Widely celebrated for his considered and profound interpretations of the classical repertoire, PAUL LEWIS is recognized internationally as one of today’s most distinctive and poetic pianists. His many awards and prizes have included the Royal Philharmonic Society’s Instrumentalist of the Year Award and the South Bank Show Classical Music Award, both in 2003, a Diapason d’or in France in 2002, two successive Edison awards in Holland in 2004 and 2005, and the Gramophone Instrumental Award and Record of the Year in 2008. In 2006 he was awarded the 25th Premio Internazionale Accademia Musicale Chigiana in Siena. Between 2005 and 2007, he performed the complete Beethoven Piano Sonatas at venues throughout Europe and North America to great critical acclaim, and his recordings of the cycle for Harmonia Mundi have received unanimous praise throughout the world.

Paul Lewis is a regular guest at many of the world’s most prestigious venues and festivals, including the BBC Proms, appearing at the televised “Last Night” in 2005, the Schubertiade Schwarzenberg, the Roque d’Antheron Piano Festival, and the Klavier Festival Ruhr. He has a particularly strong relationship with London’s Wigmore Hall, where he has appeared on more than 30 occasions. He has performed with many of the world’s leading orchestras, including all of the major UK orchestras, the Vienna Symphony, the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, the Bamberg Symphony, the NDR-Philharmonie Hannover, the Wiener Kammerphilharmonie, the Seattle Symphony, the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, the Australian Chamber Orchestra, the Sydney Symphony, and the Melbourne Symphony, with conductors such as Sir Colin Davis, Bernard Haitink, Christoph von Dohnányi, Sir Mark Elder, Sir Charles Mackerras, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Sir Andrew Davis, Marin Alsop, Dimitri Kitajenko, Daniel Harding, Adam Fischer, Richard Hickox, Emmanuel Krivine, and Joseph Swensen.

Recent highlights have included opening the Mostly Mozart Festival in New York with Beethoven’s Fifth Piano Concerto, concerts in New York, Chicago, Milan, and Turin with the London Symphony Orchestra and Sir Colin Davis, a European tour with the Bournemouth Symphony and Marin Alsop, a complete Beethoven Concerto cycle with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra and Vasily Petrenko, recitals at the Schleswig Holstein and Rheingau festivals, and an extensive tour of the U.S. with the Australian Chamber Orchestra. Solo recitals have taken him to venues such as Toppan Hall Tokyo, Symphony Center in Chicago, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Tonhalle Zurich, Auditorio Nacional Madrid, the Kennedy Center in Washington, and the Vienna Konzerthaus.

Plans for 2009 and beyond include a busy international schedule of recitals, concerts with the London Symphony, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Chicago Symphony, a solo recital tour of Australia with Musica Viva, duo recitals with Mark Padmore and Steven Osborne, a recital at the Royal Festival Hall in 2010, and the start of a two-year Schubert project from 2011. Future recording plans feature Beethoven’s “Diabelli” Variations, the complete Beethoven Concertos with the BBC Symphony Orchestra and Jir?í Be?lohlavek, and the three Schubert song cycles with Mark Padmore, all for Harmonia Mundi.

Paul Lewis studied with Joan Havill at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, before going on to study privately with Alfred Brendel. Along with his wife, the Norwegian cellist Bjørg Lewis, he is artistic director of Midsummer Music, an annual chamber music festival held in Buckinghamshire, UK.