Emilio de Mercato

Born and raised in Varese, Italy, Emilio de Mercato had his early debut in 1999 at the Sala Verdi in Milan. He is the founder and Music Director of the Alberta Symphony Orchestra, a professional symphony orchestra and the first touring orchestra in Alberta and Canada. Its mission is to integrate classical music into the lives of youth.

Emilio won numerous awards, performed throughout North America, Europe and Asia, composes chamber and orchestral works, created more projects than we can count, and conducted multiple orchestras throughout his long successful career.

The Pintadera Award in Italy praised his “…outstanding technique combined with a very unique and very personal sensitivity…”

The piano recital program features works by some of the most important composers of the piano literature of all times: Chopin, Beethoven, Rachmaninoff, and Liszt. Through their compositions, the piano is explored to its full potential of tone, registers, dynamics, as well as the pianist is engaged into an intense performance, musically and technically. Emilio feels “at home” by opening the program with his favorite composers: Fryderyk Chopin with Nocturne in B flat minor Op.9 No.1 and Nocturne in C sharp minor Op.27 No.1, followed by Ludwig Van Beethoven with the Sonata in C minor Op.13 “Pathétique”. Works by the two pianists with biggest hands in history complete the second half of the program, including the famous Prelude in C sharp minor Op.3 No.2 and the Prelude in G minor Op.23 No.5 by Sergei Rachmaninoff, and Franz Liszt’s poetical Sonetto 104 del Petrarca from Années de pèlerinage, Deuxième année: Italie, and the turbulent Mephisto Waltz No.1.

Individual tickets go on sale two weeks before show date or get a subscription to the Wednesday Mosaic Series.