Christian Zacharias

Christian Zacharias (* April 27, 1950 in Jamshedpur, India) is a German pianist and conductor. He is the director of the Lausanne Chamber Orchestra since 2000.

Life

Zacharias received his first piano lessons at age seven. He studied from 1961 to 1969 at the University of Music in Karlsruhe with the exiled Russian Irene Slavin and 1970-1973 in Paris with Vlado Perlemuter.

1969 Zacharias won a second prize at the Geneva Music Competition, other awards followed. He was awarded the 1973 Van Cliburn Piano Competition in the United States and received in 1975 the first prize at the Paris Ravel Competition.

1975, marked the beginning of an international career. 1977 was Zacharias for their recording of Schubert 's Sonata the "German Record Critics' Award " and was named " New Artist of the Year 1977 ". In the 1980s, he was known to a wider audience through his definitive interpretations of works of Viennese classicism, including complete recordings of the sonatas of Mozart and Schubert and Beethoven Piano Concertos. In several episodes, he also played a number of sonatas by Domenico Scarlatti.

His insertion of Janissary music in a Mozart concert to emphasize its proximity to the opera The Abduction from the Seraglio, his recording of Preludes without Fugues from the Well Tempered Clavier by Bach and the experiment, the same Scarlatti Sonata repeatedly in various stages of his career and included in various concert halls and publish, show him to be a musician who thinks beyond pure grandstanding about the purpose of interpretation.

Zacharias took engagements in various prestigious national and international orchestras, including the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra, Bamberg Symphony Orchestra and the Dresden Philharmonic.

Zacharias appeared in several TV shows with, produced documentary films, including about Scarlatti and Schumann, and gives numerous master classes. In 2012 he was awarded the Echo Klassik German music award in the category Concert Recording of the Year (incl. 18th century) / Piano with his album Mozart: Piano Concertos Volume 7, with the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne and recorded by MDG.