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Martino Tirimo

Professorial Staff - Piano and Chamber Music

Music

Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance
Faculty of Music
King Charles Court
Old Royal Naval College
Greenwich
London
SE10 9JF

Tel: +44 (0)20 8305 4444

Email: m.tirimo@trinitylaban.ac.uk

Martino Tirimo

Biography

Martino Tirimo was born into a musical family in Cyprus and began piano and violin lessons with his father, a conductor and violinist. He gave his first concert at the age of six and when only twelve he conducted seven performances of Verdi’s La traviata, including soloists from La Scala, Milan. He has appeared with many of the world’s leading orchestras, including all the major British orchestras and those in Berlin, Cleveland, Dresden, Leipzig, Munich, Prague, Vienna and other centres, with conductors including John Barbirolli, Adrian Boult, John Pritchard, Kurt Sanderling, Kurt Masur and Simon Rattle. 

Qualifications And Background

At the age of sixteen, Martino won the Liszt Scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music, graduating with the highest honours, after which he completed his studies in Vienna. He later worked closely with Gordon Green, whom he regarded as his greatest mentor.

He has also played and directed many cycles of the five Beethoven Concertos with the Dresdner Philharmonie in Germany and at the Royal Festival Hall in London. He has often appeared with this orchestra, both as soloist and conductor. His repertoire is enormous, including 70 concertos and most of the major works of the great composers, and he has become a champion of the Tippett Concerto, which he performed several times with the composer conducting. Tirimo is particularly renowned for his Schubert interpretations, and in 1975 became the first pianist to perform a truly complete cycle of the 21 sonatas in public, with his own completions to the unfinished movements, at the Queen Elizabeth Hall. The eight CDs were released throughout 1997 and in the same season he presented six concerts at Wigmore Hall devoted to all of Schubert’s major piano works.

For more information, visit Martino Tirimo’s website.

Qualifications/ Educational Background

At the age of sixteen Martino won the Liszt Scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music, graduating with the highest honours, after which he completed his studies in Vienna. He later worked closely with Gordon Green, whom he regarded as his greatest mentor.

Creative Outputs

Reviews:

“An inspiring poet of the piano… a pianist of vision… his playing is among the most haunting and fascinating of all”.
The Daily Telegraph

Recordings:

  • 1991 – The Tippett Concerto (Nimbus)
  • Two Brahms Concertos with the London Philharmonic (EMI)
  • Two Chopin Concertos with the Philharmonia (BMG)
  • Rachmaninov’s Concerto No. 2 and Paganini Rhapsody with the Philharmonia (EMI)
  • Complete piano music of Debussy (4 CDs)
  • Complete piano music of Janacek (2 CDs)
  • 1997 – 21 Schubert Sonatas (EMI)

Broadcasts:

  • The Tippett Concerto live from Coventry cathedral in celebration of the composer’s 90th birthday
  • 1998 – composer of the film score for The Odyssey, screened on Channel 4 and other TV stations in Europe

Awards

  • 1971 – Winner, International Piano Competition, Munich
  • 1972 – Winner,  International Piano Competition, Geneva
  • 1995 – Gold Disc winner for Rachmaninov’s Concerto No. 2 and Paganini Rhapsody with the Philharmonia (EMI)

Martino Tirimo