Jan Lisiecki - Life and Career

Life and Career

Jan Miłosz Lisiecki was born in Calgary, Canada to Polish parents. He has been studying piano since the age of five at the Mount Royal University Conservatory. He had his orchestral debut at the age of 9, and has since performed more than 100 times with orchestras in Canada and internationally, including the National Arts Centre Orchestra, Montreal Symphony Orchestra, L’Orchestre Symphonique de Québec, Minnesota Orchestra, Sinfonietta Cracovia, Suwon Philharmonic Orchestra, and Sinfonia Varsovia, to name a few. On January 1, 2010 Jan opened the Chopin 200th Birthday celebrations from the composers’ birthplace, Żelazowa Wola. In January 2010, he performed Chopin Concerto No. 1 in E minor at the MIDEM Classical Awards Gala in Cannes, France. In April, Jan was asked to substitute for Nelson Freire in four concerts in France, and in May he opened the Seoul International Music Festival in Korea. In July he performed for Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II, and a hundred thousand people on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Canada. In October he signed an exclusive contract with Deutsche Grammophon. Since 2010 he is represented by IMG Artists.

Jan has played at Carnegie Hall, the Warsaw Philharmonic Concert Hall, Kaufman Hall, Salle Cortot and has shared the stage with Yo-Yo Ma, Pinchas Zukerman, James Ehnes, and Emanuel Ax. He has performed in the USA, Korea, China, Japan, France, Germany, England, Scotland, Italy, Guatemala, Poland and throughout Canada. Jan is a dedicated performer of chamber music and has collaborated with the New Zealand String Quartet, Quatuor Ébène, and the Penderecki String Quartet, appearing at festivals including the Merano Festival, Menton Festival, d'Auvers-sur-Oise Festival, Seoul Festival, Chopin and his Europe Festival and many others in Canada and the USA.

Recognized for his poetic and mature playing, Lisiecki was awarded many prestigious awards including the 2010 "Debut Atlantic" tour, the 2010 Révélations Radio-Canada Musique, and the 2011 Jeune Artiste des Radios Francophones. Jan has won numerous major Canadian music titles. In 2009 he was awarded Grand Prize at the OSM Standard Life Competition (the youngest in history). In 2008 he won the Grand Award in both the Canadian Music Competitions (June 2008) and the Canadian Music Festival (August 2008, as the youngest in history). Jan was a prize winner in seven international competitions in the USA, Italy, England, and Japan.

In 2008, Jan performed the Chopin F minor Concerto and was named the sensation of the prestigious festival “Chopin and His Europe” in Poland. In 2009, he returned to Warsaw performing the Chopin E minor Concerto, receiving glowing reviews and praise from critics. The concerts were broadcast by the Polish Radio 2. Jan’s debut CD, featuring these two live performances, with Sinfonia Varsovia and Howard Shelley, was released at the beginning of 2010 by the Fryderyk Chopin Institute as catalogue No. 1 on the new “White Series”. The CD was awarded the prestigious Diapason d’Or Découverte award in May 2010. The Diapason magazine describes Lisiecki as “an unmannered virtuoso already with virile, and above all, irresistibly natural playing.” BBC Music Magazine’s July 2010 review commended "Lisiecki's mature musicality,” and his “sensitively distilled” interpretation of the contrasting concerti, played “with sparkling technique as well as idiomatic pathos”, noting that “even in a crowded CD catalogue, this refreshingly unhyped CD release is one to celebrate".

His performances have been broadcast nationally on CBC Radio in Canada, Polish Radio, Radio France, Radio Luxembourg, Austrian Radio, and German Radio, as well as on French Television 3 and the TV 1 and 2 in Poland. Jan was featured in the CBC Next! Series on March 1, 2009, on Sunday Afternoon in Concert as one of the most promising young artists in Canada. Two of his recitals that were recorded by the CBC are available on their "Concerts on Demand" website. On September 7, 2009, CBC National News broadcast a Joe Schlesinger documentary about Jan, "A Reluctant Prodigy".

Jan performs frequently for various charity organizations, including the David Foster Foundation, the Polish Humanitarian Organization and the Wish Upon a Star Foundation. In June 2008 he was appointed a National Youth Representative by UNICEF Canada.

Upon the school board’s recommendation Jan was accelerated four grades. In January 2011, he graduated from Western Canada High School in Calgary, Canada. Since September 2011 he has been studying with Marc Durand for a Bachelor of Music at the Glenn Gould School of Music in Toronto on a full scholarship.

In February 2011 Jan Lisiecki and Deutsche Grammophon signed an exclusive recording-agreement. Lisiecki’s debut recording for Deutsche Grammophon features Mozart’s Piano Concertos no. 20, K. 466 and no. 21, K. 467 and was released internationally on April 16. “With Deutsche Grammophon’s history of over 100 years, it is amazing to look through the catalogue and see the names of all the great artists that have some of their artistic souls with us,” said Jan Lisiecki. “To be with DG makes me feel happy, excited, and privileged – it also reinforces the idea that music is larger than any single artist – as DG encompasses the entire spectrum of this art.”