PIOTR TOMASZ SZCZEPANIK
fortepian

Juil­liard Alum­nus and CEO of FaceArt Mu­sic In­ter­Na­tions in Shang­hai — Pol­ish pi­anist Pi­otr Tomasz — is an ac­com­plished per­former, pro­duc­er, ed­u­ca­tor, com­pos­er, and am­bas­sador of Pol­ish cul­ture on three con­ti­nents, whose ver­sa­til­i­ty as an artist has earned him an unique po­si­tion in the field of mu­sic.

Af­ter earn­ing Mas­ter's de­grees from both the Acade­my of Mu­sic in Krakow, where he stud­ied un­der prof. An­drzej Pikul, and the pres­ti­gious Juil­liard School of Mu­sic in New York City, study­ing pi­ano un­der Jerome Lowen­thal, Mr. Tomasz re­turned to his na­tive city of Krakow, Poland. Here Mr. Tomasz was prompt­ly ap­point­ed Vice Pres­i­dent of the new­ly es­tab­lished Pi­an­oClas­sic As­so­ci­a­tion, the or­ga­ni­za­tion re­spon­si­ble for the Roy­al Krakow In­ter­na­tion­al Pi­ano Fes­ti­val and Pi­ano Com­pe­ti­tion.

In 2010, Mr. Tomasz moved to Shang­hai, Chi­na, and, to­geth­er with con­tem­po­rary pi­anist Jen­ny Q Chai, co­found­ed the new mu­sic cen­ter FaceArt Mu­sic In­ter­Na­tions, which serves as a cul­tur­al bridge be­tween the mu­sic worlds of Shang­hai, Krakow and New York City. The of­fi­cial open­ing of the cen­ter took place on June 12th, 2011, with a mas­ter class led by pi­anist Dr. Solomon Mikowsky, vis­it­ing pro­fes­sor at FaceArt and fac­ul­ty mem­ber at Man­hat­tan School of Mu­sic.

Hailed by mu­sic crit­ic David Dubal as a “rare and in­spir­ing Chopin­ist,”” Mr. Tomasz is an ac­tive am­bas­sador of Pol­ish mu­sic abroad and lau­re­ate of in­ter­na­tion­al pi­ano com­pe­ti­tions and a fre­quent par­tic­i­pant in pres­ti­gious fes­ti­vals across the globe. Mr. Tomasz has toured his na­tive coun­try and per­formed at such ma­jor con­cert halls as Paul Hall in New York City, Con­cert Hall in Shang­hai, Hô­tel des In­valides in Paris, and many oth­ers in Spain, Italy, U.S.A. and Chi­na. Mr. Tomasz's per­for­mances in Paris, New York City and Shang­hai pre­sent­ing the works of Fred­er­ic Chopin, Karol Szy­manows­ki and Witold Lu­toslaws­ki have al­ways gar­nered a warm re­cep­tion from au­di­ences.

In 2009, Mr. Tomasz was co-or­ga­niz­er of a se­ries of four recitals fea­tur­ing the mu­sic of Karol Szy­manows­ki, host­ed by the Ko­ciuszko Foun­da­tion in New York. In 2005, Mr. Tomasz had the plea­sure of per­form­ing in Krakow the com­plete pi­ano works by Mau­rice Rav­el, com­mem­o­rat­ing the 130th an­niver­sary of the com­poser's birth, a unique and ground­break­ing event for that city. In the same year, Mr. Tomasz gave three con­certs of Rav­el's Con­cer­to for the Left Hand with the Krakow Phil­har­mon­ic Or­ches­tra, con­duct­ed by Stanis­law We­lanyk. In 2007, he was in­vit­ed by the Krakow Phil­har­mon­ic Or­ches­tra to per­form Robert Schu­man­n's Pi­ano Con­cer­to.

The mu­sic of J.S. Bach has al­ways been in the cen­ter of Mr. Tomasz's life. Al­ready at age of 13 he has been ap­point­ed an or­gan­ist and choir mas­ter at St. Pe­ter’s Church in Cra­cow Dis­trict in Poland, where he worked for 10 years while study­ing coun­ter­point, har­mo­ny, and Bach’s or­gan works. Dur­ing his years at Juil­liard School of Mu­sic, Mr. Tomasz stud­ied harp­si­chord with Li­onel Par­ty, which led him to dis­cov­er his own voice in the key­board mu­sic of J.S. Bach.

For more information please visit www.piotrtomasz.com