Among his generation of concert artists, pianist Awadagin Pratt is acclaimed for his musical insight and intensely involving performances in recital and with symphony orchestras. Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Pratt began studying piano at the age of six. Three years later, having moved to Normal, Illinois with his family, he also began studying violin. At the age of 16, he entered the University of Illinois, where he studied piano, violin, and conducting. He subsequently enrolled at the Peabody Institute (previously the Peabody Conservatory of Music) of the Johns Hopkins University, where he became the first student in the school’s history to receive diplomas in three performance areas: piano, violin, and conducting.
In 1992, Pratt won the Naumburg International Piano Competition, and two years later was awarded an Avery Fisher Career Grant. Since then, he has played numerous recitals throughout the U.S., including performances at Lincoln Center, the Kennedy Center, Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in Los Angeles, Chicago’s Orchestra Hall, and the New Jersey Performing Arts Center. His many orchestral performances include appearances with the New York Philharmonic, Minnesota Orchestra, and the Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Baltimore, Indianapolis, Atlanta, St. Louis, National, and Detroit symphonies, among many others. Pratt’s summer festival engagements have included appearances at Ravinia, Blossom, Wolftrap, Caramoor, Aspen, and the Hollywood Bowl.
Through the Art of the Piano Foundation, and inspired by a stanza from T. S. Eliot’s Four Quartets, Pratt has commissioned seven composers—Jessie Montgomery, Alvin Singleton, Judd Greenstein, Tyshawn Sorey, Jonathan Bailey Holland, Paola Prestini, and Peteris Vasks—to compose works for piano and string orchestra, or piano, string orchestra, and the musical ensemble Roomful of Teeth. Montgomery’s piece, “Rounds,” was part of a nine-orchestra co-commission; and a total of 22 orchestras have performed the work so far, including the Boston, Chicago, St. Louis, Atlanta, Milwaukee, Baltimore, and Indianapolis Symphonies, and the Minnesota Orchestra. All seven works were recorded in summer 2022 with the chamber orchestra A Far Cry for New Amsterdam Records. The Art of Piano Foundation also will host the inaugural Nina Simone Piano Competition for African American pianists. The early rounds will take place in June in Cincinnati, Ohio, with the finalists in the concerto round performing with the Cincinnati Symphony in October 2023.
Pratt is currently professor of piano and artist in residence at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music (CCM), and in July 2023 will join the faculty of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music as professor of piano. He also served as artistic director of the Cincinnati World Piano Competition and the Next Generation Festival.