French pianist, Francois Dumont will open the Redlands Symphony’s SignatureSERIES, the orchestra’s 2020-21 virtual concert season on November 14 at 8 PM with a performance of Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata and Chopin’s Four Ballades. The concert will repeat on Sunday, November 15 at 4 PM. The concert is free and can be accessed via the symphony’s website at www.redlandssymphony.com/signature.
This is the first of six musical events in the SignatureSERIES, Redlands Symphony’s response to the limitations placed on live concerts by the COVID-19 epidemic.
“As it became clear that we would not be able to perform normally during the upcoming season,” explains Ransom Wilson, the Symphony’s Music Director and Conductor, “The board and I began to explore viable alternatives a live concert. We wanted to remain visible in the community, continue to provide the musical performances at a high standard, and remain viable. The SignatureSERIES is our solution. I’m thrilled that my friend and musical colleague, Francois Dumont, will be with us to kick-off the series.”
SignatureSERIES programs will be performed in December, January, February, March, and April. The December program, Horns for the Holidays, will feature a performance by members of Redlands Symphony’s brass section performing an eclectic mixture of music for brass, including several elections suitable for the holidays.
Francois Dumont
François Dumont’s international career has been launched by his success in major international piano competitions winning prizes in the Chopin Competition, the Queen Elisabeth Competition, the Clara Haskil Competition, the Montecarlo Piano Masters. He has been nominated for the Victoires de la musique, a major French classical music event. He has received the Prix de la Révélation from the Syndicate of Music Critics in France.
François Dumont has been chosen by Leonard Slatkin to play and record both Ravel concerti with the Orchestre National de Lyon. The CD will be issued for Naxos during the 2019 season.
He appears as a soloist with orchestras such as the Cleveland Orchestra, the Mariinsky Theater Orchestra, the Montecarlo Philharmonic, the Warsaw National Philharmonic, the Orchestre national de Lorraine, the Orchestre National de Lille, the Orchestre National d’Ile-de-France, the Orquesta Nacional de Colombia, the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne, the Tokyo Symphony with conductors such as Jesùs Lopez-Cobos, Antoni Wit, Arie van Beek, Philippe Bender, Rani Calderon, David Reiland, Stefan Sanderling, Alexander Sladkovsky.
François Dumont was fourteen years old when he entered the Paris Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique in Bruno Rigutto’s class. He later studied at the prestigious Lieven Piano Foundation and the Lake Como International Piano Academy with artists such as Dmitri Bashkirov, Leon Fleisher, Murray Perahia, William Grant Naboré, Menahem Pressler, Andreas Staier and Fou Ts’ong.
François Dumont is invited to perform recitals in major venues such as the Festival International de la Roque d’Anthéron, the Piano aux Jacobins Festival à Toulouse, Chopin Festival in Nohant, Radio-France Montpellier Festival, Chopin à Paris Bagatelle Festival, Chopin and his Europe Festival in Warsaw, Nuits du Suquet in Cannes, Journées Ravel in Montfort l’Amaury, Ljubljana Festival, Kennedy Center in Washington. He regularly tours Japan, South Korea, and China.
His chambers music partners are Tabea Zimmerman, Augustin Dumay, Henri Demarquette, Xavier Philipps, the Prazak, Sine Nomine, Talich, Zemlinsky, Voce and Debussy Quartets. With Virginie Constant and Philippe Aïche, his is part of the Trio Élégiaque, which whom he recorded the complete Beethoven and Schubert Trios.
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