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The Hungarian pianist, organist, editor, and Bach-researcher, Sebestyén Nyírő, began his serious encounter with music as a pupil in the piano class of gifted children at the ”Antal Csermák” Music School in Veszprém, Hungary, where he was instructed by Júlia Szirbek. He graduated thereafter in 1997 from the ”Ernst von Dohnányi” Special Vocational School of Musical Arts in Hungary, where he studied with his uncle, Gábor Nyírő (who became later a beloved teacher of piano at the Liszt Academy in Hungary, and is also an organist). He obtained his Bachelor of Arts degree (2001) as well as his first Master of Music degrees (2004) in Piano Teaching and Performance from the Musikakademie der Stadt Basel (1999-2004), where he studied with László Gyimesi; his second pair of Master of Arts degrees in Piano Teaching and Performance Summa cum Laude from the Liszt Academy (University) of Music Budapest (2005-2007), where he studied with Professors Jenö Jandó and Balázs Szokolay; his Certificate of Sacred Music Studies at the Zürich Hochschule der Künste (2011-2012), where he studied with Tobias Willi, Andreas Jost and Beat Schäfer; his Master of Sacred Music (MSM) from School of Theology at the Boston University (2012-2016), where he studied with Max Reger-specialist Peter Sykes; and his Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the University of Connecticut (2009-2017), working with Professor Neal Larrabee (student of Stanislav Neuhaus), Irma Vallicello-Keller and Glenn Stanley (2017, Dissertation: Ornament-Related Passages in Selected Works of Johann Sebastian Bach). He spent two semesters in the Graduate Professional Diploma program at the HARTT School of Music of the University of Hartford, Connecticut, USA, where he studied with Oxana Yablonskaya (a pupil of Alexander Goldenweiser, Dmitry Bashkirov and Tatiana Nikolayeva).
He attended following master-classes as an active participant:
Zoltán Kocsis (piano), Lev Naumov (piano, pupil of Heinrich Neuhaus), Peter Frankl (piano), Jenö Jandó (piano) and Rudolf Lutz (Baroque improvisation, at HMT Zürich).
He attended following master-classes as passive participant: Michael Radulescu (organ), Andres Céa Galán (organ), András Schiff (piano), Gábor Takács-Nagy (chamber music), György Kurtág (chamber music).
Since 2018, Sebestyén Nyírő is enrolled in the PhD research program at Queen’s University Belfast, working with Professor Dr. Yo Tomita. He is a member of and presenter at the 2019 BNUK: J.S. Bach Dialogue Meetings at Cambridge University, UK (Early Career Forum). He presented at the American Guild of Organists 2014 Boston Convention, as well. He has received numerous Swiss, American and Hungarian honors and scholarships.
In the USA, Sebestyén Nyírő held positions of organist at St. Matthew Lutheran Church in Avon, Connecticut (July 2008-July 2009), St. Mary’s and St. Anne’s Roman Catholic parishes in New Britain, Connecticut (August 2009-August 2010), Holy Trinity United Methodist Church in Danvers, Massachusetts (September 2012-July 2013; also acting as music director), as well as in Switzerland, at Thomaskirche in Basel (September 2013-September 2016), and, currently serves as Principal Organist at Evangelisch-Reformierte Kirchgemeinde Olten (since September 2014).
His annotated translation of Hans Klotz’s book (1985) J.S. Bach's ornamentation was published by MHMC in Hungary in 2011 (reviewed by pianist Zoltán Kocsis). Television and radio broadcasts (DCAT, MTV Budapest, Telebasel, WMNR Fine Arts Radio/CT, MR Budapest) give account of his work. In the New York Concert Review June 2010 issue, Harris Goldsmith compares his “unusual, and [...] compelling new recording” of J.S. Bach's Goldberg Variations (BWV 988) to those of Glenn Gould's, Claudio Arrau's, Wilhelm Kempff’s, Simone Dinnerstein’s and Rosalyn Tureck’s.
As a chamber musician, Sebestyén Nyírő worked with the violin virtuoso Alexandre Dubach, the cellist Mark Varshavsky, the flautist Peter-Lukas Graf, and the Balkányi Quartet, sopranos Eva Csapó and Katalin Dijk. In the USA, for a short time, he worked together with the violinist Stan Renard.
He was a jury member of the first (2010) International Chopin Piano Competition in Hartford, Connecticut, USA (invited by the founder of the competition, Dr. Krystian Tkaczewski).
Sebestyén Nyírő has edited two works by Rudolf Lutz (Ciaccona, Fantasy for Violin and Piano, both in 2018 at SKM Zürich) and Michael Haydn (forthcoming editions of two unpublished Offertories). He is also active as a composer and makes arrangements of Swiss and Hungarian melodies for piano and organ, such as the Appenzell Variations for Organ Solo in 2018. |
