Niko Laaris: Saturday, April 25 at 2:00 p.m.

Nikolaos Laaris studied piano at the Athens Conservatory, the Royal College of Music (MMus), and has been awarded a Doctorate of Musical Arts from the Manhattan School of Music (DMA), where he served as a professor; he also taught at the Columbia University and the University of Macedonia. He is the recipient of the Ballantine’s Gold Seal sponsorship, as well as of the RCM and MSM, the Alexander Onassis, J.F. Costopoulos and Lilian Voudouri Foundations scholarships.
He has performed in Europe (South Bank Centre – London, Gärtnerplatz Τheater – Munich) and the USA (Carnegie Hall – Νew York), and has been featured as a soloist with Armonia Atenea Orchestra and the State Orchestras of Athens and Thessaloniki. In his London debut he was singled out by Stephen Pettit of the Times as “a fine artist, incapable of making an ugly sound”; for his collaboration with the Munich Ballet Theater in Goldberg Variationen, Dance Europe magazine hailed him as “the star of the evening”.
He presents programs of all eras: Baroque: Rameau – Les Indes Galantes, Classical: Haydn – The Seven Last Words, with the late Pulitzer-Prize winner photographer Yiannis Behrakis (Athens Concert Hall), Romantic – Wagner & Liszt tributes, and Modern: John Cage: the keyboards (Onassis Cultural Center), Leonard Bernstein: an anniversary (ACH), Sir John Tavener: Prayer of the Heart (Greek National Opera – Alternative Stage). He has premiered in Greece works by Haydn, Satie, Copland, Bernstein, Cage, Tavener, Boulez, Kurtag, and Tsontakis.
He recently premiered the hour-long solo cycle Twenty Gratitudes for the teachings of Jesus by George Tsontakis, a commission supported by the G. & V. Karelias Foundation. In his future projects is the Greek premiere of Moises Kaufman’s theatrical play 33 Variations, in his own translation, directed by George Petrou.
He also studied conducting at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam (BMus), and has collaborated extensively with Armonia Atenea. He has conducted Philip Glass’ opera In the Penal Colony (OCC, NYC), musicals such as Bernstein’s West Side Story, Porter’s Kiss me Kate and Sakellaridis’ operetta The Godson (ACH), and new works: Kipourgos’ Aristophanes’ Peace (National Theater), and Papadimitriou’s St Francis; recently he conducted Andrew Lloyd-Webber’s Phantom of the Opera, and George Tsontakis’ The Air of Greece I (GNO – AS).

Michael Boriskin: Saturday, May 9 at 2:00 p.m.

“A pianist with the Midas touch” —The New York Times

“A pianist of the highest rank” —Die Welt [Berlin]

“One of the most skilled and versatile pianists of his generation” —American Record Guide

One of Musical America’s “Top 30 Professionals of the Year” (2023), pianist Michael Boriskin has been involved in every aspect of the music world, as an internationally-acclaimed piano soloist and chamber music collaborator, curator, producer, radio host, and program advisor. He has performed in over 30 countries and traveled across four centuries of music, appearing on many of the world’s foremost concert stages, from Toronto and Tokyo to Mexico City and Munich. He has been a guest artist at Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, the Tanglewood and Ravinia Festivals, Library of Congress, Kennedy Center, BBC in London, Smithsonian Institution, Berlin Radio, Theatre des Champs-Elysees (Paris), Teatro Colon (Buenos Aires), Arnold Schoenberg Center (Vienna), and many other preeminent venues. He has recorded extensively for Naxos, SONY Classical, Harmonia Mundi, New World, Bridge, and other labels, and appeared on CBS Sunday Morning, NPR, Sirius, and Euro-Radio. Hailed by Fanfare magazine as “a brilliant pianist who has done as much as anyone for contemporary music,” he has been Music Director of Mikhail Baryshnikov’s fabled White Oak Dance Project, hosted his own NPR broadcast series, heard on over 200 stations coast-to-coast, written articles for the Library of Congress, Schirmer Books, and numerous other North American publications, and served as project advisor for the New York Philharmonic, Carnegie Hall, U.S. State Department, Lincoln Center, and other major institutions. As longtime Artistic and Executive Director of Copland House, he has led that unique creative center for American music and the arts based at legendary composer Aaron Copland’s National Historic Landmark home in the Lower Hudson Valley to worldwide prominence.

Ayane Nakajima: Saturday, June 20 at 2:00 p.m.

Program

Maurice Ravel Sonatine 
I. Modéré
II. Mouvement de menuet
III. Animé

Beethoven Piano Sonata No. 31 Op. 110
I. Moderato cantabile molto espressivo 
II. Allegro molto 

About Ayane Nakajima: Praised for her “emotional warmth and celestial lyricism” (Elena Vorotko, Keyboard Charitable Trust), pianist Ayane Nakajima enjoys a versatile career as a soloist, collaborator, and chamber musician. Active across the United States, the United Kingdom, Italy, and Germany, she has appeared in major venues including Wigmore Hall, Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall, and the New World Center.

Ayane’s concert highlights include performances at Klavier Festival Bayreuth, the Minnesota Orchestra’s Summer at Orchestra Hall, Lake District Summer Music, and the London Song Festival. Her 2026 season features a recital debut in Los Angeles, radio debuts across Europe, and a summer spent as a 2026 Marlboro Music Festival Artist.

Deeply committed to championing the voices of living composers, Ayane is passionate about bringing contemporary works into dialogue with the classical canon. She has premiered works both as a répétiteur and soloist for composers including Daniel Zlatkin, Thordur Magnusson, and Eunike Tanzil, among others.

She is a prizewinner in competitions including Pianale, YoungArts, the International Keyboard Odyssiad, and Young Texas Artists. Additional accolades include her nomination as a 2019 U.S. Presidential Scholar, the 2023 Louis Sudler Prize in the Arts from Rice University, and First Prize in the 2024 Royal College of Music Concerto Competition. She has also participated in masterclasses with distinguished artists such as Jeremy Denk, Dina Yoffe, Akiko Ebi, Uta Weyand, Ronan O’Hora, Caroline Hong, Elena Levit, and Marina Lomazov.

A devoted song pianist and chamber musician, she has won top prizes at the Young Musicians’ Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center Competition, as well as pianist prizes at the AESS Patricia Routledge National English Song Competition and the RCM Brooks Van der Pump Competition. She is the pianist of the recently formed Trio Auri (with violinist Mee-Hyun Esther Park and cellist Lily Dai) and is a frequent recital partner of mezzo-soprano Lily Mo Browne.

Growing up in New York City, Ayane began her piano studies at the age of three with Chaim Freiberg at the Kaufman Music Center. From ages six to seventeen, she studied with Dr. Hiromi Fukuda and graduated from Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts. She earned her Bachelor of Music from Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music under the guidance of Dr. Jon Kimura Parker and later graduated with distinction from her postgraduate studies at the Royal College of Music, where she studied with Danny Driver.

She is currently pursuing an Artist Diploma at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, studying with Ronan O’Hora, Charles Owen, and Bretton Brown. Through her artistry, Ayane strives to bring people together by curating meaningful and colorful performances. In addition to her classical work, she enjoys collaborating in musical theatre, jazz, and film music.