Polish pianist Ignaz Friedman was one of the leading virtuosos of his day but was also a composer and a master transcriber. Friedman’s transcriptions are both a delight for the listener and a challenge for the performer, and his creative imagination gives these delicious, charming and moving works a life of their own, introducing pianistic effects both breathtakingly bravura and disarmingly subtle while remaining faithful to the originals.

Grammy nominated American pianist Joseph Banowetz has been heard as recitalist and orchestral soloist on five continents, with performances with such orchestras as the St Petersburg Philharmonic, the Moscow State Symphony, the Prague and Bratislava Radio Orchestras, the Budapest Symphony, the Barcelona Concert Society Orchestra, the New Zealand Symphony, the Beijing National Philharmonic, the Shanghai Symphony, the Hong Kong Philharmonic, and the Seoul Philharmonic. Banowetz is also well known as an author. His book The Pianist’s Guide to Pedalling (Indiana University Press) has to date been printed in seven languages. He is a graduate with a First Prize from the Vienna Akademie für Musik und Darstellende Kunst, and his teachers have included Carl Friedberg (a pupil of Clara Schumann) and György Sándor (a pupil of Bartók).