Biography
Born in San Diego and raised in British Columbia and California鈥檚 Bay Area, pianist Andrew Zhou has been noted for his 鈥済reat sensitivity鈥 and 鈥渓uminous technique鈥 (Anaclase), as well as performances of 鈥渆xtraordinary energy鈥 whose 鈥渟onic range and expressive power stun under his steely fingers鈥 (ResMusica). Second-prize laureate at the Concours International de Piano d鈥橭rl茅ans, where he garnered four special awards, Zhou has worked closely with countless leading composers of our time, including Unsuk Chin, Liza Lim, Tristan Murail, and Walter Zimmermann, as well as with conductors such as Jonathan Nott, Jean-Philippe Wurtz, and Julien Leroy.
Zhou also composes, improvises, and opines on sundry topics intersecting the musical, social, and literary, frequently on Zhouology, his Substack newsletter. He is a proponent of recovering and performing historically erased works, while his performances make complex contemporary scores accessible to audiences.
Zhou has toured throughout France and has appeared in major venues such as the KKL (Lucerne), Tongyeong Concert Hall, and the Th茅芒tre des Bouffes du Nord (Paris). He has been the recipient of commissioning grants from the Arts Council of Ireland, the Galaxie-y Funds, and the Fromm Foundation. He is a core member of the boundary-breaking ensemble PinkNoise and is half of the two-piano duo HereNowHear, which has been the dedicatee of numerous new works, including the recent premiere of Loren Loiacono鈥檚 hour-long multimedia work 鈥淒o No Harm.鈥
Zhou is an assistant teaching professor at Syracuse University and teaches piano and chamber music at Cornell University, where he earned his doctorate. He served for several years as a contemporary leader for the Lucerne Festival Academy and is a regular featured guest at the Santa Monica Music Festival. Primary teachers include Xak Bjerken (Cornell) and Bruce Brubaker (New England Conservatory), alongside influential work with Teresa Dybvig, Pierre-Laurent Aimard, and Tamara Stefanovich.
His recent albums include sedgeflowers | MANTRA (False Azure), which was described as 鈥渄eeply principled鈥 and 鈥渁stonishingly inventive鈥 (Sequenza21), as well as Pr茅sences Lointaines (Solstice), featuring rarely heard works from a 300-year tradition of virtuosic French music. The album includes the first studio recording of a keyboard suite by Elisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre on the piano.
Called a 鈥渟urrealophile鈥 in Natan Last鈥檚 Across the Universe (Pantheon), a history of crosswords, his puzzles have appeared in the New York Times. ()