Dr. Andrew Brownell–2019 MMTA Guest Artist
Since winning 2nd Prize at the 2006 Leeds Competition, Andrew Brownell has pursued an active and varied international performing career. Critics regularly remark on his creative programming and interpretive insight. Musical Opinion described him as “potentially one of the most significant pianists of his generation”, and The Oregonian wrote that Brownell “impresses as much with his mind as with his hands… the anti-Lang Lang.”
Mr. Brownell won 2nd Prize ex aequo at the 2002 International J. S. Bach Competition in Leipzig, making him the first American pianist to have ever won a prize in the history of the competition. He also won 1st Prize at the 2005 J.N. Hummel Competition in Bratislava, has since achieved widespread recognition as “one of the foremost Hummel interpreters of our time” (Hudobný Život), and is an honorary member of the Hummel Gesellschaft in Weimar. His edition of the Piano Concerto in a minor, Op. 85 was released by Breitkopf & Härtel in 2016.
Mr. Brownell’s performances have aired on BBC radio and television, Classic FM (UK), NPR, CBC, Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk, and RBB KulturRadio. He has been soloist with orchestras such as the Hallé, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Slovak Philharmonic, and the Hermitage State Orchestra (Russia); and he has collaborated with such conductors as Sir Mark Elder, Owain Arwel Hughes, André Bernard, and Murray Sidlin.
A native of Portland, Oregon, Andrew Brownell began studying the piano at the age of four. His teachers have included Nancy Weems and Horacio Gutiérrez at the University of Houston; John Perry at the University of Southern California (Los Angeles); and Joan Havill at the Guildhall School of Music in London, where he earned a doctorate. An enthusiastic collaborative artist, Andrew Brownell was a member of a prize-winning trio at the Fischoff Chamber Music Competition (USA) and has appeared in concert with principals of orchestras such as the Philharmonia, Amsterdam Concertgebouw, and Vienna Philharmonic. In 2017, he joined the faculty of the Butler School of Music, The University of Texas at Austin.