The Italian
Maurizio Pollini,
considered one of the great pianists of the 20th century, died at the age of 82 after a long illness that had forced him to cancel his last concerts, the La Scala theater, the Milanese temple of Milan, announced this Saturday. the opera to which he was very attached.
Admired for his prodigious virtuosity, the breadth of his repertoire and the originality of his interpretations, with his death "one of the
great musicians of our time and a fundamental reference
in the artistic life of the theater for more than fifty years" disappears. wrote la Scala on his website.
"Superintendent Dominique Meyer, musical director Riccardo Chailly, the orchestra teachers and the workers of La Scala are at the side of his wife Marilisa, his son Daniele and the entire family," he added.
The burning chapel of the maestro born in Milan in 1942, "absolute protagonist of the international concert scene since his victory at the age of eighteen in the Chopin competition in Warsaw in 1960", will open in the next few hours at La Scala, as has already happened when the famous Italian classical dancer Carla Fracci died.
Pollini was an interpreter capable of
revolutionizing the perception of authors such as Chopin, Debussy and Beethoven himself
and promoting with tireless dedication the listening to the historical avant-garde, especially Schönberg, and current music, as he remembers what was his home during five decades.
Along with his greatness as a pianist, "his testimony on the very role of music, understood as an essential component of culture and civic life and as an instrument of transformation of society, remains fundamental," he adds.
"From his debut on October 11, 1958 until his last recital on February 13, 2023, Pollini has played at La Scala 168 times," explains the theater about his long career, in which he collaborated with great artists of his time such as Claudio Abbado, Paolo Grassi, Riccardo Muti, Daniel Barenboim and Riccardo Chailly, without forgetting his concerts with Carlo Maria Giulini, Pierre Boulez and Zubin Mehta.
In addition to the musicians of La Scala, Pollini performed his music with major orchestras such as the Wiener Philharmoniker (with Abbado) and the Leipzig Gewandhausorchester (with Chailly) and numerous companies dedicated to today's music, such as the Ensemble Intercontemporain, the Klangforum Wien, Musikfabrik K The SWR experimental studio.
Pollini also stood out in chamber music, but at the center of his long career "are above all recitals: from the historic cycle with Beethoven's 32 sonatas in 1995 to the long-awaited annual concert in which the fixed stars of his musical universe: also Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Chopin, Debussy, Schönberg and Ninth".
"We were expecting it again on October 20
," reveals La Scala.
Source: EFE