Paul Berkowitz, Faculty Recital

Friday, April 17, 2026 | 7:30 pm

Lotte Lehmann Concert Hall, UC Santa Barbara

Robert Schumann – Fantasy Pieces and other stories

Faculty pianist Paul Berkowitz picks up where he left off after his performances of Robert Schumann’s Humoreske in 2024 and Fantasie in 2025 (soon to be released together as a CD and streaming album for Meridian Records). He continues on April 17 with an entire evening of Schumann piano music in Lotte Lehmann Concert Hall, spanning the composer’s life. Opening with a group of five early evocative short pieces from Bunte Blätter (Colored Leaves), op. 99, he follows with one of Schumann’s most beloved collections, the eight Fantasiestücke, op. 12, displaying Schumann’s dual personalities – the dreamy poet and exuberant extrovert – in full flood. Mr. Berkowitz will then perform the hardly known late second set of three Fantasiestücke, op. 111, reflecting Schumann’s soul at its most troubled in music of astonishing imagination. The recital will conclude with the warm and tender Waldszenen (Forest Scenes), op. 82, a virtualsong cycle for solo piano, epitomizing the Romantic approach to nature.

Bio

Paul Berkowitz has recorded the complete piano sonatas and other major works of Schubert for Meridian Records, to worldwide acclaim. He was described by the London Sunday Times as being “in the royal class of Schubert interpreters” and his Compact Disc recordings of the Last Three Schubert Piano Sonatas were included among the same newspaper’s Records of the Year. His recording of Schumann’s Kreisleriana was selected by BBC Radio Record Review as the best of all available recordings. He also released a series of three CD recordings of Brahms Piano Music. BBC Music Magazine reviewed Vol. I commenting, "...praise to Meridian, which has in the Canadian pianist Paul Berkowitz an artist who isn't shy of taking on the kind of repertoire traditionally the preserve of more internationally high-profile artists. Rightly so, for he has a voice, a musicality, a bigness of pianism distinctively his own...his integrity is commanding, his stylistic authority convincing and his refusal merely to play the notes impressive." 

Mr. Berkowitz recorded the Schubert Impromptus, Moments Musicaux and other repertoire as the final two volumes, released in 2017, of his 9-CD cycle of major works for piano by Schubert for Meridian which he began in 1984. The Guardian of London noted: "A sparkling technique allied to a clear sense of line make these recordings particularly special." More recently he has taken an interest in the piano works of the 20^th-century French composer Francis Poulenc, with a new Meridian CD of Poulenc piano music released in July 2025. International Piano Magazine praised Berkowitz’s “innately musical” playing, noting the warmth and sophistication of his interpretation. BBC Music Magazine welcomed the recording as an important contribution to the Poulenc discography, highlighting Berkowitz as “an especially fine advocate” for these underappreciated works and praising the poignancy, vitality, and character he brings to each piece. His next project for Meridian is a second volume of major works by Schumann, the Humoreske, Arabeske, and Fantasie, already recorded and currently in preparation for imminent release.

Mr. Berkowitz, a native of Montreal, Canada, is a graduate of McGill University and of the Curtis Institute of Music, where he studied with Rudolf Serkin. He lived in Britain for 20 years appearing frequently at the Queen Elizabeth and Wigmore Halls and on the BBC, as a soloist with major orchestras in Britain and Canada and at music festivals in Belgium, Denmark, England, Scotland, France, Italy and Spain. Mr. Berkowitz left the Guildhall School of Music in London, where he had been a professor since 1975, to join the music faculty at the University of California, Santa Barbara in 1993, where he is Professor of Piano and Head of Keyboard, and served as Chair of the Department of Music 2007-12. He has been invited to present master classes at major conservatories, universities and festivals, and his students have won prizes in numerous competitions, including the BBC Young Musician of the Year (Thomas Adès), the International Piano Competition Palma d'Oro in Italy, the Bradshaw and Buono International Competition in New York, and the Los Angeles Liszt Competition, and have gone on to have concert and academic careers of their own in Europe, North America and Asia.

Mr. Berkowitz is a Steinway Artist.