The American pianist, Diane Walsh, holds degrees from the Juilliard School, where she studied with Irwin Freundlich, and from the Mannes College of Music, where she studied with Richard Goode. She has been awarded many honors including the top prizes at the Munich ARD International Piano Competition, Salzburg International Mozart Competition, Concert Artists Guild International Competition and Young Concert Artists International Auditions. She was also a prize-winner at the Ferruccio Busoni, Van Cliburn and William Kapell competitions.
Since making her New York recital debut on the Young Concert Artists Series, Diane Walsh has toured the globe, with performances in forty-six of the fifty states and in twenty-one other countries. Highlights include recitals at Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie, Merkin Concert Hall, Kaufmann Auditorium and Miller Theatre in New York City; the Kennedy Center in Washington, Orchestra Hall in Chicago, Wigmore Hall in London, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Philharmonia Great Hall in St. Petersburg, and the Rudolfinum Dvorák Hall in Prague. Recent reviews have praised her "soulful outpouring," "intelligent virtuosity" and "exquisite care and loving touch."
Diane Walsh has appeared as soloist with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, Austin Symphony, Rochester Symphony, Delaware Symphony, Syracuse Symphony and American Symphony and the Bayerischer Rundfunk Symphonieorchester (Munich), HR-Sinfonieorchester (Frankfurt), Radio-Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart and Radio-Symphonie-Orchester-Berlin. She has toured the USA with the Orchestra of St. Luke's, appeared at Carnegie Hall and toured Europe with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, and soloed with orchestras in Brazil, Russia, the Netherlands and the Czech Republic. Conductors with whom she has collaborated include David Zinman, Seiji Ozawa, Kazuyoshi Akiyama, Leon Botstein, Stephen Gunzenhauser, Eliahu Inbal, John Giordano, Erich Kunzel, John Nelson, and Peter Bay.
In 2009 Diane Walsh was the onstage pianist in the Broadway production of Moisés Kaufman's play 33 Variations, starring Jane Fonda, during which she gave 113 performances of L.v. Beethoven's Variations on a Waltz of Diabelli. She was the pianist in three other productions of the play, in Washington, La Jolla and Los Angeles.
Summer chamber music festivals where Diane Walsh has performed include the Marlboro Festival, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Bard Music Festival, Chesapeake Chamber Music Festival, Eastern Music Festival and the Cape Cod Chamber Music Festival. She also was artistic director of the Skaneateles Festival for five years. She is a member of the quintet La Fenice and of the Walsh-Drucker-Cooper Trio.
Diane Walsh has released eighteen recordings of diverse repertoire on the Bridge, Newport, Sony, Nonesuch, Koch, Stereophile, CRI, Jonathan Digital and Naxos labels. Her latest recording, "Bach Suites", includes a French Suite, English Suite and Partita by J.S. Bach. She is a Steinway Artist.
Diane Walsh was an associate professor at Mannes College of Music in New York for 32 years, and in 2015 she was a visiting artist at Colby College. She lives in Portland, Maine with her husband, the writer Richard Pollak. |