Markus Becker - Freistil (2019)

Markus Becker, internationally acclaimed classical pianist, arrives at the Hemingway Lounge with his first jazz album "Freistil". "Freistil" is a brilliant, hypnotic, surprising project in which Becker guides us through his personal musical landscapes. Improvised narratives, bizarre miniatures, pop songs, a very intimate biographical journey with a wide horizon.

In international concert life, Markus Becker has been convincing as a cognitive artist of piano literature from Bach to Rihm, as an imaginative program designer, and as a distinguished artist, who has his second home in jazz for many years. At the big festivals Kissinger Sommer, Ruhr Piano Festival, Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival, Rheingau Music Festival, Beethovenfest Bonn, the Ludwigsburger Schlossfestspiele Markus Becker is a regular guest. He also gave concerts at the Salzburg Easter Festival. His directing partners include Claudio Abbado, Eiji Oue, Steven Sloane, Carlos Kalmar, Alun Francis, Howard Griffiths and Marcus R. Bosch.

Markus Becker's main concern is chamber music. As an interpreter, professor and festival director, he devotes himself to this field with particular dedication. The balance between artistic individuality and the common path to interpretative solutions, the fusion or juxtaposition of different soundscapes and instrumental possibilities form the core of his artistic work. His chamber ensemble partners include u.a. Albrecht Mayer, Nils Mönkemeyer, Adrian Brendel, Igor Levit, Sharon Kam and Alban Gerhardt.

In 2001, Markus Becker founded the Chamber Music Festival of the HMTMH: In eight concerts during the summer semester, lecturers, students and guests of the university devote themselves to the chamber music oeuvre of a composer. In a short time, the encyclopedic festival has become a crowd puller. Markus Becker received the "ECHO Klassik" three times and was honored several times with the Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik and the "Editor's choice" in GRAMOPHONE. His complete recording of Max Reger's piano works on a total of 12 CDs (Thorofon) is already legendary today. Since 1999 Becker has been a member of the Board of Trustees of the Max Reger Institute / Elsa Reger Foundation in Karlsruhe.