Aaron Pilsan

Pianist Aaron Pilsan secured international visibility after selection for the European Concert Hall Organization’s 2014-2015 ECHO Rising Star program, which led to solo recitals, orchestral engagements, and chamber appearances in leading venues across Europe and the United States. Committed to supporting younger musicians, he established the Pilsan Academy to guide career advancement. His 2023 Alpha release presented solo piano music by Schumann and Jörg Widmann, and BBC Music Magazine designated him a Rising Star the following year.

Born in 1995 in the Austrian town of Dornbirn to a non-musical family, Pilsan began piano studies at age five under Ivan Kárpáti and Susanne Schnetzter at the Dornbirn Music School. He entered Mozarteum University in Salzburg in 2007 for lessons with Karl-Heinz Kämmerling, then continued with the same teacher at the Hannover University of Music’s Institute for Early Development until 2012, where he also worked with Vassilia Efstathiadou. Multiple first prizes, among them the Wendl & Jung Competition in Vienna, preceded his 2011 selection by Germany’s Fono Forum magazine as Best Young Artist of the Year. The accolade prompted debuts at the Bregenz Festival, Schloss Elmau, and Lars Vogt’s Tannungen Chamber Music Festival in Heimbach. As an ECHO Rising Star, Pilsan performed at London’s Barbican, Paris’s Cité de la Musique, Vienna’s Konzerthaus, and additional major halls. In the same period he began studies with Vogt at Hannover University and made his recording debut on the Naïve label with Beethoven and Schubert works.

An experienced chamber musician, Pilsan performs regularly with cellist Kian Soltani as well as violinist Isabelle Faust, clarinetist Sharon Kam, and the Szymanowski Quartet. He has worked with composers Thomas Larcher, Jörg Widmann, and Reza Vali, giving the premiere of Vali’s Persian Folk Songs: Set No. 16C for cello and piano alongside dedicatee Soltani; the piece appeared on their 2018 Deutsche Grammophon album Home. In the late 2010s Pilsan launched the Pilsan Academy as a mentorship initiative. He received his master’s degree from Hannover University in 2021 and realized a long-held ambition by recording Book I of Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier. He subsequently presented both books at the “BACHathon for Ukraine” benefit concert in Szczecin’s Filharmonie, Poland. The 2023 Alpha recording of Schumann and Widmann followed, and BBC Music Magazine named him a Rising Star in 2024.