Rudolf Buchbinder

Rudolf Buchbinder (born 1 December 1946, in Leitmeritz, Czechoslovakia) is an Austrian classical pianist.

Biography

Buchbinder studied with Bruno Seidlhofer at the Vienna Academy of Music. In 1965 he made a tour of North and South America. In 1966 he won a special prize awarded at the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition. Subsequently he has toured with the Vienna Philharmonic and appeared as soloist around the world. He also has taught piano at the Basel Academy of Music. He has recorded the complete Beethoven piano sonatas and variations for the Teldec label as well as both Brahms piano concertos with Harnoncourt and the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam.

He is probably the only person to have ever recorded the entire Part II of Vaterländischer Künstlerverein, which consists of 50 variations by 50 different composers on a waltz by Anton Diabelli. He has also recorded Beethoven's Diabelli Variations, which originally comprised Part I of that anthology.

In 2009, Buchbinder was featured in the award-winning German-Austrian documentary Pianomania, about a Steinway & Sons piano tuner, which was directed by Lilian Franck and Robert Cibis. The film premiered theatrically in North America, where it was met with positive reviews by The New York Times, as well as in Asia and throughout Europe, and is a part of the Goethe-Institut catalogue.

Decorations and awards

This article incorporates information from the equivalent article on the German Wikipedia.

• 1961: First Prize at the International Competition in Munich, division "Piano Trio"
• 1970: Mozart Interpretation Prize of the Austrian Minister for Education and the Arts
• 1977: Grand Prix du Disque for the entire piano works of Joseph Haydn
• 1989: Austrian Cross of Honour for Science and Art
• 1992 Honorary Member of the Vienna Symphony
• 1994: Honorary Member of the Carinthian Summer
• 1995: Austrian Cross of Honour for Science and Art, 1st class
• 1996: Great Merit of the Province of Salzburg
• 1996: Grand Gold Decoration of Carinthia
• 1996: Bruckner Ring of the Vienna Konzerthaus
• 1996: Gold Medal for services to the City of Vienna
• 1999: Grand Gold Decoration of Lower Austria
• 2003: Grand Gold Decoration for Services to the Republic of Austria
• 2004: Gold Medal of Salzburg
• 2007: Gold Medal of the Austrian capital Vienna
• 2008: Honorary Member of the Society of Friends of Music in Vienna
• 2010: Tourism Award of the State of Lower Austria for his work in music tourism in Grafenegg
• 2011: Gloria Artis, Medal for Merit to Culture
• 2012: Echo Klassik in German music award as Instrumentalist of the Year (piano) and the album Beethoven: The Sonata Legacy issued by RCA Red Seal/Sony

External links

• Biography from IMG Artists
• Hear Rudolf Buchbinder in concert from WGBH Radio Boston

Sources

• Slonimsky, Nicolas; Laura Diane Kuhn; Dennis McIntire (1997). Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Twentieth-Century Classical Musicians. New York: Schirmer Books. ISBN 978-0-02-871271-0. 

See also: Buchbinder