Tobias Koch is a German

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 pianist

Pianist

A pianist is a musician who plays the piano. A professional pianist can perform solo pieces, play with an ensemble or orchestra, or accompany one or more singers, solo instrumentalists, or other performers.-Choice of genres:...

.

Biography

Tobias Koch was born in Kempen

Kempen, Germany

Kempen is a town in the district of Viersen, named after Aaron Kempen, in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is situated approx. 30 km northwest of Düsseldorf, and 20 km east of Venlo. It was once a centre of textile manufacturing, i.e. silk, cotton, linen, etc.-Notable persons:Kempen is...

. He attended the Robert Schumann Music College in Düsseldorf

Düsseldorf

Düsseldorf is the capital city of the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia and centre of the Rhine-Ruhr metropolitan region.Düsseldorf is an important international business and financial centre and renowned for its fashion and trade fairs. Located centrally within the European Megalopolis, the...

, and conservatories Vienna

Vienna

Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...

, Graz

Graz

The more recent population figures do not give the whole picture as only people with principal residence status are counted and people with secondary residence status are not. Most of the people with secondary residence status in Graz are students...

 and Brussels

Brussels

Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...

. He has also gained valuable artistic inspiration from the pianists David Levine, Roberto Szidon

Roberto Szidon

Roberto Szidon is a Brazilian classical pianist who has had an international performing and recording career, and has settled in Germany.He gave his first concert at age 9, in his home town of Porto Alegre...

, Jos van Immerseel

Jos van Immerseel

Jos van Immerseel is a Flemish harpsichordist, pianist and conductor.Van Immerseel studied organ, piano and harpsichord at the Antwerp Conservatory under Flor Peeters, Eugène Traey and harpsichordist and musicologist Kenneth Gilbert...

, Andreas Staier

Andreas Staier

Andreas Staier is a German pianist and harpsichordist.-Life:Staier studied piano and harpsichord in the Hochschule für Musik in Hanover, with Kurt Bauer and Erika Haase for piano and from Lajos Rovatkay for harpsichord, and also in Amsterdam. From 1983 until 1986 he was the harpsichord soloist for...

, and Malcolm Bilson

Malcolm Bilson

Malcolm Bilson is an American pianist specializing in performance on the fortepiano, which is the 18th century version of the piano. Bilson is the Frederick J...

. Tobias Koch is the recipient of the Music endowment award of the City of Düsseldorf. He pursues a concert career specializing in historically informed performance

Historically informed performance

Historically informed performance is an approach in the performance of music and theater. Within this approach, the performance adheres to state-of-the-art knowledge of the aesthetic criteria of the period in which the music or theatre work was conceived...

 practice and musicological research, constantly striving to lend the music he performs vivid color and unorthodox style on keyboard instruments best suited for the repertoire in question, be it clavichord

Clavichord

The clavichord is a European stringed keyboard instrument known from the late Medieval, through the Renaissance, Baroque and Classical eras. Historically, it was widely used as a practice instrument and as an aid to composition, not being loud enough for larger performances. The clavichord produces...

, harpsichord

Harpsichord

A harpsichord is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It produces sound by plucking a string when a key is pressed.In the narrow sense, "harpsichord" designates only the large wing-shaped instruments in which the strings are perpendicular to the keyboard...

, piano

Piano

The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...

, organ

Organ (music)

The organ , is a keyboard instrument of one or more divisions, each played with its own keyboard operated either with the hands or with the feet. The organ is a relatively old musical instrument in the Western musical tradition, dating from the time of Ctesibius of Alexandria who is credited with...

, Romantic or modern concert grand.

His repertoire extends from Orlando Gibbons

Orlando Gibbons

Orlando Gibbons was an English composer, virginalist and organist of the late Tudor and early Jacobean periods...

 to Karlheinz Stockhausen

Karlheinz Stockhausen

Karlheinz Stockhausen was a German composer, widely acknowledged by critics as one of the most important but also controversial composers of the 20th and early 21st centuries. Another critic calls him "one of the great visionaries of 20th-century music"...

. His performing career has taken him all over Europe including appearances as a soloist, chamber music partner and vocal accompanist at important festivals in Schleswig-Holstein

Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival

The Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival is a classical music festival held every year in summer time all over the state of Schleswig-Holstein in Northern Germany....

, Ludwigsburg, Verbier

Verbier Festival

The Verbier Festival is an international music festival that takes place annually for two weeks in late July and early August in the mountain resort of Verbier, Switzerland.Founded by Swedish expatriate Martin T...

, the Rheingau Musik Festival

Rheingau Musik Festival

The Rheingau Musik Festival is an international summer music festival in Germany, founded in 1987. It is mostly for classical music, but includes other genres...

, the Schumann Festivals in Düsseldorf and Zwickau

Zwickau

Zwickau in Germany, former seat of the government of the south-western region of the Free State of Saxony, belongs to an industrial and economical core region. Nowadays it is the capital city of the district of Zwickau...

, and the Mendelssohn Festival in Leipzig. He frequently performs as the official pianist at the Queen Elisabeth Music Competition

Queen Elisabeth Music Competition

The Queen Elisabeth Music Competition, a founding member of the World Federation of International Music Competitions has been, since its foundation, considered the world over to be one of the most prestigious and most difficult. It is devoted to violin , piano , to composition and to singing...

 and Verbier Academy.

His chamber music partners include Andreas Staier, Joshua Bell

Joshua Bell

Joshua David Bell is an American Grammy Award-winning violinist.-Childhood:Bell was born in Bloomington, Indiana, United States, the son of a psychologist and a therapist. Bell's father is the late Alan P...

, and Steven Isserlis

Steven Isserlis

Steven Isserlis CBE is a British cellist. He is distinguished for his diverse repertoire, distinctive sound and total command of phrasing. He studied at Oberlin Conservatory of Music and was much influenced by the great iconoclast of Russian cello playing, Daniil Shafran...

. He collaborates closely with instrument makers, is on the faculty of the Robert Schumann Music College Düsseldorf and the Gutenberg University in Mainz, and at the Summer Academy in Montepulciano

Montepulciano

Montepulciano is a medieval and Renaissance hill town and comune in the province of Siena in southern Tuscany, in Italy. Montepulciano, with an elevation of 605 m, sits on a high limestone ridge. By car it is 13 km E of Pienza; 70 km SE of Siena, 124 km SE of Florence, and...

. His performances are featured in more than 90 radio and TV productions. Publications on performance practice, rhetoric and musical aesthetics round out his work in the field of music. Koch has a strong affinity with encyclopedic projects, as demonstrated in his complete performances of the piano works of Mozart, Haydn, Schubert, Felix Mendelssohn

Felix Mendelssohn

Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Barthóldy , use the form 'Mendelssohn' and not 'Mendelssohn Bartholdy'. The Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians gives ' Felix Mendelssohn' as the entry, with 'Mendelssohn' used in the body text...

, Norbert Burgmüller

Norbert Burgmüller

Norbert Burgmüller was a German composer.-Life:Burgmüller was born in Düsseldorf, the youngest son in a musical family. His father, August Burgmüller, was the director of a theatre. His mother, Therese von Zandt, was a singer and piano teacher. He had two brothers, Franz and Friedrich, who was...

, Robert Schumann

Robert Schumann

Robert Schumann, sometimes known as Robert Alexander Schumann, was a German composer, aesthete and influential music critic. He is regarded as one of the greatest and most representative composers of the Romantic era....

, Leoš Janáček

Leoš Janácek

Leoš Janáček was a Czech composer, musical theorist, folklorist, publicist and teacher. He was inspired by Moravian and all Slavic folk music to create an original, modern musical style. Until 1895 he devoted himself mainly to folkloristic research and his early musical output was influenced by...

 and Arnold Schoenberg

Arnold Schoenberg

Arnold Schoenberg was an Austrian composer, associated with the expressionist movement in German poetry and art, and leader of the Second Viennese School...

. He is also considered one of the leading Schumann specialists, in particular within the field of Romantic performance practice.

Discography

Robert Schumann: Piano Music for the Young.
Recorded 2009.
GENUIN 10170 (2010)

Robert and Clara Schumann: Piano Works from Dresden 1845-1849.
Recorded 2008.
GENUIN 10159 (2010)

Robert Schumann: Late Piano Works 1850-1855.
Recorded 2006.
GENUIN 86062 (2007)

Robert Schumann: Complete Works for Violin and Pianoforte.
Albert Dietrich, Johannes Brahms, Robert Schumann: FAE-Sonata
Joseph Joachim, Clara Schumann, Ferdinand David: Romances for Violin and Pianoforte
with Lisa Marie Landgraf - violin.
Recorded 2004.
GENUIN 04043 3 CDs (2004)

Norbert Burgmüller: Complete Works for Pianoforte.
Frédéric Burgmüller: Reveries fantastiques, Op. 41; Valse brillante, Opus 106; Etudes, Op. 100
Felix Mendelssohn: Marcia funebre, Op. 103
Recorded 2005.
GENUIN 86061 (2006)

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: The Palatine Sonatas, KV 301-306.
Andante and Fugue KV 402
with Lisa Marie Landgraf - violin
Recorded 2006.
GENUIN 87096 2 CDs (2007)

Felix Mendelssohn: Piano Works. (Songs without Words Opp. 30, 62; Rondo cappricioso, Op. 14; Phantasy "The last Rose", etc.)
Fanny Hensel: Songs without Words, Op. 8; Prelude e-minor
Recorded 2009.
GENUIN 89156 (2009)

Felix Mendelssohn: Complete Piano Trios.
with Alte Musik Köln
Recorded 2009.
Ars Produktion 38059 (2009)

Francois Glorieux: Divertimento for piano and strings.
with Kiev Chamber Orchestra, Francois Glorieux (cond.)
Recorded 1994.
Talent Records TLN 504 (reissue 2005)

External links

• Tobias Koch official website