefore really proud to return to the marvelous Sala Bianca of Palazzo Pitti to offer local and tourist audiences an event of the highest musical level in a place that is a symbol of our cultural heritage, in close contact with the marvelous works that characterize it: in these days of concerts we will hear the best of international pianism, with the participation of exceptionally talented young musicians and established, world-renowned musicians. Thanks to the director of the Uffizi Galleries Eike Schmidt for espousing this new initiative aimed at enhancing classical music and promoting the young talents who make it come alive over time, and thanks to Giovanni Iannantuoni and Yamaha Music Europe for their valuable support as part of this extraordinary Festival.”

Pictured is Monica Zhang.

Piano Concerts at the Pitti Palace. Here the history of the piano began

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