Piers Lane (AO) announced as recipient of 2022 Sir Bernard Heinze Memorial Award

Acclaimed pianist, Piers Lane (AO), has been awarded the Sir Bernard Heinze Memorial Award at a  concert with Joseph Calleja and Amelia Farrugia.

The Award, established by the University of Melbourne and colleagues at the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, is presented annually to a person who has made an outstanding contribution to music in Australia. It honours the memory of Sir Bernard Heinze (1894 – 1982), who for 31 years was Ormond Professor of Music at the University of Melbourne, and one of the major pioneers of orchestral life in Australia.

Currently based in London, Piers has a reputation as an engaging, searching and highly versatile performer. Five times soloist at the BBC Proms, his wide-ranging concerto repertoire exceeds one hundred works and has led to engagements with many of the world’s great orchestras. Festival appearances have included Aldeburgh, Seattle, Bard, Bath Mostly Mozart, Bergen, Cheltenham, Como Autumn Music, La Roque d’Anthéron, Rockport, Prague Spring, Ruhr Klavierfestival, Schloss vor Husum and the Chopin festivals in Warsaw, Duszniki-Zdrój, Mallorca and Paris.

In recent years Piers Lane has performed three concerti at Carnegie Hall, and world premieres of Carl Vine’s second Piano Concerto and Double Piano Concerto Implacable Gifts, both written for him. His extensive discography for Hyperion includes much admired recordings of rare romantic piano concertos, including his 2020 release of Bliss, Rubbra and Bax concertos with The Orchestra Now, the complete Malcolm Williamson piano concertos, the complete Preludes and Etudes by Scriabin, transcriptions of Bach and Strauss, along with complete collections of Concert Etudes by Saint-Saëns, Moscheles and Henselt, and transcriptions by Grainger.

Piers has also recorded eleven volumes of piano quintets with the Goldner String Quartet for Hyperion, many CDs with Tasmin Little and Michael Collins for Chandos and further solo and chamber CDs for EMI, Phillips, Dutton, Unicorn Kanchana and ABC Classics.

Piers Lane is Artistic Director of the Sydney International Piano Competition. He was Artistic Director of the Australian Festival of Chamber Music from 2006 to 2017, and from 2006 to 2013 he also directed the annual Myra Hess Day at the National Gallery in London. He has written and presented over 100 programs for BBC Radio 3, including the popular 54-part series The Piano.

On 11 June 2012, Piers was made an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) for distinguished services to the arts. In 1994 he was made an Honorary Member of the Royal Academy of Music, where he was a professor from 1989 to 2007. He holds Honorary Doctorates from two Australian Universities: Griffith and James Cook.

The Sir Bernard Heinze Memorial Award medallion, crafted from an original cast for each recipient, is made by sculptor Michael Meszaros.

Our congratulations to Piers Lane on this wonderful acknowledgement of his achievements.