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Norman Krieger chats with Harmonious World about his new Gershwin recording w/ Prague National Symphony

Interview with Harmonious World

A native of Los Angeles, Norman Krieger is one of the most acclaimed pianists of his generation and is highly regarded as an artist of depth, sensitivity and virtuosic flair. As the Los Angeles Times put it, “Krieger owns a world of technique-take that for granted. He always knows exactly where he is going and what he is doing. He never for instant miscalculates. He communicates urgently but with strict control. He is alert to every manner of nuance and at every dynamic level his tone flatters the ear.”

Myung -Whun Chung, Donald Runnicles, Leonard Slatkin, Michael Tilson Thomas, Jaap van Zweden and Zubin Mehta are just a few of the conductors with whom Krieger has collaborated. Krieger regularly appears with the major orchestras of North America, among them the New York Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Chicago Symphony, Minnesota Orchestra and the National Symphony. He has performed throughout Europe, Asia and South America including tours of Germany, France, Poland, Holland Scandinavia, Korea, China, New Zealand and Israel. He recently performed at the PyeongChang Music festival in Korea. In September 2014, he recorded the Brahms Sonata Op. 1 and the Piano Concerto No. 2 with the London Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Philip Ryan Mann, which will be released on Decca. 

In recital, Krieger has appeared throughout the United States, Europe, Mexico and Asia, while chamber music collaborations have included appearances with soprano Sheri Greenawald, violinists Paul Huang, Sarah Chang, Pamela Frank and Mihaela Martin, violist Nobuko Imai, cellists Myung Wha Chung, Jian Wang, Edward Aaron and Frans Helmersen as well as the Tokyo string quartet. His debut at New York City’s prestigious Carnegie Hall and Mostly Mozart Festival earned him an immediate invitation to Lincoln Center’s Great Performers Series. Krieger made headlines by being named the Gold Medal Winner of the first Palm Beach Invitational Piano Competition. 

He began his studies in Los Angeles under the tutelage of Esther Lipton. At age 15, he became a full-scholarship student of Adele Marcus at The Juilliard School where he earned both his Bachelor and Master degrees. Subsequently, he studied with Alfred Brendel and Maria Curcio in London and earned an Artist Diploma from the New England Conservatory, where he worked with Russell Sherman.

A champion of contemporary music, he features the music of John Adams, Leonard Bernstein, John Corigliano, Daniel Brewbaker, Donald Crockett, Judith St. Croix, Lukas Foss, Henri Lazarof and Lowell Liebermann among his active repertoire.

Krieger is the founding artistic director of The Prince Albert Music Festival in Hawaii. Since 2008, he has served on the summer faculty at the Brevard Music Festival in North Carolina. From 1997 to 2016 he was a professor at the Thornton School of Music at the University of Southern California. In August 2016 he was appointed Professor of Piano and Dean Charles H. Webb Chair in Music at the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University.

Celebrating his twenty-ninth season as Artistic Director of the Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra, NEAL GITTLEMAN enjoys a career and reputation of international dimensions. With the historic merger of the Dayton Ballet, Dayton Opera and Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra into the Dayton Performing Arts Alliance in 2012, his expanded conducting duties include frequent performances with the Ballet and Opera. During the current season, Mr. Gittleman leads ballet performances of Austin Jaquity’s Dracula: Bloodlines, the annual holiday production of Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker and the same composer’s Swan Lake, and operatic productions of Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd and Puccini’s Tosca.

A native of Brooklyn, New York, Neal Gittleman graduated from Yale UniveA native of Brooklyn, New York, Neal Gittleman graduated from Yale University in 1975. He continued his musical studies with the eminent teachers Nadia Boulanger and Annette Dieudonné in Paris, Hugh Ross at the Manhattan School of Music and Charles Bruck at both the Pierre Monteux Domaine School and the Hartt School of Music, where he was the recipient of the Karl Böhm Fellowship. In 1984, he was the Second Prize Winner of Geneva's Ernest Ansermet International Conducting Competition, and, two years later, he was awarded Third Prize at the Leopold Stokowski Conducting Competition in New York City. In 1989, he was selected for the American Conductors Program at the American Symphony Orchestra League's annual conference in San Francisco. Mr. Gittleman was awarded a 2014 Governor’s Award for the Arts in Ohio.

Krieger sat down for an Interview w/ Harmonious World's Hilary Seabrook.   Listen to the conversation