Richard Goode

Biography

Richard Goode has been hailed for music-making of tremendous emotional power, depth and expressiveness, and has been acknowledged worldwide as one of today’s leading interpreters of the music of Beethoven. In regular performances with major orchestras, recitals in the world’s music capitals, and acclaimed recordings, he has won a large and devoted following. His performances of Bach, Mozart, Brahms, Schubert, Schumann, Chopin, Debussy, Janacek, and others have received equal accolades.
 
A native of New York, Goode studied with Nadia Reisenberg at the Mannes College of Music and with Rudolf Serkin at the Curtis Institute. His numerous prizes over the years include the Young Concert Artists Award, First Prize in the Clara Haskil Competition, the Avery Fisher Prize, and a Grammy Award with clarinetist Richard Stoltzman. His first public traversal of the complete cycle of Beethoven sonatas at New York’s 92nd Street Y in 1987-88 was hailed by the New York Times as “among the season’s most important and memorable events” and more recently he performed the cycle in London’s Queen Elizabeth Hall in 1994 and 1995.

In recent seasons, Goode has appeared with all of the major American orchestras - New York, Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Cleveland. In Europe, he has likewise appeared with orchestras such as the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, London Philharmonic, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Orchestre de Paris, Deutsches Symphonie Orchester Berlin, Tonhalle Zurich, Budapest Festival Orchestra, Vienna Symphony, Finnish Radio Symphony and Rotterdam Philharmonic. Goode has performed recitals in all the major concert halls and festivals around the world; he appears regularly at the BBC Proms and at the Edinburgh International Festival where he was Artist in Residence in 2004 and 2006; he also undertook a major residency at New York’s Carnegie Hall throughout the 2005/06 season, entitled Perspectives. 

During the 2008/09 season Goode appeared with the London Symphony Orchestra, Bayerische Staatsorchester, Boston Symphony, Tonhalle-Orchester Zurich, St Louis Symphony and Gothenburg Symphony. In recital Goode performed at Wigmore Hall, Bridgewater Hall, Antwerp’s De Singel, at the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern festival and in Budapest, Luxembourg, Genova and Birmingham. During the 2007/08 season Goode was Associate Artist at the Southbank Centre in London, appearing in a series of six events: a solo recital, duo recital with Dawn Upshaw, two-piano recital with Jonathan Biss, lecture recital, masterclass and performing Beethoven with the London Philharmonic Orchestra.  

Following the completion of his Beethoven concerto cycle at London’s Barbican with Budapest Festival Orchstra and Ivan Fischer in 2005, Goode recorded the Beethoven concerti for release on the Nonesuch label in 2009. An exclusive Nonesuch recording artist, Goode has made more than two dozen recordings over the years ranging from solo and chamber works to lieder and concerti. In 1993, Nonesuch released a 10-CD set of his complete Beethoven Sonata cycle, the first-ever by an American pianist, which met with widespread critical acclaim and was nominated for a Grammy and the Gramophone Good CD Guide. Other recording highlights include a duo recording with Dawn Upshaw, and a series of Mozart piano concertos with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra. His second disc of Bach Partitas was Gramophone Magazine’s Record of the Month in July 2003: “Richard Goode, whose generosity and naturalness as a man are reflected in his comparable qualities as a performer, now brings us his second volume of Bach’s six partitas. It really is a sublime disc.” His most recent recording of Mozart sonatas has once again received much critical acclaim. 

Richard Goode is co-Artistic Director with Mitsuko Uchida of the Marlboro Music School and Festival in Vermont (USA).