Moray Piano Competition 2009

Noriko Ogawa has achieved considerable renown throughout the world since her success at the 1987 Leeds International Piano Competition. Ogawa appears with all the major UK, European, Japanese and US orchestras in concerto repertoire, which ranges from the well-known romantic works to twentieth-century composAmongst the leading conductors she has worked with are Dutoit, Vanska, Vonk, Lazarev, Pesek, Slatkin, Handley, Otaka, Rozhdestvensky and Tortelier.

Ogawa is also renowned as a recitalist and chamber musician and such appearances have taken her all over the world, including a recent trip to Kenya. In February 2008 Ogawa made her recital debut at Suntory Hall, Japan for her 20^th anniversary concert. As a chamber musician, Ogawa has been involved in various projects, including a tour of Japan with the Berlin Philharmonic Wind Ensemble and the leader of the Vienna Philharmonic, Rainer Honeck. In 2001 Ogawa and Kathryn Stott launched their piano duo collaboration. The Ogawa/Stott Duo has recently completed a highly successful Japanese tour and are currently presenting Graham Fitkin’s double piano concerto Circuit. Ogawa has also worked with Steven Isserlis, Isabelle van Keulen, Martin Roscoe, Michael Collins and Peter Donohoe on chamber projects.

A regular commissioner of new pieces, Ogawa has been involved in numerous premieres. Ogawa has recently completed a chamber tour in Japan with Evelyn Glennie, for which she commissioned and premiered an exciting new work for two pianos and percussion by Yoshihiro Kanno. Ogawa will perform the premiere of ‘Ampere’, a concerto written for her by Dai Fujikura, with the Philharmonia Orchestra in February 2009. A new solo work for Nambu bell and piano by Yoshihiro Kanno, Hikari-no-Ryushi (A Particle of Light) will also be premiered by Ogawa this season.

Ogawa has made numerous recordings of a wide range of her orchestral, chamber and solo repertoire. Since 1997 Noriko Ogawa has been an exclusive recording artist for BIS Records. Her recordings include Toru Takemitsu Riverrun (Gramophone Magazine Editor’s Choice) and Mussorgsky Pictures at an Exhibition (BBC Music Magazine Critics’ Choice). Ogawa has also released the piano concertos of Rachmaninov, and discs of music by Tcherepnin, Saint-Saens and Grieg. Recent releases include Delius music for piano duo and Graham Fitkin’s double concerto Circuit both with duo partner Kathryn Stott.

Ogawa is presenting the complete solo works for piano by Debussy in an ongoing series with BIS. Volume II won the Gramophone Magazine’s Editor’s Choice. Equal admiration has been awarded to Volume III, also winning Gramophone’s Editor’s Choice, and further establishing Ogawa’s profile as a Debussy expert. The recently released Volume IV, including the complete 12 Etudes, has already won critical acclaim and prompted Roger Vignoles on BBC Radio 3 CD Review to admire the ‘beautifully nuanced and many-layered playing from Noriko Ogawa’.

Alongside performing and recording, Ogawa also has a busy schedule in other guises in the music world. As an adjudicator on various panels, Ogawa regularly judges the BBC Young Musician of the Year Competition and the Scottish International Piano Competition. In Japan, Ogawa acts as artistic advisor the MUZA Kawasaki Symphony Hall (www.kawasaki-sym-hall.jp) in her hometown. The Japanese Ministry of Education awarded Ogawa their Art Prize in recognition of her outstanding contribution to the cultural profile of Japan throughout the world and she has also been awarded the Okura Prize for her outstanding contribution to music in Japan. A regular contributor to the music press, Ogawa has recently published her first book Together with the Piano in Japan to great success. Ogawa makes regular radio and television broadcasts for both NHK and Nippon television and in autumn 2008 will be presenting BBC Worldwide’s Visionaries series. www.norikoogawa.com