Edwin Gnandt
Professor of Piano at Ambrose University in Calgary, Edwin Gnandt continues to enjoy a collaborative career in music as pianist, accompanist, author, adjudicator, competition juror, workshop clinician and international speaker. He adjudicates festivals across Canada and recently as a juror for the Canadian Music Competition (CMC), the National Stepping Stone Competition, the Bosendorfer (BC) Piano Competition and the Steinway Junior Competition. In 2022, Mr. Gnandt will be the Keynote Speaker and Competition Juror for the BCRMTA Provincial Music Conference. He has been praised by the San Francisco Examiner for his "consistently alluring sound," by the Oakland Tribune for his "ear for phrasing," and by the Los Angeles Times for his "distinct refinement." He participated as a visiting Professor of Music at Azusa Pacific University in Los Angeles, California. His book “The Soul of the Music: Gifts from the Golden Age of Piano” (2014) has been received with excellent reviews.
His newly released second book (2019) entitled “The Inner World of Fryderyk Chopin: Psychology, Medicine and the Majorca Period”, involved Chopinolgy forensic research. For this project, he made research trips to Paris, France and the Carthusian Monastery in Valldemossa on the Island of Majorca where Chopin spent the winter of 1838-1839.
Professor Gnandt presents and chairs at international conferences including the annual ‘Hawaii International Conference on Arts and Humanities’ (HICAH), the ‘International Journal of Arts and Sciences Conference’ (IJAS) in Barcelona, Spain; the International IJAS conference at the Ca Foscari University of Venice, Italy; and the IJAS conference in Florence, Italy.
He has many recordings for CBC and has collaborated with a variety of national and international artists including baritone Alan Monk (Metropolitan Opera), baritone Paul Berkholds (California Institute of the Arts), violinist Dylana Jenson (Silver Medal Winner-International Tchaikovsky Competition), violinist Thomas Williams (McGill University), violinist Connie Gantsweg (Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra), flautist Leslie Neuman (University of Toronto).
He is a regular contributor to the Victoria Conservatory of Music Summer Piano Academy, the Mt. Royal University Summer Piano Institute, Calgary CASSA Musical Arts Summer Piano and the Pt. Loma Summer Piano Institute in San Diego.
Mr. Gnandt has studied at a number of prestigious institutions, including the Juilliard School of Music, University of Washington and University of Edinburgh, Scotland (Canada Council Grant). His piano students have participated in national and international piano competitions and have gone on to graduate studies at recognized institutions such as Juilliard, University of Toronto, McGill, University of Ottawa, Eastman School of Music and the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music.
Critical Reviews
"Edwin Gnandt is a pianist of sensitivity; he has about him that elusive but distinct refinement that a wine connoisseur or a horseman might refer to as breed. One gets the impression that at his worst, this pianist couldn't offend one's sensibilities that a lapse of taste wouldn't figure in his musical makeup."
Benjamin Epstein, Los Angeles Times
"Gnandt seems to have an endless variety of tonal weight at his command. He possesses a French style of coloration - like a painting that features 15 shades of light blue and 20 shades of dark blue."
Heuwell Tircuit, San Francisco Chronicle
"He possesses a rare gift that few people have - he phrases from the heart."
Aldo Ciccolini, Concert Pianist
Gnandt “polished this outgoing concerto nicely with a fine finger technique and an ear for phrasing."
Charles Shere, Oakland Tribune
"Gnandt made a most consistently alluring sound - his most impressive showing came with a sweeping Romantic reading of the Chopin Ballade in F minor."
Allan Ulrich, San Francisco Examiner
"The Liszt was performed with flowing strength and magnificent phrasing, passing from strikingly clear attacks to romantic liquid legato phrases."
Don Forsyth, Penticton Herald