Leif Ove Andsnes returns to Carnegie Hall on U.S. solo recital tour (Jan 21–30), before joining Chicago & Atlanta Symphonies for Beethoven’s Third Piano Concerto (March 5–14)
(December 2025) — Early next year, celebrated Norwegian pianist Leif Ove Andsnes embarks on a U.S. solo recital tour, performing works by Schumann, Janáček, and Kurtág at New York’s Carnegie Hall (Jan 27) and in Athens, GA (Jan 21), Seattle (Jan 23), Stanford (Jan 25), and the Boston Celebrity Series (Jan 30). He returns to the States in the spring for accounts of Beethoven’s Third Piano Concerto with the Atlanta Symphony (March 5–7) and Chicago Symphony (March 12–14). Beethoven’s Third is also the vehicle for dates with the London Symphony Orchestra, Bamberg Symphony, Danish National Symphony, and other ensembles in Europe, where additional highlights include the world premiere of a new concerto by Norway’s Ørjan Matre with the Oslo Philharmonic. Following last month’s Warner Classics’ release of Schubert: Four Hands, recorded with Bertrand Chamayou, next April Norway’s Simax label issues Geirr Tveitt: Sonata No. 29, Folk Tunes and Songs, Andsnes’s new solo collection of music by his prolific yet long-neglected compatriot Geirr Tveitt. Anticipating the pianist’s return to Carnegie Hall, The New York Times confides: “You go to a recital by the pianist Leif Ove Andsnes to be as surprised as you are awed. His dignified virtuosity is a given.”
U.S. solo recital tour
Andsnes’s upcoming tour program combines two East European works with two by Robert Schumann, whose 4 Klavierstücke and Carnaval flank the first book of Janáček’s On an Overgrown Path and selections from György Kurtág’s vast ongoing collection of playful miniatures, Játékok (“Games”).
Music by all three composers has featured in Andsnes’s live performances and recordings for many years. As a former student of the renowned Czech teacher Jiří Hlinka, Andsnes has long impressed critics with his “resonance with Czech music” (Seen and Heard International), especially his “style and mastery” (Bachtrack) in Janáček. Having worked directly with György Kurtág, whom he considers “a unique composer and a fabulous musician,” Andsnes recently joined fellow pianist Chamayou for “beautifully shaped and vivid” (The Guardian) accounts of solos and duets from Játékok at London’s Wigmore Hall. As for Schumann, at a season-opening recital capped by Carnaval at Montreal’s Bourgie Hall this past September, Andsnes “gave a commanding performance, … meticulously putting down layer after layer of sound to create grand-scale tableaus with a clear vision for the finished canvas.” As MyScena’s review concluded: “This recital was the first of Bourgie Hall’s Outstanding Pianists series, and the verdict was that Andsnes was, in fact, outstanding.”
Beethoven 3 in Atlanta, Chicago, London, & beyond
Andsnes revisits Beethoven’s Third Piano Concerto with orchestras on both sides of the Atlantic in the spring. In the States, he joins the Atlanta Symphony and Music Director Nathalie Stutzmann for three performances (March 5–7), of which the second will stream live to home audiences in the orchestra’s “Behind the Curtain” series (March 6). Next, after giving a sold-out solo recital in the Skyline Piano Artist Series at Northwestern University’s Bienen School of Music (March 9), he reprises the concerto with Jakub Hrůša and the Chicago Symphony (March 12–14). Andsnes’s previous collaborations with the orchestra include season-opening performances of the Grieg concerto in 2019, when the Chicago Sun Times reported:
“The pianist delivered nothing shy of a definitive performance of this ever-popular masterpiece, playing with poetic elegance, unyielding clarity and nuanced touch. Never overselling or pushing too hard, he conveyed the innate romanticism and beauty of this music.”
Bookending the pianist’s high-profile U.S. engagements are performances of Beethoven’s Third with no fewer than seven European orchestras: Sweden’s Gothenburg Symphony (Jan 9 & 10), Italy’s Filarmonica della Scala (March 30), the Danish National Symphony (April 30 & May 1), Portugal’s Gulbenkian Orchestra (May 7 & 8), Germany’s Bamberg Symphony (May 22 & 23), France’s Orchestre National de Lyon (June 11 & 13), and the London Symphony Orchestra, where he reunites with Stutzmann (May 14).
Beethoven’s music has been a central focus of Andsnes’s career for many years. The Beethoven Journey, his recording of the composer’s complete music for piano and orchestra, was chosen as one of The New York Times’s “Best of 2014” and recognized with BBC Music Magazine’s “2015 Recording of the Year Award.” Similarly, his live performances of complete Beethoven concerto cycles at Carnegie Hall and London’s BBC Proms were chosen among the “Best of 2015” by The New York Times and The Guardian respectively. About his accounts of Beethoven’s First and Third Piano Concertos, Gramophone writes:
“These performances are not simply about élan and energy: they have a sense of gravitas, too, of rightness, that you find in the greatest Beethoven interpreters… . This isn’t something that is achieved by big, ballsy playing but rather by a sense of balance, of musicality, of understanding not only the notes themselves but the wider context – where these pieces stand within Beethoven’s output and a broader historical perspective, too.”
Concerto premiere in Norway
The coming months see Andsnes bring to life a new Piano Concerto, composed for him by his compatriot Ørjan Matre. After giving its world premiere performances with the Oslo Philharmonic and Danish conductor Thomas Søndergård (Feb 26 & 27), he undertakes the work with Edward Gardner and the Bergen Philharmonic (April 16 & 17). The new concerto marks Andsnes’s second collaboration with Edvard Prize winner Matre, who previously created a special arrangement of his orchestral work Lyric Pieces, a nominee for the Nordic Council Music Prize, for Andsnes to perform with the Bergen Philharmonic on Grieg’s birthday in 2020.
Committed to expanding the piano repertoire, Andsnes is already the dedicatee of Marc-André Dalbavie’s Piano Concerto, which he premiered at London’s BBC Proms, and Bent Sørensen’s The Shadows of Silence, which he premiered at Carnegie Hall. His world premiere recordings of both works were recently re-released as part of the acclaimed 36-CD retrospective Leif Ove Andsnes: The Complete Warner Classics Edition (1990-2010). Further demonstrating his dedication to contemporary music, Andsnes featured Norwegian composers Lene Grenager, Ketil Hvoslef, Marius Neset, Ruth Wilhelmine Meyer, and Knut Vaage as composers-in-residence during his nine seasons as the founder and artistic director of Norway’s celebrated Rosendal Chamber Music Festival.
New recordings of Schubert & Geirr Tveitt
Released on November 21, Schubert: Four Hands was recorded for Warner Classics with fellow pianist Bertrand Chamayou. Schubert’s Fantasia in F minor, widely counted among the greatest works for piano four hands, forms the album’s centerpiece, alongside the composer’s Rondo in A, Fugue in E minor, and Lebensstürme. In a glowing review, The Guardian writes: “Leif Ove Andsnes and Bertrand Chamayou are thoughtful musicians, and it’s immediately apparent from these affectionately searching accounts that they possess an emotional synergy.”
A second new title follows in April, when Simax issues Geirr Tveitt: Sonata No. 29, Folk Tunes and Songs, showcasing rarely heard music by Norwegian composer Geirr Tveitt (1908–81). In 1970, Tveitt lost almost 300 compositions, representing about eighty percent of his life’s work, in a devastating house fire that left him struggling to compose for the remainder of his life. Over the past two seasons, Andsnes has regularly championed Tveitt’s music, giving many live performances of the Sonata No. 29, “Sonata Etere” (Ethereal Sonata), the composer’s sole surviving piano sonata. On the new recording, Andsnes complements the sonata with a selection of piano pieces from Tveitt’s Femti folkatonar frao Hardanger (“Fifty Folktunes from Hardanger”) and several of his songs, featuring soprano Solveig Andsnes, the pianist’s sister. About the importance of the “Sonata Etere,” Andsnes says:
“This is a gigantic piece of music built on small melodies with many variations. It is a tough piece to play, but very rewarding. I feel it is the most ambitious solo piano piece by a Norwegian composer. I have played it in more than 35 concerts – from Barcelona to Baltimore – and people find it very exciting, and engaging. It really has an epic feeling, with Russian rhythmic influences combined with touches of French music and folk music. Tveitt was obsessed with modal harmonies and he really is in a world all his own – some even refer to him as the ‘Norwegian Charles Ives.’”
The Guardian found Andsnes “an insightful champion” of Tveitt’s sonata at the Wigmore Hall, where his “high musical intelligence and unerring communicative power made this journey of discovery, and rediscovery, both a tonic and a treat” (The Arts Desk, UK). Similarly, after accounts of the work in Cleveland and at Carnegie Hall, the New York Classical Review admired Andsnes’s “imagination and tonal range,” and Seen and Heard International wrote:
“I found the work stunning and can only thank Leif Ove Andsnes for his boldness and commitment in mastering the strange and glorious piece and – if I am guessing correctly – setting up this tour to share the discovery with us. … The majority of the crowd [went] into a standing, cheering ovation,” something that is “by no means a given for a thorny, visionary sonata that few in the crowd could have known.”
As the reviewer concluded: “It rather seemed that we were all caught up in the strange genius of the work, which Andsnes hypnotically conveyed.”
Andsnes’s existing discography comprises more than 50 titles, many of them bestsellers, spanning repertoire from the Baroque to the present day. He has been nominated for eleven Grammys and his numerous international prizes include seven Gramophone Awards.
Leif Ove Andsnes: upcoming engagements
Dec 11
Norrköping, Sweden
Norrköping Symphony Orchestra / Magnus Fryklund
BRAHMS: Piano Concerto No. 2
Dec 17 & 19
Vienna, Austria
Vienna Symphony Orchestra / Karina Canellakis
BRAHMS: Piano Concerto No. 2
Jan 9 & 10
Gothenburg, Sweden
Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra / Magnus Fryklund
BEETHOVEN: Piano Concerto No. 3
Jan 21–30: U.S. recital tour
Jan 21: Athens, GA
Jan 23: Seattle, WA
Jan 25: Stanford, CA (Bing Concert Hall)
Jan 27: New York, NY (Carnegie Hall)
Jan 30: Boston, MA (New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall)
R. SCHUMANN: 4 Klavierstücke
György KURTÁG: Játékok (selections)
JANÁČEK: On an Overgrown Path
R. SCHUMANN: Carnaval
Feb 26 & 27
Oslo, Norway
Oslo Philharmonic / Thomas Søndergård
Ørjan MATRE: Piano Concerto (world premiere)
March 5–7
Atlanta, GA
Atlanta Symphony Orchestra / Nathalie Stutzmann
BEETHOVEN: Piano Concerto No. 3
(March 6: “Behind The Curtain” live performance video capture)
March 9
Evanston, IL
Northwestern University, Galvin Recital Hall
Skyline Piano Artist Series
Solo recital
March 12–14
Chicago, IL
Chicago Symphony Orchestra / Jakub Hrůša
BEETHOVEN: Piano Concerto No. 3
March 27
Lucerne, Switzerland
Lucerne Festival
Lucerne Festival Orchestra
Mozart: Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor, K. 466
March 30
Milan, Italy
Teatro alla Scala
Filarmonica della Scala / Myung-Whun Chung
BEETHOVEN: Piano Concerto No. 3
April 11 & 12
Haugesund, Norway
Festiviteten Haugesund Konserthus
Solo recital:
CHOPIN: selection TBA
György KURTÁG: Játékok (selections)
BEETHOVEN: Piano Sonata No. 32 in C minor, Op. 111
CHOPIN: 24 Preludes, Op. 28
April 16 & 17
Bergen, Norway
Grieg Hall
Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra / Edward Gardner
Ørjan MATRE: Piano Concerto (Bergen premiere)
April 22
Vilnius, Lithuania
Lithuanian National Philharmonic Hall
Details to come
April 23
Tallinn, Estonia
Estonia Kontserdisaal
Details to come
April 30 & May 1
Copenhagen, Denmark
Danish National Symphony / Antonello Manacorda
BEETHOVEN: Piano Concerto No. 3
May 7 & 8
Lisbon, Portugal
Gulbenkian Orchestra / Hannu Lintu
BEETHOVEN: Piano Concerto No. 3
May 14
London, UK
London Symphony Orchestra / Nathalie Stutzmann
BEETHOVEN: Piano Concerto No. 3
May 22 & 23
Bamberg, Germany
Bamberg Symphony / Kazuki Yamada
BEETHOVEN: Piano Concerto No. 3
June 5
Arnhem, Netherlands
Musis Sacrum / Schouwburg Arnhem
Solo recital:
CHOPIN: selection TBA
György KURTÁG: Játékok (selections)
BEETHOVEN: Piano Sonata No. 32 in C minor, Op. 111
CHOPIN: 24 Preludes, Op. 28
June 6
Groningen, Netherlands
SPOT Groningen / De Oosterpoort
Solo recital:
CHOPIN: selection TBA
György KURTÁG: Játékok (selections)
BEETHOVEN: Piano Sonata No. 32 in C minor, Op. 111
CHOPIN: 24 Preludes, Op. 28
June 11 & 13
Lyon, France
Orchestre National de Lyon / Nikolaj Szeps-Znaider
BEETHOVEN: Piano Concerto No. 3
June 26
Schloss Elmau / Oberbayern, Germany
Schloss Elmau
Solo recital:
CHOPIN: 24 Preludes, Op. 28
CHOPIN: additional selection TBA
June 29
Copenhagen, Denmark
Tivoli Gardens
Solo recital:
CHOPIN: selection TBA
György KURTÁG: Játékok (selections)
BEETHOVEN: Piano Sonata No. 32 in C minor, Op. 111
CHOPIN: 24 Preludes, Op. 28