Press Releases

February/March 2025

The idea is simple: instead of constantly travelling from one concert venue to another, I want to focus on each city for a full month and offer as much as I can to the local community – including people who, for various reasons, are unable to visit concert halls – with the aim of leaving a deeper impression than would be possible with a single performance.

Filippo Gorini

In 2025, his 30th birthday year, Italian pianist Filippo Gorini launches his enterprising Sonata for 7 Cities
project with a month-long residency in Vienna starting on 10 February. The Austrian capital is the first of
seven cities he will visit over the next two years – including Cape Town, Hong Kong, Portland, and Milan –
where he will initiate a programme of philanthropic activity in the community, anchored by chamber and
symphony concerts, including premieres of of new sonatas* he has commissioned for each city.

At the heart of the Viennese programme is the Wiener Konzerthaus where Gorini will give two concerts:
a recital on 26 February featuring the world premiere of a piano sonata by the Italian composer, Stefano Gervasoni, alongside sonatas by Schubert and Beethoven; and a concert on 9 March at which he will perform Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No 2 with the Vienna Chamber Orchestra conducted by Jan Willem de Vriend.

Around these keystone events Gorini has initiated a busy schedule of free masterclasses, recitals and
community projects (based on the same repertoire) in schools and hospitals and other places in and
around the city including a retirement home, soup kitchen, homeless shelter and refugee centre with a
view to creating long term partnerships, as well as a blueprint for future programmes in other cities.
“I don’t believe that a Schubert sonata or a contemporary piece is more suited to one audience than another. I think what needs to change is how this repertoire is offered,” explains Gorini. “The inspiration comes from the music itself. Over the last few years, I have already had experiences of this kind, and they moved me deeply.”

Movies Move Us, a non-profit production and distribution company that makes films for social impact. Filmmaker Ruggero Romano will document the entire project in all seven cities and present audio and visual material throughout, across a wide range of digital media platforms to reach an even wider global audience.

In addition to his 2020 BBT Award, which supported his major project Bach: The Art of Fugue Explored,
Gorini was given the 2023 Franco Buitoni Award for Sonata for 7 Cities in recognition of this visionary
and generous approach to sharing the joy and great benefits of music with a wider global community.

NOTES TO EDITORS
* Other composers commissioned to write new sonatas include Beat Furrer, Michelle Agnes Magalhaes, Oscar Jockel, Yukiko Watanabe and Federico Gardella.

Full details of Sonata for 7 Cities visit www.sonatadoc.com

FLIPPO GORINI

• Born 1995 into a family of nuclear physicists.
• Awards and prizes include Italy’s most presKgious musical accolade ‘Premio AbbiaK’ in 2022, The Franco Buitoni Award 2023 and Borleh-Buitoni Trust Award 2020, Telekom-Beethoven Competition (First and Audience prizes). Most recently he received the Franco Buitoni Award in recognition of his Sonata for 7 Cities initiative, a radical reorganisation of his professional life to allow month-long residencies in cities around the world that encompass performance, education, outreach and philanthropy www.sonatafor7cities.com
• Concert appearances include London Wigmore Hall, New York Carnegie Hall, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Berlin Konzerthaus, Vienna Konzerthaus, Hamburg Elbphilharmonie, Milan Teatro alla Scala, Paris Louis Vuiton Foundation, Van Cliburn Foundation, Vancouver Recital Series, Zurich Tonhalle.
• Orchestras he has recently guested with include Santa Cecilia Orchestra Rome, Salzburg Mozarteum Orchester, Verdi Orchestra Milan, Flanders Symphony Orchestra, Gyeonggi Philharmonic Seoul, Nagoya Philharmonic Orchestra, and Shenzhen Philharmonic, Ópera Nacional de Chile and Orchestra del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino.
• Festival appearances include Al Bustan Festival Lebanon, Cliburn Beethoven Festival, Naples Associazione Scarlah, Accademia Filharmonica Romana, Ravello Festival, Ravenna Festival and Festival Bach Montreal, as well as a chamber music tour in New York, Boston, Philadelphia and Washington DC for the Marlboro Music Festival.
• Chamber music collaborators include Steven Isserlis/Prussia Cove and Chamber Music Connects the World in Kronberg, as well as with Marc Bouchkov, Itamar Zorman, Pablo Ferrandez, and Erica Piccoh, among others.
• Projects include Bach: The Art of Fugue Explored for which he recorded an album, performed the work internationally over 30 times and released on RAI5 and RaiPlay a series of filmed conversations on Bach’s music with personalities such as Peter Sellars, Frank Gehry, Sasha Waltz, Alexander Sokurov, Alexander Polzin, Alfred Brendel, George Benjamin and others (produced by Unitel and soon to be available internationally). Sonata for 7 Cities in 2025/27 aims to show a new, responsible and ethical approach to concert life with monthly residencies of concerts and philanthropy in cities around the world.
• Recordings on Alpha Classics of Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations (winner of Diapason d’Or Award), Beethoven’s Op. 106 & Op. 111 and Bach’s The Art of Fugue, all critically acclaimed.
• Contemporary music also features prominently in his repertoire including performances of works by Stockhausen, Kurtág, Lachenmann, Gervasoni and Lanza. His main passions are the works of Bach, Beethoven and Schubert.
• Teaching Has taught masterclasses at Liechtenstein Musikakademie, University of British Columbia, Royal Welsh College of Music and the conservatories in Bergamo and Siena.
• Studies with Maria Grazia Bellocchio and Pavel Gililov and is mentored by Alfred Brendel.
• Graduated from scientific high school with a thesis on Godel’s Incompleteness Theorems, then with honours in piano studies from the Donizeh Conservatory in Bergamo, followed by postgraduate course at the Mozarteum University in Salzburg.