Dances for two pianos

Sought after as a collaborative performer, pianist Sophia Munoz concertizes regularly with Emily D’Angelo, Cameron Shahbazi, and Hera Hyesang Park. A collaborator on Emily D'Angelo's most recently released album -- Freezing -- she can also be found on Deutsche Grammophon's DG Stage platform with Jonathan Tetelman. Sophia also accompanied the 2021 Deutsche Grammophon’s Yellowlounge celebrating International Women’s Day with Nadine Sierra, Hera Hyesang Park, and Bomsori Kim, and was featured on a Hope@Home broadcast on ARTE (2020). A graduate of the Lindemann Young Artist Program at the Metropolitan Opera (2016), she is currently a member of the music staff at the Dallas Opera, and a faculty member of the Opera Academy of the National Opera in Warsaw, Poland. Past seasons include Assistant Conductor at the Metropolitan Opera for L’Italiana in Algieri (2016) under James Levine, and as a member of the music staff at the Komische Oper Berlin from 2017-2022, she assisted in the musical preparation of operas such as Enescu’s Oedipe (2021), Shostakovich’s Die Nase (2018, 2021), and Henze’s The Bassarids under Vladimir Jurowski (2019). She is also a frequent guest artist at the LacMus Festival in Tremezzina, Lago di Como. In addition, Sophia has performed in concert with artists including Anna Pirozzi, Christiane Karg, Ambrosio Maestri, René Barbera, Rihab Chaieb, Jakub Józef Orliński, Ewa Płonka, Betty Garces, and Szymon Komasa. She was staff pianist at the Internationale Meistersinger Akademie (2017, 2016, 2015, 2013), and staff pianist at Eppaner Liedsommer (2016). Sophia received her MM (2014) and BM (2012) from Mannes College the New School for Music where she studied with Cristina Stanescu and Vlad Iftinca, who continued the training she received from her formative teacher, Jura Margulis. She speaks English, German, French, Italian, and is studying Polish.

Descritto dalla rivista Romania Literară come un artista dalla “colorata fantasia timbrica, di sapore ispirato e impressionante attrattiva”, Stefano Brizzi si avvicina al pianoforte all’età di sette anni. Nato nel 2007, studia presso il Conservatorio “F. Morlacchi” di Perugia sotto la guida di Luigi Carroccia; ha inoltre frequentato Masterclass tenute da Maestri del calibro di Benedetto Lupo, Enrico Pace e Beatrice Rana. Una componente fondamentale della sua formazione sono stati i corsi di Alto Perfezionamento Pianistico dell’Accademia Internazionale di Musica e Arte AIMART di Roma con Giorgia Alessandra Brustia. Nonostante la giovane età, si è già esibito in recital e concorsi in Italia, Austria, Polonia, Romania, Ungheria, Spagna e Stati Uniti. Tra le esperienze più rilevanti figurano la collaborazione con l’Istituto Italiano di Cultura di Bucarest, che lo ha portato a esibirsi presso la Filarmonica “George Enescu”, e la tournée in Texas con la “Las Colinas Symphony Orchestra”, con cui ha interpretato il Concerto n. 3 in do minore op. 37 di Beethoven. Tra i riconoscimenti ottenuti si distinguono il Premio Speciale “Iancu Tucarman” al Concorso Steinway per Giovani Talenti, svoltosi presso il Teatro “Ristori” di Verona, il Primo Premio assoluto ai concorsi internazionali “Città di Spoleto”, “Henryk Melcer” (Polonia) e “Andrea Baldi” (Bologna), nonché il Grand Prix al “Musica Italia Grand Prize” di Campobasso. 

Italian pianist Giorgio Lazzari—top prize winner at the International Telekom Beethoven Competition Bonn and the Robert Schumann Competition Düsseldorf, and semifinalist at the Honens International Piano Competition 2025—has already appeared extensively across Italy and Europe, both as a soloist and with orchestra. He is especially admired for his interpretations of the German and Austrian classics, as well as for his work in chamber music. He has performed at major festivals including the Klavier-Festival Ruhr, Staatsoper Unter den Linden, Schumannfest Düsseldorf, Beethovenfest Bonn, Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, Bonner Schumannfest, Vaduz Classic, Società Filarmonica di Trento, Festival Pianistico Internazionale di Brescia e Bergamo, Milano Musica, Amici della Musica di Padova, Kirchheimbolanden Festival, GIA Brescia, Musica Insieme Bologna, Teatro Ponchielli di Cremona, Trame Sonore, and Harmonies en Livradois. A devoted chamber musician, Giorgio regularly performs with violinist Sofia Manvati as Duo Rodin, with whom he recently won the Renzo Giubergia Prize 2025. His passion for chamber music was further deepened through the Résidence de Musique de Chambre at the 2023 Festival d’Aix-en-Provence and the Villa Musica Rheinland-Pfalz program, where he collaborated with artists such as Kirill Gerstein, Roman Simovic and Stefan Dohr.

Giorgio is also strongly committed to contemporary repertoire. He has worked closely with composers

including Stefano Gervasoni, Alessandro Solbiati, and Olivier Cuendet, focusing on their solo and chamber music works. In 2019 he gave the premiere of Solbiati’s Corde e Martelletti at the Trame Sonore Festival in Mantova.

Born in 2000, Giorgio studied at the Conservatorio Gaetano Donizetti in Bergamo with Maria Grazia

Bellocchio and is currently pursuing further studies with Kirill Gerstein and Jonathan Aner at the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler in Berlin. He has been a scholarship recipient of the International Academy of Music in Liechtenstein, studying under Pavel Gililov, Claudio Martínez Mehner, and Marc Bouchkov, and was recently honoured with the Roscini– Padalino Award from Perugia Musica Classica. Giorgio is also part of Althafen Foundatin’s Talent Studio 2026.

“Axel Trolese is one of those new generation pianists that gives us hope, not only for the incredible technical mastery, but especially for a round and passionate approach to Music and Art” Axel Trolese’s concert career began in 2015 after winning the Casella Prize at the “Premio Venezia” competition, followed by numerous performances and a recording debut featuring the complete Debussy Études. He went on to receive further distinctions, including the “Giuseppe Sinopoli”

scholarship awarded by the President of the Italian Republic, the “Grand Prix Alain Marinaro” and the “Pozzoli Competition.” He has performed throughout Europe, America, and Asia, in venues such as the Auditorium Parco della Musica, Teatro La Fenice, Salle Cortot, and Flagey, collaborating with institutions including the Società del Quartetto di Milano, the Dresdner Musikfestspiele, Musica Insieme, Ravenna Festival, and Festival delle Nazioni.

His concerts and recordings are regularly broadcasted on France Musique, BBC Radio 3, WWFM New York, and RSI – Swiss Radio. He studied with musicians such as Louis Lortie, Benedetto Lupo, Maurizio Baglini, Denis Pascal and Edoardo Torbianelli at the Conservatoire de Paris, the Accademia

di Santa Cecilia, the Queen Elizabeth Music Chapel and the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis.

Alongside the modern piano, he also performs on fortepiano and historical keyboards.

He has recorded 2 CDs dedicated to Albéniz’s Iberia, together with works by De Falla, Turina, Ravel, and Mompou for Da Vinci Classics. He has released an album for piano duo with Luigi Carroccia, focused on Liszt’s Dante Symphony and Les Préludes for NovAntiqua Records.

Described by the Fort Worth Star-Telegram as a piano aristocrat, Luigi Carroccia has won numerous awards in national and international competitions, including the Virtuoso Prize at the Vendome Piano Prize held during the 2019 Verbier Festival and the second Abbado Prize awarded by the MIUR in memory of Claudio Abbado.

He established himself nationally and internationally at the Van Cliburn Competition in Fort Worth, the Ferruccio Busoni Competition in Bolzano, and the Fryderyk Chopin Competition in Warsaw. Since then, his concert activity has seen him regularly engaged in Italy and abroad at festivals such as the Duszniki International Chopin Piano Festival, the Dresdner Musikfestspiele, and in venues such as the Ishibashi Memorial Hall of the University of Tokyo, Flagey in Brussels, the Symphony Hall and the Town Hall in Birmingham, the Teatro Bibiena in Mantua, the Sale Apollinee of the Teatro La Fenice in Venice, the Salle Bourgie in Montreal and the Tbilisi State Conservatoire.

In February 2025 he appeared on the cover of the monthly magazine Amadeus with a CD of the two Piano Concertos by Fryderyk Chopin in the transcription for piano and string quintet and his performances have been broadcast several times on Rai Radio3.

Between 2026 and 2028 he will be busy performing the complete piano Sonatas by the composer Franz Schubert.

Luigi is Artist in Residence of the Nicola Bulgari Foundation.