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Richard Egarr

From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist

Richard Egarr is a British conductor and keyboard player, born on 7 August 1963 in Lincoln. He received his first training as a chorister at York Minster and at Chetham's School of Music, was an organ scholar at Clare College, Cambridge, and then studied at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. Working with Gustav Leonhardt brought him even closer to historically informed performance.

Music and breakthrough

Egarr is best known as a specialist in Baroque music, but plays much more besides. His repertoire runs from fifteenth-century organ arrangements and Dussek and Chopin on period pianos to Berg and Maxwell Davies on the modern piano. He recorded solo albums of keyboard music for, among others, Harmonia Mundi and chamber music for Hyperion. His albums from the 1990s include Complete Keyboard Works and Concertos pour clavecin et cordes.

Influence

In 2006 he became music director of the Academy of Ancient Music, a post he held until 2021. In 2007 he made his debut at Glyndebourne with a staged Matthäus-Passion by Bach. From 2020 until 2024 he was music director of the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra in San Francisco. Since 2019 he has been principal guest conductor of the Residentie Orkest in The Hague. He lives in Amsterdam and led the Academy of the Begijnhof there. Egarr shows that a harpsichordist can also lead an orchestra, and that early music can sound like music of today.

Listening

Listening tip. Listen to a harpsichord recording by Egarr and notice the sound of the plucked strings. Do you hear that the instrument does not let the tone swell slowly the way a piano does?

Discography

Studio albums

Categories: Artists