Kathleen Solose

Canadian pianist Kathleen Solose is an active performer of both the solo and chamber music repertoire. An internationally-trained musician, she continues the legacy of her teachers - among them Adele Marcus, (The Juilliard School), Stanislav Neuhaus (Moscow Conservatory), Guido Agosti (Accademia Chigiana, Siena, Italy) and Carlo Zecchi (Accademia di Santa Cecilia, Rome). Unanimous first-prize winner of the Casagrande International Competition in Italy and winner of CBC Canada’s National auditions for both solo and chamber music, Kathleen Solose has appeared in recital and with orchestras in Germany, Austria, Bulgaria, Italy, the United States, and Canada. She has also recorded for RAI-TV, Radio Svizzera Italiana, American Public Radio and CBC.

Kathleen Solose has recorded a solo CD of Chopin’s Sonatas Op. 4 and Op. 35 as well as the Polonaise-Fantaisie in conjunction with CBC. Her repertoire is wide-ranging; she has commissioned new works and performed with the Toronto Array and New Music Ensembles. Research has taken her to St. Petersburg, Russia, where she was invited to perform a recital at the St. Petersburg University for Culture and Art in May of 2008.

Professor Solose has initiated several chamber ensembles, including the Toronto Kammertrio and Musici Amati, and was Artistic Director and pianist of the Saskatoon Musici Amati Chamber Music Festival. She has performed with major artists including Pierre Henri Xuereb, Erika Raum and Paul Marleyn, and presently is pianist and Artistic Director of the Elixir Ensemble, which presents their first concert season in 2009-10.

In 2001 Kathleen Solose acquired a 1814 Viennese fortepiano in order to explore the sounds of the Classical and early Romantic literature on a unique historic instrument. In the 2005-6 season she performed all five Beethoven piano concerti and the Triple Concerto on this instrument with the Saskatoon Symphony. She also performed a Schubert recital on an 1815 Viennese instrument by Antonio Marcus Thym at the National Music Museum in Vermillion, SD.

The Solose Piano Duo (with Dr. Jane Solose, Associate Professor, UMKC) has toured Canada, the US and Hungary to great accolades. They have recorded a CD of Liszt, Rachmaninov, Chopin and Schubert. The Solose Duo performed at the American Liszt Society Festival in Washington, DC in May, 2008 and were invited to perform works by Rachmaninov and Stravinsky at the St. Petersburg Conservatory International Festival in October, 2008.

A Master teacher, her students have been successful at national and international competitions. Prof. Solose has given Masterclasses at the prestigious Kansas City Conservatory (UMKC), as well as the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto, the University of Szeged (Hungary).

Her CD’s are distributed by Eroica Classical Recordings.

Kathleen Solose is Associate Professor at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, Canada.

Kathleen Solose, pianist
From the Press:

“Her virtuosity, her mastery of the fiendish difficulties (Ravel’s Scarbo) were impressive...this was high-calibre pianism!”
Badische Zeitung, Germany

“The audience was spell-bound...one felt the sheer physical and spiritual confrontation in the transcendental variations of Beethoven’s ‘summum opus’ ”(Beethoven’s Op. 111)
Sudkurier, Germany

“Absolutely first-class...perfectly calibrated sonorities...above all, this artist posesses interpretive taste and the capacity to bring life to a work within its picturesque and aesthetic context.”
Napoli Notte, Italy

“Gave the impression that the entire keyboard was not enough to contain the turbulence of harmonies...a performance of great bravura”
La Nazione, Florence

“a fine, sensitive pianist of international calibre”
Paul Badura-Skoda, pianist