Philip Glass (Baltimore, 1937) is widely known as one of the most celebrated, influential and prolific of the modern composers. He is frequently referred to as a minimalist, though he prefers to call himself a composer of “music with repetitive structures”. He has written many operas, symphonies, chamber music, musical theatre works and film scores.

The Piano Etudes were composed between 1991 and 2012,  largely in response to Glass’ need for repertoire of his solo piano concerts. They are therefore closely linked to Glass both as composer and performer. For almost two decades he was the only person who performed this music.

Glass himself remarked that this work had a twin objective, “to explore a variety of tempi, textures and piano techniques and at the same time to serve as a pedagogical tool by which I would improve my piano playing”.

The world of ideas and the quirks of Glass’s harmonic languages are instantly recognisable in each of the 20 Etudes; indeed, he has described them as self-portraits of sorts.

Since their publication in December 2014, the Etudes have been enthusiastically embraced by pianists around the world and they have taken their place as modern classics of the literature, bringing their unique soundworlds to new audiences.

Giusto Di Lallo is an eclectic pianist, composer and sound designer. He started his music studies at the age of 4 and from 1994 to 2012 he studied at the Conservatorio “Lorenzo Perosi” achieving the Master degree in Piano (2003) and the Master degree in Composition (2012).

His professional career started in 1996 and to date he has made over 1800 concerts, both as soloist and accompanist in various projects of different music styles, from classical to experimental music.

He also composes music for screen, ballet and theatre, he is the director of different multimedia shows and provides live soundtrack for art galleries and for audio-visual projects.