Pianist Kirill Gerstein to Perform in New York and New Jersey

Pianist Kirill Gerstein assumes a variety of roles-solo recitalist, chamber musician, and concerto soloist-in New York- and New Jersey-based performances from Thursday, February 23, to Wednesday, March 1. First he performs Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto in four concerts (February 23-26) with the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra conducted by Xian Zhang. The next evening at 7:30 p.m., he gives a solo recital at the McCarter Theatre Center in Princeton, performing works by Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, and Liszt. He concludes his concerts with a chamber performance of Brahms's Piano Quintet with the Hagen Quartet at Carnegie's Zankel Hall on Wednesday, March 1 at 7:30 p.m.

Tickets for the February 23-26 performances with the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra start at $20 and are available for purchase online at njsymphony.org or by phone at 1-800-ALLEGRO (255-3476). For more information about these concerts, please click here for the Orchestra's press release.

Tickets for the February 27 recital range from $25 to $42 and can be purchased online at mccarter.org, by phone at (609) 258-2787, or in person at the McCarter Ticket Office at 91 University Place in Princeton. For more information about the performance, please click here for the Center's press release.

Tickets for the March 1 concert at Carnegie's Zankel Hall are priced $60-$71 and are available at the Carnegie Hall Box Office, 154 West 57th Street, or can be charged to major credit cards by calling CarnegieCharge at 212-247-7800 or by visiting the Carnegie Hall website, carnegiehall.org. The program also features the Hagen Quartet performing Beethoven's String Quartet in G Major, Op. 18, No. 2 and Bartok's String Quartet No. 3.

The Zankel Hall concert will mark the third time that Mr. Gerstein and the Hagen Quartet have performed together, the first two performances taking place in Austria in 2014 and also including the Brahms Piano Quintet. He and the Quartet have recorded this piece for release later this year on Myrios Classics, and on March 4, they also travel to Durham, North Carolina, to perform it at Duke University. In addition to his work with the Quartet, Mr. Gerstein has collaborated extensively with Quartet cellist Clemens Hagen in a wide range of repertoire, but most prominently the works of Beethoven.

Mr. Gerstein has previously engaged with the Brahms chamber repertoire in a 2014 tour of the cello sonatas with Steven Isserlis and 2010 and '11 recordings of selected viola sonatas with Tabea Zimmermann, released on Myrios Classics. Brahms's solo and concerto repertoire for piano has also featured prominently in Mr. Gerstein's programming over the years. In 2015, he performed the First Piano Concerto with Susanna Malkki and the New York Philharmonic, while this season he performs the Second Piano Sonata alongside Liszt's Transcendental Études in Chicago, Miami, Seattle, and Washington, D.C.

Kirill Gerstein is one of today's most intriguing and versatile musicians, with a masterful technique, discerning intelligence, and a musical curiosity that has led him to explore repertoire spanning centuries and a diverse range of styles. He is the recipient of the 2010 Gilmore Artist Award and received First Prize at the 2001 Arthur Rubinstein Piano Competition in Tel Aviv. Highlights of Mr. Gerstein's US season include concerto performances with the Cleveland Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, and Atlanta, Boston, Detroit, San Diego, and St. Louis Symphonies. He performs works by Bartok, Busoni, Gershwin, Schoenberg, and Tchaikovsky, among others. Born in Voronezh, Russia, Mr. Gerstein attended a music school for gifted children and taught himself to play jazz by listening to his parents' extensive record collection. He came to the US at the age of 14 to attend Boston's Berklee College of Music and, after completing his studies in three years, moved to New York to attend the Manhattan School of Music. An American citizen since 2003, Mr. Gerstein now divides his time between the United States and Germany.