Olga Kern

Olga Kern
A CD recording of Kern's performances in the Eleventh Van Cliburn International Piano Competition
Background information
Birth name	Olga Pushechnikova
Born	April 23, 1975 (1975-04-23) (age 36)
Genres	Classical
Instruments	Piano
Labels	Harmonia Mundi

Olga Kern (Russian: Ольга Керн; born April 23, 1975) is a Russian classical pianist. Born as Olga Pushechnikova to a family of musicians with ties to Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff, she later adopted her mother's maiden name (Kern) professionally. She began studying piano with Evgeny Timakin at the Central Music School of Moscow when she was five.^[1]

She continued with Sergei Dorensky at the Moscow Conservatory, where she also pursued her postgraduate studies. She also studied with Boris Petrushansky at the Accademia Pianistica "Incontri col Maestro" in Imola.

Personal life

She was married in 1997 and had a son the following year. She and her husband divorced soon after.

Awards and titles

Kern won her first international competition at the age of eleven,^[2] and she has achieved first prize in others since then, including the first Rachmaninoff International Piano Competition at seventeen. She is a laureate of eleven international competitions, a recipient of an honorary scholarship from the former President of Russia Boris Yeltsin, and is part of Russia's International Academy of Arts.^[1] In June 2001, she became the first woman in over thirty years to receive the Nancy Lee and Perry R. Bass Gold Medal in the Eleventh Van Cliburn International Piano Competition.

Performing and recording career

Kern has performed in such locations as the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory, Symphony Hall in Osaka, La Scala, Salle Cortot in Paris, and the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.^[1] She has also performed as a soloist with the Bolshoi Theater, Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra, St. Petersburg Symphony, Russian National Orchestra, China Symphony, Warsaw National Philharmonic Orchestra, Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra, La Scala Philharmonic Orchestra, Anchorage Symphony Orchestra, Torino Symphony, Bear Valley Music Festival Symphony, Nashville Symphony, Cape Town Symphony Orchestra and Detroit Symphony Orchestra.^[1] Kern records exclusively for Harmonia Mundi USA.

References

1. ^ ^{a b c d} "Sheperd School of Music". Rice University. Archived from the original on 2008-06-29. http://web.archive.org/web/20080629110306/http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~musi/featured/olga_kern.html. 
2. ^ "Olga Kern: 11th Van Cliburn Int'l Piano Competition 1". Amazon.com. http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00005QKFM. 

Persondata
Name	Kern, Olga
Alternative names	Pushechnikova, Olga
Short description	Classical pianist
Date of birth	April 23, 1975
Place of birth
Date of death
Place of death