Grammy Award-winning pianist Daniil Trifonov (dan-EEL TREE-fon-ov) is a solo artist, champion of the concerto repertoire, chamber and vocal collaborator, and composer. Combining consummate technique with rare sensitivity and depth, his performances are a perpetual source of wonder to audiences and critics alike. He won the Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Solo Album of 2018 with Transcendental, the Liszt collection that marked his third title as an exclusive Deutsche Grammophon artist.
In 2024-25, Trifonov undertakes season-long artistic residencies with both the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Czech Philharmonic. His Chicago residency is Brahms’s Second Piano Concerto with the CSO’s Music Director Designate Klaus Mäkelä, a solo recital and a duo recital with violinist Leonidas Kavakos. Trifonov’s Czech tenure features Dvořák’s Concerto with Semyon Bychkov at season-opening concerts in Prague, Toronto, and at New York’s Carnegie Hall. Trifonov also opens the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra’s season with Mozart’s 25th Piano Concerto under Andris Nelsons; performs Prokofiev’s Second with the San Francisco Symphony and Esa-Pekka Salonen; reprises Dvořák’s concerto for a European tour with Jakub Hrůša and the Bamberg Symphony; plays Ravel’s G-major Concerto with Hamburg’s NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra and Alan Gilbert; and joins Rafael Payare and the Montreal Symphony for concertos by Schumann and Beethoven on a major eight-city European tour. In recital, Trifonov appears twice more at Carnegie Hall as part of two U.S. tours, with a solo program and with violinist Leonidas Kavakos. Due for release in fall 2024, My American Story, the pianist’s new Deutsche Grammophon double album, pairs solo pieces with concertos by Gershwin and Mason Bates.
Trifonov’s existing Deutsche Grammophon discography includes the Grammy-nominated live recording of his Carnegie recital debut; Chopin Evocations; Silver Age, for which he received Opus Klassik’s Instrumentalist of the Year/Piano award; the best-selling, Grammy-nominated double album Bach: The Art of Life; and three volumes of Rachmaninov works with the Philadelphia Orchestra and Yannick Nézet-Séguin, of which two received Grammy nominations and the third won BBC Music’s 2019 Concerto Recording of the Year. Named Gramophone’s 2016 Artist of the Year and Musical America’s 2019 Artist of the Year, Trifonov was made a Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French government in 2021.
During the 2010-11 season, Trifonov won medals at three of the music world’s most prestigious competitions: Third Prize in Warsaw’s Chopin Competition, First Prize in Tel Aviv’s Rubinstein Competition, and both First Prize and Grand Prix in Moscow’s Tchaikovsky Competition. He studied with Sergei Babayan at the Cleveland Institute of Music.
The Artist-in-Residence at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra is made possible through a generous gift from James and Brenda Grusecki.
Please note: Biographies are based on information provided to the CSOA by the artists or their representatives. More current information may be available on websites of the artists or their management.
