Paul Lewis

Sunday, May 10, 2026 – 3 :00 PM

Mairs Concert Hall, Macalester College

“Every time I play a concert, I treat it as a lesson. You comb through everything and try to be your own best teacher. It’s always changing. Every concert experience is a step in the process.” 
— Paul Lewis

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Program

MOZART
Sonata in C Major, K.330

POULENC
Improvisations, Nos. 7-12

DEBUSSY
L’isle joyeuse

POULENC
Improvisations, Nos. 1-6 and  13-15

MOZART
Sonata in C minor, K. 457

As one of the foremost interpreters of the Central European piano repertoire, Paul Lewis has performed and made recordings of Beethoven and Schubert that receive high critical acclaim. The sincerity and depth of his musical approach have won him global popularity that is reflected in the world-class orchestras he works with, including the Berlin Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony, London Symphony, Philharmonia, Bavarian Radio Symphony, NHK Symphony, New York Philharmonic, LA Philharmonic, Royal Concertgebouw and Leipzig Gewandhaus orchestras. His close relationship with Boston Symphony Orchestra led to his selection as the 2020 Koussevitzky Artist at Tanglewood.

With a natural affinity for Beethoven, Lewis took part in the BBC’s three-part documentary Being Beethoven and performed a piano concerto cycle over 3 concerts at Tanglewood in summer 2022, and then in Boston in 2023 with Andris Nelsons and the Boston Symphony . He has performed the cycle all over the world and was the first pianist to play the complete cycle in a single BBC Proms season in 2010.

Between 2022 and 2025, Lewis embarked on a Schubert Piano Sonata Series, presenting four programs of the complete sonatas at over 40 venues around the world. In March 2025 he gave the world premiere of Thomas Larcher’s Piano Sonata in Oviedo and will give the regional premiere of the piece in Austria, Czech Republic, Holland, Italy, Singapore, Switzerland, United Kingdom and the USA.  

Beyond many award-winning Beethoven and Schubert recordings, his discography with Harmonia Mundi also demonstrates his characteristic depth of approach in Romantic repertoire such as Schumann, Mussorgsky, Brahms and Liszt. In chamber music, he works closely with tenor Mark Padmore in lied recitals around the world and with him has recorded three Schubert song cycles. He is co-Artistic Director of Midsummer Music, an annual chamber music festival held in Buckinghamshire, UK.

Lewis has been honored with numerous awards, including Royal Philharmonic Society Instrumentalist of the Year; two Edison awards; three Gramophone awards; Diapason d’Or de l’Annee; South Bank Show Classical Music Award; honorary degrees from Liverpool, Edge Hill and Southampton universities; appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2016 Queen’s Birthday Honours. Most recently, in May of 2025, Lewis became the first non-American pianist to chair the jury of The Van Cliburn International Piano Competition.

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“Lewis is a wonderfully unfussy and straightforwardly lucid interpreter of these great works, judicious with his rubato, and never imposing unnecessary mannerisms on the music; whether structurally or texturally everything is consistently uncluttered.”

— The Guardian

“…the music seems to flow out of him effortlessly, as manifest in a poised and controlled execution that easily handles the formidable challenges posed by each piece”

— Chicago Classical Review

 “…Lewis surely gives you the best of all possible worlds; one devoid of idiosyncrasy yet of a deeply personal musicianship…his quiet and distinctive voice can lift even the most familiar phrase on to another sphere and his playing throughout, shorn of accretion, makes all these sonatas shine with their first radiance and eloquence.”

— Bryce Morrison, Gramophone

“His uncanny ability to open up a unique perspective on the familiar gems delivered more than even the most demanding listener could expect.”

— The Boston Musical Intelligencer

 “Paul Lewis’s performance was totally unmannered: no varnish was applied… There were passages of powerful drama, wide vistas, and a wonderful delicacy and poise; magical changes of key, shifts of perspective, shafts of sunlight. I feel very fortunate to have heard Lewis in this music.”

— Seen and Heard International

“Lewis is a wonderfully unfussy and straightforwardly lucid interpreter of these great works, judicious with his rubato, and never imposing unnecessary mannerisms on the music; whether structurally or texturally, everything is consistently uncluttered.”

— The Guardian