Louis Lortie
Pianist Louis Lortie achieved international recognition by his mid-twenties. His strong, sensitively crafted playing has served him well in a repertory of considerable breadth, with a concentration on composers from the late Classical period to the early 20th century.
Lortie was born in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, on April 27, 1959. After studying with Yvonne Hubert, he made his first professional public appearance as a soloist with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra when he was 13 years old. Wisely, he elected not to pursue a concert career immediately. After winning first prize in Canada's two premier competitions, the Canadian National Music Competition and the CBC National Competition, when he was 16, Lortie made what he considers his official debut with the Toronto Symphony in 1978 and joined the orchestra in a subsequent tour of Japan and the People's Republic of China. While in his early twenties, he moved to Baltimore to work with Leon Fleisher and expand his knowledge of piano literature.
In 1984, Lortie won first prize in the Busoni International Competition and was also a prizewinner at the Leeds Piano Competition. Following his exposure to European culture and the recognition resulting from his successes in competition, Lortie undertook a more extensive number of concert engagements and released his first recording in 1986. Within the first few years of an active career, Lortie performed throughout the U.S., Canada, and Europe. His engagements included dates with the Cleveland Orchestra, the San Francisco Symphony, the Houston Symphony, the Dallas Symphony, the St. Louis Symphony, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the BBC Philharmonic, the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, the Deutsche Symphonie Orchester, and the Orchestre National de France. With the latter ensemble, he performed on tour. Lortie has performed for several summers with the Montréal Symphony in a program series devoted to a single composer. Complete cycles of the 32 Beethoven piano sonatas have been given throughout the world.
Few pianists have enjoyed such a long-term and mutually satisfying relationship with a recording company as that existing between Lortie and Chandos. Lortie has been allowed to preserve his interpretations of composers extending from Mozart to Ligeti. Among them is his collection of the complete piano works of Ravel, a set that has received several awards, the complete Beethoven piano sonatas, and the complete works for piano and orchestra by Liszt. His recordings of Chopin's Preludes and Etudes are also of particular interest. In 2020, Lortie released the second volume in his survey of Saint-Saëns works for piano and orchestra, with Edward Gardner and the BBC Philharmonic.
Lortie has taught at the piano institute at Imola, Italy, when his schedule has allowed, he is the co-founder and artistic director of the LacMus International Festival in Tremezzina, Italy, and he is a master in residence at the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel in Brussels. Lortie was honored by being made an Officer of the Order of Canada, and he was made a Knight of the National Order of Quebec.
© Erik Eriksson /TiVo
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PIANO SONATAS (INC. THE ''TEMPEST'')
Classical - Released by Chandos on 1 Aug 2000
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Beethoven: Piano Sonatas Nos. 8, 21 & 26
Classical - Released by Chandos on 1 Sep 1991
24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Liszt: Piano Sonata in B Minor & Three Concert Studies
Classical - Released by Chandos on 1 Feb 1987
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bernstein: West Side Story - Gershwin: Rhapsody in Blue
Netherlands Wind Ensemble, Louis Lortie, Harmen de Boer, Richard Dufallo
Classical - Released by Chandos on 26 Jul 1994
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Beethoven: Piano Sonatas, Op. 31
Classical - Released by Chandos on 1 Aug 2000
24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Maurice Ravel : Concertos pour piano
Louis Lortie, London Symphony Orchestra, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos
Keyboard Concertos - Released by Chandos on 1 Sep 1989
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Beethoven: Piano Sonatas Op. 22, 26 & 49
Classical - Released by Chandos on 1 Sep 1999
24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Louis Lortie joue Schumann & Chopin
Louis Lortie, Philharmonia Orchestra, Neeme Järvi
Concertos - Released by Chandos on 1 Jan 1992
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Mozart: Piano Concertos No. 12 & Piano Concerto No. 14
Yuli Turovsky, I Musici de Montreal, Louis Lortie
Concertos - Released by Chandos on 1 May 1986
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Liszt: Works for Piano & Orchestra, Vol. 2
George Pehlivanian, Residentie Orchestra The Hague, Louis Lortie
Symphonies - Released by Chandos on 1 Mar 2001
24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Liszt: Works for Piano & Orchestra, Vol. 3
George Pehlivanian, Residentie Orchestra The Hague, Louis Lortie
Concertos - Released by Chandos on 1 Jan 2002
24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Schumann & Brahms: Piano Works
Solo Piano - Released by Chandos on 1 May 1994
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Ravel: Piano Music, Vol. 1
Solo Piano - Released by Chandos on 1 Dec 1988
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Schumann: Piano Concerto in A Minor - Chopin: Piano Concerto No. 2
Neeme Järvi, Philharmonia Orchestra, Louis Lortie
Concertos - Released by Chandos on 1 May 1992
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Louis Lortie plays 20th Century Original Piano Transcriptions
Classical - Released by Chandos on 1 Apr 1989
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Beethoven: Piano Sonatas Nos. 1, 2 & 3
Classical - Released by Chandos on 1 Sep 1993
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 28 & Piano Sonata No. 29 "Hammerklavier"
Classical - Released by Chandos on 1 Feb 1996
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Mendelssohn: Piano Concertos Nos. 1 & 2 and Symphony No. 5 "Reformation"
Orchestre Symphonique de Québec, Louis Lortie
Classical - Released by ATMA Classique on 1 Sep 2009
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Liszt: Works for Piano & Orchestra, Vol. 1
George Pehlivanian, Residentie Orchestra The Hague, Louis Lortie
Symphonies - Released by Chandos on 1 Mar 2000
24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Liszt: Années de pèlerinage II (Italie)
Solo Piano - Released by Chandos on 1 May 1992
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Ravel: Piano Music, Vol. 2
Solo Piano - Released by Chandos on 1 Jun 1989
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo