Key Biscayne Piano Festival presents Julien Libeer

Key Biscayne Piano Festival in collaboration with Miami International Piano Festival is proud to present Julien Libeer

Join us on Friday, January 18, 2018 for the Key Biscayne Piano Festival’s Inaugural Series 2018-19.

Our second performance will be showcasing Julien Libeer (Belgium) at the Key Biscayne Crossbridge Church at 7 pm.

There are two ticket types available for purchase:

• Concert Ticket:The Concert Ticket admits one adult or child to the concert only. THIS TICKET WILL BE AVAILABLE ONLINE UNTIL THURSDAY, JANUARY 17. ALL OTHER CONCERT TICKET PURCHASES CAN BE MADE ON SITE AT THE BOX OFFICE.
• Gourmet Ticket: The Gourmet Ticket admits one child or adult to the concert as well as a gourmet tasting & prosecco reception provided by Puntino Key Biscayne in a reserved zone and ONLY BEFORE the concert at 6:30pm. A description, sample menu, and photographs of the Gourmet Tasting are below. GOURMET TICKETS WILL ONLY BE AVAILABLE UNTIL WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 16 . NO GOURMET TICKETS WILL BE SOLD THE DAY OF THE FESTIVAL.

Concert Tickets are available online or at the door, and Gourmet Tickets are only available online.

Also a Puntino truck will be selling pizza before the concert & during the Intermezzo to the ones that have not bought the gourmet tickets.

Prosecco/white-red wines/water on sale to all only during the Intermezzo.

Each of our performances will be held at the Key Biscayne Crossbridge Church (located at 160 Harbor Dr.), and performance seating is first come, first serve. A ZONE WILL BE RESERVED IN THE CHURCH FOR THE GOURMET TICKET HOLDERS.

Piano Festival performances are a formal affair calling for “Miami Chic” attire.

Children 8 and up are welcome to attend, and Crossbridge Church babysitting services are available. Babysitting services must be reserved maximum two days before the performance. For babysitting reservations, please click here.

Community service hours are available for student volunteers. Volunteers will be able to register up to Thursday, January 17th, 2019. Contact Carolyn at carolyn@keybiscaynefoundation.org to learn more.

Parking is available at the front of the church.

JULIEN LIBEER (BELGIUM)

“The complete musician with a solid intellectual approach and an infallible instinct for the impalpable.”
−Maria João Pires

Born in 1987 near Brussels, Belgium, Julien Libeer’s earliest musical memory was the famous documentary on the recording of West Side Story by Leonard Bernstein. The piano, which he took up at age six, quickly became the faithful companion for expressing a love of music that, until today, thrives as much on opera, orchestra and chamber music as on the piano repertoire.

For five decisive years, French-Polish pedagogue Jean Fassina was the patient, demanding, wise teacher that any aspiring musician should have the chance to encounter. This experience was followed by the equally intense collaboration with Maria João Pires at the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel, whose advice and support strongly influenced Julien Libeer’s views over the last years and continue to do so.

Julien Libeer has been the guest of the Palais des Beaux-Arts and Flagey in Brussels, the Théâtre de la Ville (Paris), the Barbican Hall in London, the Auditorio Nacional in Madrid, Barcelona’s Palau de la Musica and the Amsterdam Concertgebouw. Other tours take him to Japan (Tokyo, Sumida Tryphony Hall), Lebanon (Beirut Chants festival), the US (Miami International Piano Festival). He is the artist in residence at Flagey, Brussels.

He has performed with the Brussels Philharmonic, the Belgian National Orchestra, deFilharmonie, Sinfonia Varsovia and the New Japan Philharmonic among others, under conductors like Michel Tabachnik, Augustin Dumay, Hervé Niquet, Serge Pehlevanian, Joshua Weilerstein, Enrique Mazzola, Christopher Warren-Green…

An accomplished chamber musician, he works on regular basis with Augustin Dumay, Camille Thomas, Frank Braley, Maria João Pires and Lorenzo Gatto, with whom he performs the complete Beethoven violin sonatas.

Julien Libeer has studied piano with Daniel Blumenthal (Royal Conservatory of Brussels), Jean Fassina (Paris), and is an associate artist of the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel, where he also specialized in chamber music with the members of the Artemis Quartet. Furthermore, he has received the advice of Dmitry Bashkirov, Alfred Brendel, Abdel Rahman El Bacha and Gerhard Schulz (Alban Berg Quartet).

Although he consciously avoided engaging in any kind of competition, has received such honorary prizes as the Juventus award (most promising young European soloist) in 2008, and was elected Young Musician of the Year by the Belgian Music Press Association in 2010. The Klara award 2013 was attributed to him by the audience of the national radio for classical music. Much appreciated for his eloquence, Julien Libeer is a regular guest of media at home and abroad. His work has been subject of a TV documentary (“Technique doesn’t exist”, 2013), also available on YouTube.

Based in Brussels, he spends most of his free time reading, swimming or enjoying a good series, and is actively engaged in several social projects, all rooted in the idea that music, far beyond its esthetic value, can be a force of change for anyone ready to listen.

PROGRAM

LIPATTI Nocturne

CHOPIN Nocturne Op. 9 and Op. 32

BACH Partita No. 2 in C minor, BWV 826

FAURE Preludes, Op. 103

CHOPIN Piano Sonata No. 2 in B-flat minor, Op. 35