Join 2022 Cliburn Competitor Arseniy Gusev for a 30-minute recital, followed by a Q&A Session hosted by the librarians.

Make sure to get a copy of  Cliburn Notes, an activity booklet about the 2022 Competition with baseball card style statistics about each competitor.  Following the visit, follow Arseniy’s progress online at cliburn.org, or by attending Watch Parties held at your library.

ABOUT ARSENIY GUSEV

Russia  |  Age 23

When Arseniy Gusev was 5 years old, an upright piano was brought into his St. Petersburg home, and he immediately started playing and experimenting with it. He wrote his first piece—a romance on a Pushkin poem—shortly thereafter, and his grandmother asked him if he would like to go to music school. He went on to study both composition and piano performance at the St. Petersburg Conservatory. Upon graduation in 2018, he moved to the United States, where he attends the Cleveland Institute of Music, under the tutelage of Sergei Babayan (piano) and Keith Fitch (composition).

He has performed in Austria, Belgium, Italy, Russia, Slovakia, Germany, and the United States, and his compositions have been heard in Mariinsky Theatre, Carnegie Hall, Konzerthaus Dortmund, St. Petersburg Philharmonic, and other major venues. Arseniy is a laureate of many prestigious competitions, such as the Dorothy McKenzie Artist Award, Cleveland Piano Virtu(al)oso Competition, Singapore International Piano Competition, Three Arts Piano Competition, Cleveland Composers Guild Contest, “Another Space” Composition Competition, International Gavrilin Competition, International Competition “Performer-Composer,” and others.

Arseniy has an exclusive publishing contract with Kompozitor, one of the biggest publishers in Eastern Europe. He says: “I hope to do everything I can to bring the tradition of composer-pianists back on a new level.”

CENTRAL LIBRARY
500 W 3rd St, Fort Worth, TX 76102

Join 2022 Cliburn Competitor Xiaolu Zang for a 30-minute recital, followed by a Q&A Session hosted by the librarians.

Make sure to get a copy of  Cliburn Notes, an activity booklet about the 2022 Competition with baseball card style statistics about each competitor.  Following the visit, follow Xiaolu’s progress online at cliburn.org, or by attending Watch Parties held at your library.

XIAOLU ZANG

China  I  Age 22

Born in Qinhuangdao, Xiaolu Zang was 4 years old when an electric keyboard caught his attention. He eventually attended the Beijing Central Music Conservatory Middle School for seven years under Professor Ye Lin and won first prizes in several major Chinese competitions. It was during that time, at the age of 15, that he recalls a singular day when he determined himself to become a professional musician. That commitment took him to Germany in 2017, where he studies with Arie Vardi at Hochschule für Musik, Theater und Medien Hannover.

Xiaolu has done well at international contests, including winning first prize at the Verona and Mayenne (France) Competitions, and strong showings at the Busoni, Leeds, Queen Elisabeth, and Hamamatsu Competitions. He performed numerous concerts in China, Germany, Japan, Austria, France, Italy, Belgium, Spain, Portugal, Greece, and Dubai. His strong interest in collaboration led to his work with the Staatsballett Hannover in 2020, playing both of Chopin’s piano concertos with the Staatsorchester Hannover in its special production about the life of choreographer Nijinsky.

Growing up in China and living five years in Europe now, Xiaolu visited the United States three times prior to the Cliburn and is looking forward to more time here. He finds experiencing different cultures to be key to artistic development, noting: “The essence of all kinds of music is to move people, to let one think, to mark the victory of humanity. The way we achieve it should not be the same, just like what Feruccio Busoni said, ‘Music is born free.’”

SOUTHWEST REGIONAL LIBRARY
4001 Library Ln, Fort Worth, TX 76109

Join 2022 Cliburn Competitor Ilya Shmukler for a 30-minute recital, followed by a Q&A Session hosted by the librarians.

Make sure to get a copy of  Cliburn Notes, an activity booklet about the 2022 Competition with baseball card style statistics about each competitor.  Following the visit, follow Ilya’s progress online at cliburn.org, or by attending Watch Parties held at your library.

ILYA SHMUKLER

Russia  I  Age 27

When he was 3 years old, Moscow native Ilya Shmukler’s mother found him jumping on the bed and beautifully singing Robertino Loreti’s “Jamaica;” she immediately recognized his musical talent and started him in lessons. It was important to his non-musician parents that he be raised as a well-rounded person, so his early years were also spent with school, table tennis, and ballroom dancing. But at 10, he says his life changed after applying for and winning his first music competition and attending the subsequent international summer academy: “There I discovered a true musical life, and I fell in love with it, inspiring me to commit my life to music.”

He performed his first recital at age 12, and made his orchestral debut at 14. He has since made solo appearances in Europe and North America, and has performed with the Mariinsky Theatre, Sendai Philharmonic, Bayer Symphoniker, Tambov Symphonic, and New Music Orchestras, among others.

Ilya is a laureate of many international piano competitions, taking top prizes at the New York Virtuoso, Lewisville Lake Symphony, Artist Presentation Society (St. Louis), Shigeru Kawai (Tokyo), Sсriabin–Rachmaninov (Bulgaria), and Rachmaninov (St. Petersburg) Competitions. He was also a competitor in the 2017 Cliburn Competition. In 2021, he won the Carnegie Weill Recital Hall Debut Audition and will make his New York debut at the venerated venue in December 2022.

He completed his master’s degree with honors at the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory in 2021, under the guidance of Elena Kuznetsova and Sergey Kuznetsov. Presently, he studies with 2001 Cliburn Gold Medalist Stanislav Ioudenitch at the International Center for Music at Park University in Parkville, Missouri.

EAST REGIONAL LIBRARY
6301 Bridge St, Fort Worth, TX 76112

Join 2022 Cliburn Competitor Denis Linnik for a 30-minute recital, followed by a Q&A Session hosted by the librarians.

Make sure to get a copy of  Cliburn Notes, an activity booklet about the 2022 Competition with baseball card style statistics about each competitor.  Following the visit, follow Denis’ progress online at cliburn.org, or by attending Watch Parties held at your library.

ABOUT DENIS LINNIK

Belarus  I  Age 26

Denis Linnik began his musical education in his hometown of Maryina Horka, Belarus, when he was 6. Just two years later, he moved to Minsk to study piano and live with other talented young musicians—he says being constantly surrounded by music made it a truly inseparable part of his life. His musical development advanced quickly over the next years, leading him to success in youth competitions and successful stints at the State Gymnasium-College of Arts “I.O. Akhremchik” and the Belarusian State Academy of Music.

He moved to Switzerland in 2017, where he currently studies at the Hochschule für Musik in Basel with Claudio Martinez Mehner and Zoltán Fejérvári. He has won awards at several major piano international competitions, such as the Città di Cantù International Piano and Orchestra Competition, International Horowitz Competition, and Orpheus Chamber Music Competition. His debut CD was released by the KNS Classical label in 2022.

His concert activity as a soloist, recitalist, and chamber collaborator has led him across Europe, where he performed at prestigious festivals, including the Gstaad Menuhin, Wien Modern, ArtDialog, 100% Classique, and SOLSberg Festivals. Aside from the standard piano repertoire, he enjoys exploring the fields of historical performance, contemporary music, and jazz. In 2021, he took part in several jazz projects, as well as two operas by contemporary American composers Du Yun and Michael Hersch.

He sees his participation in the Cliburn as a “singular opportunity to try myself on the highest level and to compete with the best musicians of my generation.” More than that, though, he says: “For several reasons since my very childhood, I was imagining myself playing in this particular competition and had a feeling that it could be a life-changing event for me as a musician.”

NORTHWEST LIBRARY
6228 Crystal Lake Dr, Fort Worth, TX 76179

Join 2022 Cliburn Competitor Elizaveta Kliuchereva for a 30-minute recital, followed by a Q&A Session hosted by the librarians.

Make sure to get a copy of  Cliburn Notes, an activity booklet about the 2022 Competition with baseball card style statistics about each competitor.  Following the visit, follow Elizaveta’s progress online at cliburn.org, or by attending Watch Parties held at your library.

ABOUT ELIZAVETA KLIUCHEREVA

Russia  I  Age 23

When she was 6, Elizaveta Kliuchereva—who was born in Moscow into a family of visual artists—was walking in the corridors of her art school and found a very old piano standing in the corner. She says: “From the moment I saw the piano and opened the keyboard, I realized that it is going to be my life, and I would not be able to live without music.”  

She has since studied at the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory, the Hochschule für Musik, Theater und Medien Hannover, and the Accademia Internazionale di Imola “Incontri col Maestro” with Vladimir Ovchinnikov, Arie Vardi, and Boris Petrushansky, respectively. Elizaveta is a prizewinner of more than 30 international piano competitions in the United Kingdom, China, Kazakhstan, Italy, Estonia, Russia, and France, and was a semifinalist at last year’s Leeds Competition.

Among her performance highlights are the Ukrainian Kharkiv Philharmonic, Central Music School at the Great Hall of Moscow Conservatory, Hilton Head Symphony, National Philharmonic of Russia, St. Petersburg State Symphony, Prague Radio Symphony, Karaganda Symphony Orchestra, Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, and New Mexico Philharmonic. She now comes to the Cliburn to realize a “real dream—to play in this hall and on this stage, where many genius pianists have played before.”

Summerglen Library
4205 Basswood Blvd, Fort Worth, TX 76137

Join 2022 Cliburn Competitor Anna Geniushene for a 30-minute recital, followed by a Q&A Session hosted by the librarians.

Make sure to get a copy of  Cliburn Notes, an activity booklet about the 2022 Competition with baseball card style statistics about each competitor.  Following the visit, follow Anna’s progress online at cliburn.org, or by attending Watch Parties held at your library.

ABOUT ANNA GENIUSHENE

Russia  |  Age 31

Born in Moscow on New Year’s Day in 1991, Anna Geniushene made her recital debut just seven years later in the small hall of the Berlin Philharmonic. She has since developed a diverse and versatile career as an artist: performances in major world venues such as the Town Hall in Leeds, National Concert Hall in Dublin, Museum of Arts in Tel Aviv, the Konzerthaus ‘Neue Welt,’ Great Hall of Moscow Conservatory, and Sala Greppi in Milan; a dedication to chamber music, including duo piano repertoire with her husband, Lukas Geniušas, and close collaboration with Quartetto di Cremona; and the creation of her own festival of collaborative music-making (NikoFest).

During the pandemic, Anna’s pension for creativity manifested in online projects, such as a series of online recitals for the Vancouver Chopin Society, participation in the “Armchairs Season” of the Moscow Philharmonic, and recording sessions for the ConSpirito music channel on YouTube. Her debut CD was released on LINN Records in March 2020.

A laureate of major international piano contests, she has had strong finishes at the Leeds, Tchaikovsky, Busoni, and Dublin Competitions. She sees her participation in the Cliburn as a “dream,” as an “opportunity to be part of a very friendly community, to find a new audience, and to challenge myself.”

Anna graduated from the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory in 2015, and completed her Master’s with Distinction and Advanced Diploma from the Royal Academy of Music (London) in 2018. She has also been one of the elite Bicentenary Scholars at the Academy under the tutelage of Christopher Elton.

Reby Cary Youth Library
3851 E Lancaster Ave, Fort Worth, TX 76103

Join 2022 Cliburn Competitor Jonathan Mak for a 30-minute recital, followed by a Q&A Session hosted by the librarians.

Make sure to get a copy of  Cliburn Notes, an activity booklet about the 2022 Competition with baseball card style statistics about each competitor.  Following the visit, follow Jonathan’s progress online at cliburn.org, or by attending Watch Parties held at your library.

ABOUT JONATHAN MAK

Canada  I  Age 25

On Jonathan Mak’s third birthday, his sister’s piano teacher decided to give him a trial lesson; he has been actively studying both piano and viola ever since. He made his orchestra debut with the Canadian Sinfonietta just one year later, at the age of 4.

After graduation from the Cardinal Carter Academy for the Arts in his native Toronto, he went on to study with Daniel Shapiro at the Cleveland Institute of Music, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in piano performance, as well as minors in viola performance and German. Under the tutelage of Boris Slutsky, he recently completed his master’s degree in piano performance at the Yale School of Music, where he is currently pursuing a Master of Musical Arts degree. In fall 2022, he will begin doctoral studies at Rice University with Jon Kimura Parker.

Jonathan’s international accomplishments include first prize at the 2009 Manchester International Concerto Competition for Young Pianists; the 2013 Jean Lumb Foundation Kotcheff Family Arts Award; and the 2021 Sylva Gelber Music Foundation Award. He has been a guest soloist with numerous orchestras, most notably the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra in Bulgaria, Manchester Camerata, Orchestra Filarmonica di Udine, and Krakow Philharmonic Orchestra, and has also given recitals in Italy, Bulgaria, Manchester, China, Vienna, and Poland.

An avid chamber musician, he has been invited to perform at various festivals including the Festival of the Sound in Ontario, Ottawa Chamberfest, and the Edinburgh International Festival. In the summer of 2017, Jonathan was part of the National Youth Orchestra of Canada as an Award of Excellence winner. Returning to the orchestra in 2018, he joined NYOC on their European tour as a recipient of the Canada Council for the Arts Michael Measures Prize.

Golden Triangle Library
4264 Golden Triangle Boulevard, Fort Worth, TX 76244

Join 2022 Cliburn Competitor Elizaveta Kliuchereva for a 30-minute recital, followed by a Q&A Session hosted by the librarians.

Make sure to get a copy of  Cliburn Notes, an activity booklet about the 2022 Competition with baseball card style statistics about each competitor.  Following the visit, follow Elizaveta’s progress online at cliburn.org, or by attending Watch Parties held at your library.

ABOUT ELIZAVETA KLIUCHEREVA

Russia  I  Age 23

When she was 6, Elizaveta Kliuchereva—who was born in Moscow into a family of visual artists—was walking in the corridors of her art school and found a very old piano standing in the corner. She says: “From the moment I saw the piano and opened the keyboard, I realized that it is going to be my life, and I would not be able to live without music.”  

She has since studied at the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory, the Hochschule für Musik, Theater und Medien Hannover, and the Accademia Internazionale di Imola “Incontri col Maestro” with Vladimir Ovchinnikov, Arie Vardi, and Boris Petrushansky, respectively. Elizaveta is a prizewinner of more than 30 international piano competitions in the United Kingdom, China, Kazakhstan, Italy, Estonia, Russia, and France, and was a semifinalist at last year’s Leeds Competition.

Among her performance highlights are the Ukrainian Kharkiv Philharmonic, Central Music School at the Great Hall of Moscow Conservatory, Hilton Head Symphony, National Philharmonic of Russia, St. Petersburg State Symphony, Prague Radio Symphony, Karaganda Symphony Orchestra, Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, and New Mexico Philharmonic. She now comes to the Cliburn to realize a “real dream—to play in this hall and on this stage, where many genius pianists have played before.”

Meadowbrook Library
2800 Stark St. Fort Worth, TX 76112