Pieter Wispelwey is equally at ease on the modern or period cello. His acute stylistic awareness, combined with a truly original interpretation and a phenomenal technical mastery, has won the hearts of critics and public alike in repertoire ranging from JS Bach to Gubaidulina, Dutilleux and works composed for him.
Wispelwey’s career spans five continents and he has appeared as soloist with many of the world’s leading orchestras including the Boston Symphony, Dallas Symphony, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, Vancouver Symphony, NHK Symphony, Yomiuri Nippon, Tokyo Philharmonic, Sapporo Symphony, Sydney Symphony, Orquestra Sinfônica do Estado de São Paulo, London Philharmonic, Hallé Orchestra, BBC Symphony, BBC Scottish Symphony, Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, Academy of Ancient Music, Gewandhaus Orchester Leipzig, Danish National Radio Symphony, Budapest Festival Orchestra and Camerata Salzburg.
Conductor collaborations include Ivan Fischer, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Herbert Blomstedt, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Jeffrey Tate, Kent Nagano, Otto Tausk, Sir Neville Marriner, Philippe Herreweghe, Vassily Sinaisky, Vladimir Jurowski, Louis Langrée, Marc Minkowski, Ton Koopman and Sir Roger Norrington.
With regular recital appearances in London (Wigmore Hall, Kings Place), Paris (Châtelet, Louvre), Amsterdam (Concertgebouw, Muziekgebouw), Brussels (Bozar), Berlin (Konzerthaus), Vienna (Konzerthaus, Musikverein), Milan (Società del Quartetto), Buenos Aires (Teatro Colon), Sydney (The Utzon Room), Seoul (Arts Center), Tokyo (Toppan Hall), Los Angeles (Walt Disney Hall) and New York (Lincoln Center), Wispelwey has established a reputation as one of the most charismatic recitalists on the circuit.
Wispelwey’s performances of the complete Bach Suites in a single evening form a major strand of his recital appearances, an accomplishment that has attracted major critical acclaim throughout Europe and the US. “On paper it is a feat requiring brilliance, stamina and perhaps a bit of hubris. In practice Mr. Wispelwey proved himself impressively up to the challenge, offering performances as eloquent as they were provocative” (New York Times).
With a number of “complete” sets by other composers in his repertoire, he has also followed the complete Bach Suites with a recital of those by Britten, and extended the venture to its greatest proportion yet when he played the complete Bach Suites, Beethoven’s complete works for cello and piano, and the two cello sonatas by Brahms over the course of three consecutive evenings at Melbourne Recital Centre as part of their Great Performers Series.
Together with Paolo Giacometti, Wispelwey is the recipient of the 2019 Brahmspreis in recognition of the duo’s groundbreaking interpretations of the composer’s music, which culminated in an exciting recording venture committing the complete duo works by Schubert and Brahms to disc. The final instalment of the 6 CDs was released in May 2019 by Evil Penguin Records Classic.
Pieter Wispelwey’s impressive discography of about 50 albums, available on Channel Classic, Onyx and EPR, has attracted major international awards. As well as the complete Schubert and Brahms, he has released three recordings of the complete Bach Suites, and his recent recording of Weinberg’s Concertino received the German Record Critics Award. In 2023, he released two albums In Memoriam, dedicated to his son Dorian, who tragically died in 2022. The first of these is a rerelease of the three greatest Schubert Violin-Piano pieces and the Trockne Blumen Variations, Schubert having played a great role in Dorian’s life. The second, the Scordatura album, features two works in darker, alternative tunings: Bach’s Fifth Suite and Kodaly’s Sonata.
Born in Haarlem, The Netherlands, Wispelwey studied with Dicky Boeke and Anner Bylsma in Amsterdam and later with Paul Katz in the USA and William Pleeth in the UK. Pieter is Professor of Cello at Robert Schumann Musikhochschule Düsseldorf and the Conservatorium van Amsterdam. He plays on a 1760 JB Guadagnini cello and a 1710 Barak Norman baroque cello.
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35 CDs: The Complete Channel Recordings; Channel Classics
November 2024
"Haydn's cello concertos with Pieter Wispelwey and Florilegium were one of the greatest personal key experiences in the field of instrumental music. His cello playing is slender, vocal, changeable, yet firmly grounded, focused, with precisely reflected vibrato and a temperament (awareness of rhythmic edge and emphasis where it belongs). From the very first note I was swept away, indeed the door opened for new listening experiences. In addition, there is a lightness and a flowing, swirling river of extroversion in the playing: electrifying. (…) Wispelwey always understood tradition as a living thing, just as the creators of great Baroque masterpieces still do today. Wispelwey soon emancipated himself from the dogmas of the original sound movement and sought to transfer the knowledge gained from this practice to modern instruments. Despite his strong formal awareness, his playing is completely free in its exploration of individual nuances and facets, moods and emotions. (...) After listening to the box, a picture emerges of a unique artistic profile that understands transformation as a principle and truthfulness in the moment as the highest commandment. Wispelwey is a gifted communicator of stories on his instrument, where seriousness and mischievousness, dedication and improvisational spontaneity result in a delicious blend. A compendium of cello music in exceptional interpretations."
Online Merker, Dr. Ingobert Waltenberger
CD: In Memoriam II
Evil Penguin (September 2023)
"Never has the Kodaly Suite been heard with such turmoil as in this extremely intense and profound interpretation which captivates the listener ceaselessly from the first minute.
In the fifth Suite by Bach, too, Wispelwey achieves extraordinary depth of emotion with his sensitive phrasing and the intensity of his expression.
…a CD that won’t leave anyone untouched."
Remy Franck, Pizzicato
"...Wispelwey's reading has wonderful life and elasticity... It's impossible not to find solace in its ineluctable harmonic logic, and impossible not to be profoundly moved by Wispelwey's self-effacing reading, a performance heavy with held-back tears."
Helen Wallace, BBC Music Magazine ****
"A major addition to the cellist's discography."
Jean-Charles Hoffélé, Artalinna Magazine
"Wispelwey delivers the superb Sonata op. 8 (1915) by Kodaly in a deep and introverted interpretation, undoubtedly the most captivating published for ages..."
Patrick Szersnovicz, Diapason
"This celebration captures the soul of a musician who reinvented the entire repertoire of his instrument."
Jean-Charles Hoffélé, Clic Musique
"Wispelwey’s tone is rich from top to bottom, and he emphasizes expressiveness, particularly in the Kodály and Britten, by varying the degree and speed of his vibrato. The intensity of his playing and the fierce concentration heard throughout make these performances anything but run of the mill."
Henry Fogel, Fanfare Magazine
CD: In Memoriam I
Evil Penguin (February 2023)
...in the Fantasy they achieve a moving blend of grace, playfulness, warmth, and restrained sadness.
Remy Franck, Pizzicato Magazine
...duo music by Schubert adapted for cello and piano, performed with insight and lyrical warmth by Wispelwey...
Erik Levi, BBC Music Magazine
Bach Cello Suites for Mozarteum Argentino
Teatro Colón (November 2022)
This repertoire is like the bible for cellists: it is full of interpretive layers and connotations. But Wispelwey's stripped reading, with great imagination and unprecedented dedication to the repertoire... made the works sound with the freshness of newly written pieces.
Laura Novoa, Clarín
...cellist Pieter Wispelwey delved into Bach with a technical, physical and emotional tour de force. In an unbeatable closing of the season for the Mozarteum Argentino, [Pieter] performed the six Bach suites in a concert to remember.
Pablo Gianera, LA NACION *****
Dresden Music Festival
Dresden. May 2022
Pieter Wispelwey played Ravel’s Kaddish: a sound of such luminescent richness, so charged with feeling that even the quietest phrases seemed to flood the entire hall. Wispelwey gives the impression of creating expressive shadow even within light; the only valid response was quiet awe.
Richard Bratby, Slippedisc
Ebenso emotional und tiefgehend interpretiert Pieter Wispelwey das „Kaddish“ aus den „Deux mélodies hébraïques“ von Maurice Ravel.
Pieter Wispelwey's interpretation of the "Kaddish" from Maurice Ravel's "Deux mélodies hébraïques" is equally emotional and profound.
Pauline Lehmann, Klassik Begeistert
Spielerisch, leicht und locker, frisch und klangvoll, auch mit Äußerlichkeiten, aber souveräner Meisterschaft und großer Kantilene (2. Satz) spielte Senior Pieter Wispelwey das „Konzert A‑Dur (Wq 172). Als Einziger brillierte er mit einer Zugabe von Johann Sebastian Bach für Violoncello solo scheinbar mühe- und schwerelos.
Playful, light and easy, fresh and sonorous, even with externals, but with sovereign mastery and great cantilena (2nd movement), senior Pieter Wispelwey played the "Concerto in A major (Wq 172). He was the only one to shine with an encore by Johann Sebastian Bach for violoncello solo seemingly effortlessly and weightlessly.
Ingrid Gerk, Online Merker
CD: Weinberg
Evil Penguin April 2022
Pieter Wispelwey inflects the solo cello part with tremendous artistry, sculpting Weinberg’s melodic lines with a wonderful sense of colour and imagination yet without succumbing to indulgent emotion even in the most heart-rending passages. The Belgian ensemble Les Métamorphoses under Raphaël Feye are admirably responsive partners both in this work and in the Fantasy, another attractive work in which Wispelwey mesmerises the listener with his charismatic shaping of the hauntingly mysterious waltz in the slow sections and the rumbustious dance rhythms of the central Allegro.
Performance ★ ★ ★ ★ ★
Recording ★ ★ ★ ★ ★
Erik Levi, BBC Music Magazine
Wispelwey plays with supple energy, keeping emotion in check in the lament at start and finish, the double-stopped chords clean and precise, the pizzicato warm and fluid.
Fiona Maddocks, The Guardian
Pieter Wispelwey captures the music’s claustrophobic intensity with even greater acuity. At times it feels as though he is merely breathing on his instrument, whispering emotional confidences.
Julian Haylock, The Strad
Britten's Cello Suite No. 1, best recording
Building a Library on BBC Music Magazine
“In terms of emotional intensity and in finding the poetry within the score, Pieter Wispelwey’s 2002 recording proves utterly exceptional – and that is within a very distinguished roster of interpretations…This is simply breath-taking playing”.
Jo Talbot, BBC Music Magazine
Schubert, Brahms: The Complete Duos / Coda
With Paolo Giacometti, Evil Penguin Classic
Pieter Wispelwey’s multi-album mission to record all of Brahms’s and Schubert’s duos – not just ones for cello – has struck a special chord with me over the course of its creation. Partly because it’s very clearly been a labour of love, and partly because it’s thrown up a few really interesting interpretations…here is the fifth and final instalment, which as ever is further strengthened by hugely enjoyable and committed partnering, and I’d say it’s probably my favourite.
Charlotte Gardner, Gramophone
Wispelwey and Giacometti finally reach the coda of their six-disc exploration of the duos of Schubert and Brahms with this pair of CDs. Never mind that none of the works here were originally written for cello and piano – Wispelwey’s is a bold and mostly convincing bid to expand the cello repertoire.
Cellists usually play the G major Violin Sonata in Klengel’s D major version. Wispelwey here returns it to its original key with enlightening results: the lyrical first-movement theme now appears in the cello’s middle range, which suits its autumnal character better than the soaring notes of Klengel’s version, while in the final pages of the D minor Sonata’s Presto the extra weight of the cello sound adds excitement and power. In both Schubert works Wispelwey leans towards the playful, keeping us waiting fractionally longer than expected for the return of the theme in both finales and enjoying the sprightly interplay with the piano. Balance is always tip-top and the sound spacious and warm.
Brahms’s C minor Scherzo fizzes with urgency, and the duo’s exceptionally free and poetic playing of the first interlude feels like a nostalgic look back at the whole series.
Janet Banks, the Strad
Brahms, Ravel, Debussy
Rockport Chamber Music Festival (June 2019)
Wispelwey communicated his musical intentions through both sound and physical gestures that created an enthralling performance atmosphere. … The evening demonstrated Wispelwey’s virtuosity as one of the great communicative performing artists of his generation.
Nicolas Sterner, The Boston Musical Intelligencer
Van der Aa: Double Concerto
Vancouver Symphony Orchestra (June 2019)
The entrance of the soloists affirmed a poignant spirit, one that appeared selectively throughout the work and gave the piece a distinctive resonance.
Geoffrey Newman, Vancouver Classical Music
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