Kirill Gerstein

Driven by a fascination with musical discoveries, combined with virtuosity and imagination, the Russian pianist Kirill Gerstein is one of the most versatile interpreters of our time. His repertory ranges from Baroque suites to Classical concertos and on to contemporary music and jazz. He maintains close ties with leading orchestras, conductors and fellow artists worldwide and performs regularly at international festivals.

Highlights of the 2025/26 season included his residency with the Tonhalle Orchestra, Zurich, and performances with the Orchestre de Paris under Semyon Bychkov, the Vienna Symphony Orchestra under Santtu-Matias Rouvali, the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe and the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra under Simon Rattle. He appeared at venues and festivals including the Berlin Philharmonie, the Verbier Festival and the Leipzig Gewandhaus (with HK Gruber), performed with the Hagen Quartet at KKL Luzern and with Leonidas Kavakos at the Wigmore Hall and toured with Brad Mehldau.

A champion of contemporary music, he has given the premieres of works by Timo Andres, Chick Corea, Alexander Goehr, Oliver Knussen and Brad Mehldau among others. Following the world premiere of Francisco Coll’s Two Waltzes Toward Civilization, in March 2026 he gave the world premiere of Coll’s new Piano Concerto in Munich. Since the world premiere of Thomas Adès’s Concerto for Piano and Orchestra in 2019, he has performed this work more than sixty times with 20 different orchestras on three continents, and recorded it under the baton of the composer with the Boston Symphony Orchestra (earning three Grammy nominations, and a 2020 Gramophone Award).

His discography also includes Strauss’s Enoch Arden with Bruno Ganz, Tchaikovsky’s piano concertos, the album The Gershwin Moment and Mozart’s piano sonatas for four hands with Ferenc Rados. He received the OPUS Klassik in 2025 for Music in Time of War, which features works by Debussy and Komitas.

Following a meeting with Gary Burton, at the age of 14 Kirill Gerstein was invited to attend the Berklee College of Music in Boston. He completed his studies at the Manhattan School of Music and perfected his craft with Dmitri Bashkirov in Madrid and Ferenc Rados in Budapest. He is a prize-winner of the Arthur Rubinstein Competition, the Gilmore Artist Award 2010 and the Avery Fisher Career Grant.

He is professor of piano at the Hanns Eisler School of Music in Berlin and the Kronberg Academy, where he presents the popular online conversation series Kirill invites featuring guests such as Ian Bostridge, Sasha Waltz and Ai Weiwei.