Inon Barnatan

Internationally acclaimed classical pianist Inon Barnatan has been Music Director of La Jolla Music Society’s SummerFest since 2019. He is widely acclaimed as “one of the most admired pianists of his generation” (New York Times), celebrated globally as a “true poet of the keyboard” (Evening Standard) for his uncommon sensitivity, impeccable technique, and insightful interpretations. Inon’s artistic vision, knowledge, and relationships have propelled SummerFest to new heights, uniting a vibrant community of world-class musicians, jazz artists, and dancers who are eager to share the stage with him, performing works both famous and obscure in innovatively curated programs.

As SummerFest Music Director, Inon decides the theme of the festival and works closely with LJMS’ Artistic Department to direct the programming and choose the performing musicians. He also performs in several of the concerts each summer, and participates in Learning & Engagement activities such as Artist Encounters, Open Rehearsals, and Coaching Workshops with our Fellowship Artists, whom he helps select each year.

Inon also partners with investor and philanthropist Clara Wu Tsai to create the Synergy Initiative, a series which invites top creators of music, dance, spoken word and visual arts to collaborate across their different art forms and produce performances that inspire audiences in unexpected and powerful ways.

Highlights of the past six SummerFests under Inon’s leadership include a special dance performance of The Planets, a spoken word and dance version of Carnival of the Animals, Tasting Notes featuring famed chef Kenji López-Alt, contemporary American percussive dancers Caleb Teicher and Nic Gareiss, and concerts and takeovers featuring Renée Fleming, Thomas Adès, Cécile McLorin Salvant, Jessie Montgomery, Paul Wiancko, Gabriela Lena Frank, Anthony Roth Costanzo, and more.

As a soloist, Barnatan appears regularly with the world’s foremost orchestras and conductors. He was the inaugural Artist-in-Association of the New York Philharmonic from 2014–17 under then Music Director Alan Gilbert, with whom he maintained a close and extensive collaboration, and has performed with the Boston, Chicago, and Cleveland symphonies, the Los Angeles Philharmonic at the Hollywood Bowl, the BBC Symphony at the Proms, and most major U.S. orchestras. Abroad he has appeared with the Leipzig Gewandhaus, Zurich Tonhalle, Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony, Helsinki Philharmonic, and the London, Hong Kong, and Royal Stockholm Philharmonics. He has given complete Beethoven concerto cycles with the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields and the Orchestre Philharmonique de Marseille, played Copland’s Piano Concerto with Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony at Carnegie Hall, and toured the U.S. with the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields, leading from the keyboard. With Osmo Vänskä and the Minnesota Orchestra he performed Tchaikovsky’s First Piano Concerto on New Year’s Eve, followed by a Midwest tour and a return to the BBC Proms.

Inon regularly collaborates with world-class partners such as Renée Fleming and Alisa Weilerstein, and plays at major chamber music festivals including Seattle, Santa Fe, and Spoleto USA. Barnatan was a member of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s Bowers Program (formerly CMS Two) from 2006 to 2009 and continues to perform with CMS in New York. His passion for contemporary music has resulted in commissions and performances of many living composers, including premieres of new works by Thomas Adès, Sebastian Currier, Avner Dorman, Alan Fletcher, Joseph Hallman, Alasdair Nicolson, Andrew Norman and Matthias Pintscher, among others.