Associazione "A.Scarlatti" Vincenzo Maltempo Pianista

ASSOCIATION "ALESSANDRO SCARLATTI"
Musical Season 2025/2026
TEATRO SANNAZARO
January 15, 8:30 PM — Via Chiaia, 157, 80121 Naples

Pianist Vincenzo MALTEMPO
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Robert SCHUMANN: Widmung, from “Myrthen” Op. 25 No. 1
(transcription for piano by Sergio Fiorentino)
Robert SCHUMANN: Grande Sonate Op. 14
(Sonata No. 3, second edition, 1853)
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Johannes BRAHMS: 6 Klavierstücke Op. 118
Johannes BRAHMS: Passacaglia (4th movement of Symphony No. 4 Op. 98)
(transcription for piano by Vincenzo Maltempo)

Vincenzo Maltempo
Some pianists approach the keyboard as a territory to explore, others as a battlefield. Vincenzo Maltempo, however, seems to sculpt sound: he shapes it, models it, makes it vibrate until it is transformed into a physical and spiritual experience. It is this combination of strength and poetry that has made him one of the most original voices of his generation, and one of the leading living interpreters of Charles‑Valentin Alkan, the visionary French composer as brilliant as he is enigmatic, known for the technical complexity and expressive depth of his works.

International critics have repeatedly pointed out how Maltempo combines an impressive technique — always in the service of the music — with a profound and personal interpretive vision.
Maltempo trained under the pianist and teacher Salvatore Orlando, a disciple of Sergio Fiorentino, a figure who deeply influenced his artistic development. It is an almost artisanal relationship, built on listening, discipline and creative freedom. Under Orlando’s guidance, Maltempo developed a technique at once elegant and “powerful,” but never an end in itself, and an idea of sound that would become his signature.

With Salvatore Orlando he studied and graduated as an external student in 2005 at the “Santa Cecilia” Conservatory in Rome, with the highest marks and honors. He subsequently continued his studies with Riccardo Risaliti at the Imola Piano Academy, further pursuing what today is his musical vision. He refined his interpretive approach, deepened his repertoire and developed that combination of rigor and audacity that became his distinctive trait.

Maltempo’s concert career gained momentum in 2006, when he won the “Premio Venezia” at La Fenice Theatre in Venice. Since then he has performed at important festivals and concert halls in Europe, the Americas (including Mexico) and Asia, consolidating a reputation as a charismatic and rigorous interpreter.

His performances have attracted the attention of major international music magazines (including The Guardian, Diapason, PianoNews and Gramophone), which have welcomed him enthusiastically:
- Andrew Clements (The Guardian) called him “exhilarating, a real revelation.”
- Robert Nemecek (PianoNews) considers him “one of the greatest contemporary interpreters of Alkan,” capable of mastering immense technical difficulties with an orchestral and structured approach.
- Paul Ruckert (Gramophone) awarded him an “Editor’s Choice” for his complete recording of Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsodies, calling it “the most beautiful complete set ever heard.”

Maltempo’s name is now inextricably linked to that of Charles‑Valentin Alkan. Not only has he recorded five albums considered reference recordings, but he is also one of the very few pianists in the world to have performed live the entire cycle of Alkan’s Douze Études dans tous les tons mineurs, Op. 39 in a single recital, given in Yokohama in 2013.

For his contribution to the dissemination of Alkan’s music he was named an honorary member of the London Alkan Society and has begun a collaboration with the prestigious publisher G. Henle Verlag.

In 2020 he published the first Italian biography dedicated to Alkan: Lo strano caso di Charles‑Valentin Alkan. Vita e musica di un genio dimenticato — a volume that combines musicological rigor and interpretive passion and that has contributed significantly to the rediscovery of the composer.

Critics describe Maltempo as a musician endowed with:
- formidable technique and deep musical intelligence. Listeners talk about a sound “sculpted in marble,” and a phrasing that is free, warm and deeply human.

Internationally renowned pianists, such as Alexander Lonquich, consider him an extraordinary interpreter, capable of exploring the extreme boundaries of every style without ever losing the sense of form and poetry.

Maltempo’s discography includes numerous complete recordings, among them:
- Five albums dedicated to Alkan, now considered reference recordings
- Studies by Lyapunov
- The complete Hungarian Rhapsodies of Liszt
- The complete Nocturnes of Chopin
- The complete piano sonatas of Scriabin (he is the first Italian pianist to record them in full)
- The two piano concertos by Brahms (live)
- Works by Schumann, Beethoven, Paul Dukas and others
- A forthcoming double CD dedicated to Brahms

His performance of the monumental Busoni Concerto Op. 39 for piano, orchestra and male chorus in Bologna in 2024 marked a historic moment, reviving a rare masterpiece in the city where it was first conceived.

His repertoire spans a wide time frame, from the Baroque to contemporary music, with a particular interest in the Romantic period and in lesser‑known composers such as Godowsky, Delaborde, Ravina, Zimmermann and Chaminade.

For the Berlin publisher Ries & Erler he has produced piano transcriptions of Ravel’s Second Suite from the ballet Daphnis et Chloé and of Hans Rott’s Symphony No. 1, thus presenting previously unpublished concert versions of these works.

He is one of the founders of the “Imola Piano Academy – Talent Development Eindhoven,” a Dutch institution created in collaboration with the Accademia “Incontri col Maestro” of Imola. He has also given masterclasses at the European Arts Academy “Aldo Ciccolini” in Trani.

Alongside his concert activity, Maltempo is principal piano professor at the Turin Conservatory and founder and artistic director of the “Alkan Prize for Pianistic Virtuosity,” a project that celebrates the boldest and most visionary repertoire of the piano literature.

M.M.