The American pianist Robert Levin performs all over the world. He has performed on the concert grand piano with the orchestras of Berlin, Birmingham, Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, La Scala, Los Angeles and Vienna; on the fortepiano with the Academy of Ancient Music, the English Baroque Soloists, and the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment. His revival of the practice of improvised cadenzas and ornaments in Viennese classical music is recognized worldwide.
He has made complete recordings of the Mozart piano concertos with Christopher Hogwood, the Beethoven concertos with John Eliot Gardiner and the complete works for piano by Henri Dutilleux. His more recent recordings include the six Bach partitas (Grand Prix International du Disque) and Mozart’s complete piano sonatas on Mozart’s own Walter grand piano.
A passionate advocate of new music, Robert Levin has performed numerous commissions and world premieres, including Paysage au clair de lune by Denissow, Veils (2001) by Joshua Feinberg, the 2nd Piano Sonata by John Haribson (2003), the piano concerto Chiavi in mano by Yehudi Wyner (2005, Pulitzer Prize 2006) and Träume by Hans Peter Türk (2014).
His active career as a chamber musician includes a long collaboration with the violist Kim Kashkashian and a duo with his wife, the pianist Ya-Fei Chuang. In addition to his concert activities, Robert Levin is a music theorist and Mozart researcher.
From 2007 to 2016, Robert Levin was Artistic Director of the Sarasota Music Festival/FL; from 2002 to 2024, he was President of the International Johann Sebastian Bach Competition Leipzig. He was awarded the Bach Medal of the City of Leipzig in 2018 and the Golden Medal of the International Mozarteum Foundation in Salzburg in 2024. A member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and an honorary member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, he was the Dwight P. Robinson, Jr. Professor of the Humanities at Harvard University from 1993 to 2013. He currently holds visiting professorships at the Juilliard School New York and the Sibelius Academy Helsinki and is International Chair at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama London.