Elected ECHO Rising-Star for the 2015/2016 season, Luxembourg pianist Cathy Krier has enjoyed
great success in the most prestigious concert halls in Europe. Her programmes, combining classical
and modern periods and featuring works by Rameau, Schubert, Ravel and Berg, as well as a piece
specially written for her by the German composer Wolfgang Rihm, were highly praised.
Cathy‘s passion for music always drives her to go beyond conventions. She loves to work on special
projects and pushes her boundaries to go beyond herself and arouse her curiosity and that of her
audience. This includes well-thought solo programmes as well as collaborations with choreographers
such as Elisabeth Schilling (Hear Eyes Move with Études pour piano by György Ligeti), musical journeys
for younger audiences (Clara! – A compositional journey with music by Clara Schumann and Catherine
Kontz, directed by Tobias Ribitzki), music theatre (Funeral Blues – the missing cabaret, directed
by Olivier Fredj), projects with her chamber music partners Laurence Koch (violin) and Nils Kohler
(clarinet) and an annual cycle for Yoga at the Phil at the Philharmonie Luxembourg.
Cathy Krier has given successful concerts at the Bozar in Brussels, the Barbican Centre in London,
the Philharmonie 2 in Paris, the Sage Gateshead, the Philharmonie Luxembourg, the Laeiszhalle in
Hamburg, the Konzerthaus Dortmund, the Palau de la musica in Barcelona, at the Calouste Gulbenkian
Fondation in Lisbon, at the Palace of Arts (Müpa) in Budapest, Konserthus Stockholm, Concertgebouw
Amsterdam, Cologne Philharmonie, Casa da musica in Porto, Musikverein Vienna, Town Hall in
Birmingham, Festspielhaus Baden-Baden as well as at the Festspiele Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.
Radio and television appearances – as seen on Daniel Hope‘s musical journey EUROPE@HOME on
arte – frame Cathy‘s busy artistic schedule.
Born in Luxembourg, Cathy Krier began her piano studies at the Luxembourg Conservatory at the
age of five. At the age of 14, she was admitted to Pavel Gililov‘s virtuosity class at the Hochschule
für Musik und Tanz Köln. She received further musical impulses from Dominique Merlet, Robert Levin,
Homero Francesch and Andrea Lucchesini, with whom she continued her studies at the Scuola di
Musica di Fiesole.
Since 2018, Cathy Krier holds a professorship in piano at the Conservatory of the City of Luxembourg,
where she also lives with her family.
If you would open any biography of Franz Liszt, you would probably mostly read about his disquiet life as a piano virtuoso, his passionate love life, and the return to his catholic roots at the end of his life. Although all of this might be true, it only scratches the surface of his comprehensive musical personality. Liszt was a pianist, conductor, teacher and organiser, but above all he was a composer of a voluminous, capricious body of work. Even though his piano works formed his core business, he gave rise to the symphonic poem, got rid of the organ's stuffy appearance, and reinvigorated the oratorio. Moreover, with his piano transciptions of Bach's organ works and Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique, he was an advocate of both old and new music.
Together with his son-in-law Richard Wagner, he was in the forefront of the Romantic movement and anticipated the musical revolutions of the early 20th century with his new composition techniques.
Alban Berg was an Austrian composer. Berg studied from 1904 to 1910 under Arnold Schoenberg and together with his teacher and fellow student Anton Webern he is part of the Second Viennese School. Berg married with Helene Nahowski (1885-1976), a singer who was a daughter from Anna Nahowski and, allegedly, Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria.
At first, Berg applied a free atonality, but later he started developing strict twelve tone techniques and combined these to a style which, despite its expressionistic character, reminds of the Late Romantic music of Gustav Mahler.
Arnold Schoenberg was one of the most influential composers of the 20th century, but perhaps also one of the least listened to. Strikingly, Schoenberg was self-educated, even though his music is imbedded in complex music theory. It was Schoenberg who definitely departed from tonality and he developed the twelve tone technique. In this composition style, one has to use every twelve tones of the scale, before one can be repeated. The struggle to adhere to this dogma is clearly audible: his music is tense, hectic and particularly acute - and therefore at times not that accesible to occasional listeners.
Nevertheless, his music and his liberation of tonality had an enormous impact on all composers that came after him. Together with the music of his students Alban Berg and Anton Webern, his style is often referred to as the Second Viennese School, parallel to the First Viennese School of Mozart, Haydn and Beethoven, who, in a similar vein, changed the history of music for good.
His most performed works are his string sextet Verklärte Nacht, his five Orchestra pieces op. 16, and his opera Moses und Aron. The development of Schoenberg's music can be heard in his Five String Quartets in particular.
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