Marc-André Hamelin

The Festival dei Due Mondi welcomes Marc-André Hamelin for the first time, one of the most original artists of our time. An acclaimed pianist and composer, his debut in Spoleto is an event of particular significance: not only because of the performer’s artistic stature, but also because of the rare opportunity to hear live a musician who combines legendary technical mastery with extraordinary intellectual depth.

Hamelin is renowned for the encyclopedic breadth of his repertoire, encompassing masterpieces of the piano tradition alongside rare or unjustly neglected works. His tireless curiosity and rigorous musical inquiry have made him an absolute point of reference, capable of illuminating every score with analytical clarity and interpretative imagination.

The programme chosen for this occasion fully reflects his distinctive artistic voice, interweaving celebrated works with less frequently performed pieces of great fascination. Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s The Cypresses opens the evening with refined and evocative lyricism, while the second book of Claude Debussy’s Images unfolds a sonic universe rich in colour and suggestion.

A lesser-known work of extraordinary intensity is Mieczysław Weinberg’s Piano Sonata No. 5, Op. 58, a page of great dramatic force by a composer still awaiting full rediscovery. Bringing the evening to a close is Sergei Rachmaninov’s Piano Sonata No. 2, Op. 36 in its 1931 version, a pinnacle of the piano repertoire, where virtuosity and expressive momentum merge in a manner that still carries the lingering fragrance of late European Romanticism.