Eugene Asti

Eugene Asti is one of the most successful and sought-after collaborative pianists of his generation. In a distinguished career, he has partnered some of the world’s greatest singers including Sir Thomas Allen, Nancy Argenta, Katherine Broderick, Alison Buchanan, Dame Sarah Connolly, Sophie Daneman, Neil Davies, Richard Edgar-Wilson, Rebecca Evans, Alessandro Fisher, Anna Grevelius, Susan Gritton, Sophie Karthäuser, Angelika Kirchschlager, Mhairi Lawson, Stephan Loges, Dame Felicity Lott, Hannah Morrison, James Newby, Mark Padmore, Dame Margaret Price, James Rutherford, Sir Bryn Terfel, Sir Willard White, Roderick Williams, Helene Wold and Catherine Wyn-Rogers. He has formed particularly close musical partnerships with Sophie Karthäuser, Stephan Loges and James Rutherford both on the recital platform and in the recording studio.

He has performed at venues such as the Wigmore Hall and the Barbican, London; the Musikverein in Vienna; Mariinsky Theatre in St Petersburg; the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam; the Kölner Philharmonie; the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels; Symphony Hall in Birmingham; the Usher Hall in Edinburgh and Alice Tully Hall and Carnegie Hall in New York. Eugene appears regularly at the Oxford Lieder Festival and has devised and curated numerous recital series for King’s Place, the Wigmore Hall and St. John’s Smith Square in London.

He has recorded extensively for many record labels including Hyperion, Harmonia Mundi, Chandos, BIS, Signum and Lawo [see discography] and has performed many live broadcasts for the BBC, Radio France and RTBF (Belgium).

In 2009, to honor the bicentenary of Felix Mendelssohn’s birth, Eugene devised and curated a recital series for the inaugural season at King’s Place in London. In the same year he completed an edition of previously rare and unknown songs by Mendelssohn for the publisher Bärenreiter. 

Recent engagements included recitals with Dame Sarah Connolly and Tenebrae Choir at the Wigmore Hall, and at the Oxford Lieder Festival; recitals with Sophie Karthäuser at the Kölner Philharmonie and in Zürich, the Pierre Boulez-Saal in Berlin and Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels at the L'Amphitheatre Vauban in Namur, The Théâtre de la Ville, Paris, the Aula Collegium Novum Hall in Krakow and at the concert hall in Blaibach; and concerts with Sophie Karthäuser, Mhairi Lawson, Stephan Loges, Alessandro Fisher and James Newby as well a masterclass at the Clara Schumann Festival at St John’s, Smith Square in London.  Further engagements last season included a recital with Stephan Loges as well as giving a masterclass at the Oxford Lieder Spring Weekend of Song, and a concert with Sir Willard White at the Barber Institute in Birmingham. He also shared the platform with pianist Graham Johnson and seventeen of the finest young singers of today for the season’s final concert at the Wigmore Hall.  Future engagements include recitals with Sophie Karthäuser at the International Lied Festival in Zeist, at L’Été Mosan in Belgium, and at the Wigmore Hall. Eugene is a Steinway Artist. 

Eugene is a highly regarded and inspiring teacher at two of London’s most prestigious music colleges: the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance. 

He studied at the Mannes College of Music, New York with Jeannette Haien (whose other pupils have included Murray Perahia) and then with Graham Johnson at GSMD. Since then, he has been on the faculty of the Guildhall School for over 30 years where he teaches piano accompaniment and gives vocal coaching and Lieder classes. He regularly directs a variety of song projects that culminate in performances at the Milton Court Concert Hall in the Barbican.

As vocal accompaniment coordinator, Eugene leads performance projects at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance and also teaches within the keyboard department.

He has given masterclasses both in the UK and abroad including at the Oxford Lieder Mastercourse and the Schubert-Institut in Baden-bei-Wien. 

He is often asked to adjudicate competitions and has been on the panel for the Kathleen Ferrier Award, the Gerald Moore Award, the Oxford Lieder Young Artist Platform and the Lieder prizes at the Royal College of Music and Royal Academy of Music.