Phillip Martin

The celebrated Irish pianist and composer, PHILIP MARTIN, has just returned from his native Dublin where he premiered his third piano concerto with the National Symphony of Ireland. This concerto, entitled “The Nine Orders of Angels” adds an important work to his already distinguished concerto repertoire of over 60 concertos. He has used these in his many concerto appearances in Ireland, the United Kingdom and abroad, with all the BBC orchestras, the Halle, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, City of Birmingham Orchestra, Ulster Orchestra, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and those in London such as the London Sinfonietta, the LSO and the RPO. Late in 2005, he toured Mexico and played recitals of Debussy, Liszt, Philip Martin and Louis Moreau Gottschalk in the Palace of Fine Arts. He was immediately requested to return for further concerts. 2007 marks his 60th birthday and he is planning a major National and International tour under the direction of ArtScope, his Irish management. In March of this year, his performance of Gershwins Concerto in F met with particular critical acclaim. This and many other American concerti are but one of his specialities. He has recorded an eight - volume set of CDs for Hyperion Records of the music of the colourful 19th century American composer, Louis Moreau Gottschalk, as well as a critically acclaimed recording called “The Maidens Prayer” which is heard repeatedly on Classic FM.
He gave the premiere of Samuel Barbers Piano Concerto in Ireland and subsequently played it on Radio 3 with three separate BBC orchestras and also toured in Germany, France and Turkey with the same work.His concert tours have taken him to countries as varied as Japan, Italy, Saudi Arabia and Canada and he has toured extensively in the United States where besides holding a UK-US Bi-centennial Arts Fellowship, he has also held residencies in various Universities and has been a guest of Tanglewood and Aspen Music Festivals. His BBC and foreign broadcasts are many and he has also been a frequent visitor to the BBC Promenade concerts, the last of which was televised on “ Omnibus at the Proms” PHILIP MARTIN manages, unusually for today, to combine a busy solo career with that of a composer and teacher and these three elements of his musical personality are what make him such a force in musical life today.