Gulsin Onay

“...an artist with a sensitive decisiveness and intelligent brilliance, who is passionate and who has the ability to entrust everything that is tender as if smilingly to her intelligent fingers... a supreme pianist, full of fantasy” - Peter Cosse

Gülsin Onay started her piano education when she was three and gave her first public recital on Turkish Radio when she was only six. With the aid of a special state scholarship she studied with Ahmed Adnan Saygun and Mithat Fenmen, and subsequently at the Paris Conservatoire, from where she graduated at the age of 16, winning the prestigious “Premier Prix du Piano”. Prizes in top international competitions, including the Marguerite Long-Jacques Thibaud (in Paris) and the Ferruccio Busoni (in Bolzano), quickly followed.

Gülsin Onay's subsequent, truly international, career has spanned over 55 countries across all continents, from Venezuela to Japan. Gülsin Onay has given concerts in the major musical centres of the world such as Amsterdam's Concertgebouw, the Berlin Philharmonic Hall, the Vienna Konzerthaus, London's Queen Elizabeth Hall and Wigmore Hall, the Salle Gaveau in Paris, the Washington DC National Gallery of Art and the New York Miller Theater. She has performed as a guest soloist with such leading orchestras as Dresden Staatskapelle, English Chamber Orchestra, Japan Philharmonic, Munich Radio Symphony, St Petersburg Philharmonic, Tokyo Symphony, Warsaw Philharmonic and Vienna Symphony Orchestras. Conductors with which she has performed include Vladimir Ashkenazy, Erich Bergel, Michael Boder, Andrey Boreyko, Jorg Faerber, Emmanuel Krivine, Ingo Metzmacher, Vassily Sinaisky, Stanislaw Wislocki and Lothar Zagrosek. Ms. Onay's many festival appearances include Berlin, Warsaw, Granada, Mozartfest Würzburg, Newport, Schleswig-Holstein and Istanbul.

Gülsin Onay is acknowledged worldwide as the finest interpreter of the music of A.Adnan Saygun, whose works feature prominently in her concerts and recordings, and whose 2nd Piano Concerto (which she has premiered in Turkey and abroad) was dedicated to her. Other contemporary composers who have dedicated works to Gülsin Onay are Hubert Stuppner, Denis Dufour, Jean-Louis Petit, Muhiddin Dürrüoğlu-Demiriz and Marc-André Hamelin. Gülsin Onay has also given world premieres of concertos by Stuppner and Tabakov.

“An exceptional pianist, endowed with virtuosic brilliance and boundless energy, and an interpretive power both intelligent and emotionally sensitive”, Gülsin Onay has recorded 18 albums that illustrate the breadth of her repertoire as well as her interpretive power. Her latest CD features live concert recordings of Tchaikovsky’s 1st and Rachmaninov’s 3rd Piano Concertos, which have been acclaimed by critics and virtuosi alike. Many of Onay’s concerts have been broadcast on European radio and television, and in the USA on National Public Radio. An exceptional Chopin interpreter, Gülsin Onay was in 2007 honoured with the award of a State Medal by the Polish nation.
Gülsin Onay takes a special interest in the promotion of charitable causes, giving charity concerts around the world – most recently for children in Lebanon, under the auspices of UNICEF, whose Turkish National Committee appointed her “Goodwill Ambassador” in 2003. Since its inception in 2004, Gülsin Onay has been the artistic advisor of the Gümüşlük Classical Music Festival.

Highlights of the 2006-2007 concert season included concerts with the Iceland and Bilkent Symphony Orchestras conducted by Vladimir Ashkenazy, recitals at the Gina Bachauer Festival in Salt Lake City, Golandsky Institute Festival in Princeton and the Miami International Piano Festival in Lecce. She is performing in many events to celebrate the 100th anniversary of Adnan Saygun, including a special concert at the 2007 Istanbul Festival, concerts in London and Vienna, and recordings of Saygun's solo works for piano. Her CD of both Saygun concertos will appear in 2007 under the CPO label.

Gülsin Onay holds the titles of State Artist in her native Turkey, and of soloist for the Presidential Symphony Orchestra in Ankara. She is “Artist in Residence” at Bilkent University in Ankara and holds an honorary doctorate degrees from Bosphorus University in Istanbul, and from Hacettepe University in Ankara. The Sevda-Cenap And Music Foundation awarded its prestigious 2007 Honorary Award Gold Medal to Gülsin Onay.

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