Pianist Igor Levit Returns to Princeton University Concerts

Nine years after his Princeton University Concerts debut, internationally acclaimed pianist Igor Levit returns to Princeton on Wednesday, Oct. 30 through Sunday, Nov. 3 for a mini-residency bookended by live performances, with a screening of the documentary Igor Levit: No Fear at the Princeton Garden Theatre in the intervening days.

On Wednesday, Oct. 30 at 7:30 p.m. at Richardson Auditorium, Alexander Hall, Levit will play a solo recital program encompassing J.S. Bach Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue in D Minor, BWV 903, Johannes Brahms Ballades, Op. 10, and Ludwig van Beethoven Symphony No. 7 in A Major, Op. 92 arranged for piano solo by Franz Liszt. Following his performance of another Beethoven symphony at Carnegie Hall last season, The New York Times wrote, “Forget four-hands piano: Levit seemed to be playing with six or eight. He generated the breadth, force and baffling volume of a full orchestra.”

On Sunday, Nov. 3 at 3 p.m. at Richardson Auditorium, Alexander Hall, Levit will appear on PUC’s Healing with Music series in a program entitled “Igor Levit: Pianist and Advocate for Change” hosted by award-winning journalist Deborah Amos. In a conversation permeated by live performance, he will speak about his experience performing amidst antisemitic death threats and his commitment to using his platform to address on social issues, including climate change and fascism.

Tickets for Igor Levit’s recital on Oct. 30 are $25-60 general admission and $10-15 for students. They are available at puc.princeton.edu or by calling the Princeton University box office at 609-258-9220.

Beyond his artistic prowess and contributions to the field of classical music, at a time when very few artists take a clear political stand, Levit speaks out on social and political issues often. He is politically active on his social media channels; is a frequent guest on prominent European talk shows; has played at the national convention in Germany, at demonstrations on behalf of social inclusion, and at forests protesting deforestation; dedicated his albums to social causes; created a living room concert series on Twitter during lockdown, and more. His commitment to using his platform and artistry for the betterment of the world has earned him the International Beethoven Prize for Human Rights, Statue B of the International Auschwitz Committee, and Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany.

On Saturday, Nov. 2 at 1 p.m., the Princeton Garden Theatre will screen the fly-on-the-wall documentary Igor Levit: No Fear. The film follows Levit from the final recordings of his Beethoven piano sonata cycle and into the beginning of the Covid lockdown when public music-making stopped and Levit gave a series of concerts from his apartment in Berlin. The film offers a fascinating look at the day-to-day life of a world-class artist: going from concert to studio to sleep, all the while feeding the social media beast, which will eventually turn into an important medium for Levit during the Covid lockdown. Tickets are $14 for general admission, $9 Students, and $12 for Garden Theatre members and PUC Deluxe Subscribers. Tickets are available at puc.princeton.edu or by calling the Princeton Garden Theatre at 609-279-1999.

Born in Nizhni Novgorod in Russia, Igor Levit moved to Germany with his family at the age of eight. He completed his piano studies in Hannover with the highest score in the history of the institute. His teachers included Karl-Heinz Kämmerling, Matti Raekallio, Bernd Goetzke, Lajos Rovatkay and Hans Leygraf. Igor Levit was the youngest participant in the 2005 International Arthur Rubinstein Competition in Tel Aviv, where he won silver, the special prize for chamber music, the audience prize and the special prize for the best performance of contemporary pieces.

Levit now calls Berlin his home. For his civic engagement, Igor Levit has been awarded the 5th International Beethoven Prize in 2019 followed by the award of the “Statue B” of the International Auschwitz Committee in January 2020. His 53 Twitter-streamed live house concerts during the lockdown in spring 2020 garnered a worldwide audience, offering a sense of community and hope in a time of isolation and desperation. In October 2020 Igor Levit was recognized with the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany.

In 2018, Igor Levit was named the eighth recipient of the prestigious “Gilmore Artist Award” – conferred only every four years to a classical pianist and recognized as the largest and one of the world’s most distinguished music awards. Levit has performed in recital at the Musikverein Vienna, Philharmonie Berlin, La Scala Milan, Carnegie Hall New York, London’s Wigmore Hall, and Princeton University Concerts as well as in Seoul, Tokyo, Paris, Montréal and Toronto among others. He has also performed with orchestras around the world: the Vienna Philharmonic, the Orchestra dell’Academia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Staatskapelle Berlin, the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, and the New York Philharmonic. Igor Levit’s highly-acclaimed first recording of the 32 Beethoven Sonatas was awarded the Gramophone Artist of the Year Award as well as the Opus Klassik in the autumn of 2020. Igor Levit is Musical America’s “Recording Artist of the Year 2020.”

In spring 2021, Hanser published Igor Levit’s first book “House Concert,” co-authored by Florian Zinnecker followed in Fall 2022 by the release of the feature documentary “Igor Levit – No Fear” in cinemas and on DVD. He is a professor of piano at his alma mater, the University of Music, Theatre and Media in Hanover.