Background
DMA, University of Texas at Austin
Pianist Christopher Guzman enjoys an international performing career, showcasing a broad range of styles from the Baroque era to the avant-garde. Since winning top prizes in international competitions such as the Walter M. Naumburg Competition (USA), the Seoul International Music Competition (S. Korea) and the Isang Yun Competition (S. Korea), Mr. Guzman has performed across Europe, North and South America, and Asia. As a result of winning the top prize at the Concours International de Piano d’Orléans in Orléans, France, he has toured France extensively, giving performances and teaching masterclasses.
Mr. Guzman has appeared in major international venues such as Tokyo’s Suntory Hall, Leipzig’s Gewandhaus, Buenos Aires’s CCK, Carnegie’s Weill Hall, London’s Wigmore Hall and others. As a chamber musician, he has collaborated with the classical music world’s most exciting soloists, including Ilya Gringolts, Antoine Tamestit, David Fray, and Jeremy Denk, among others. He continually performs with members of the world’s finest orchestras, including the Berliner Philharmoniker, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the San Francisco Symphony, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic, and the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra. He was appointed to the keyboards position in Chicago’s Grant Park Symphony Orchestra in 2024.
Although Mr. Guzman has earned several international accolades for his performances of the western canon, much of his career is dedicated to showcasing music written after 1900; his performances have included world premieres by Donald Martino, Nico Muhly, and Paul Schoenfield. The New York Times hailed his performance of Christopher Theofanidis’s Statues as “coiled” and “explosive.” His CD of German and Austrian music from the past one hundred years, Vienne et après, is available on the Tessitures label; his CD of music of Paul Reale on the Naxos Label, “Chopin’s Ghosts,” was included in Fanfare magazine’s Top Five releases of 2018. He has subsequently recorded two additional albums of Reale’s music, including chamber music and concerti, to much critical acclaim. Mr. Guzman will release a premiere video recording of piano works of Mexican composer Carlos Chávez in 2024.
Born in Texas, Christopher Guzman began studying piano at age nine and violoncello two years later. His teachers include Jerome Lowenthal and Robert McDonald (The Juilliard School), Anton Nel (University of Texas at Austin), and the late Patricia Zander (New England Conservatory). In addition to performing, he is also Professor of Piano at the Bienen School of Music at Northwestern University. He previously taught at Penn State University, and has taught masterclasses throughout the United States, Europe, and Asia. For more information, please visit christopherguzmanpiano.com.