The 92nd Street Y, New York (92NY) presents Pierre-Laurent Aimard on the David Geffen Stage at Kaufmann Concert Hall, 92NY, 1395 Lexington Ave, New York, NY 10128 on Wednesday, April 15, 2026 at 7:30PM. Tickets start at $45 ($25 for streaming), and are available at https://www.92ny.org/event/pierre-laurent-aimard.

In his second 92NY recital of the season, Pierre-Laurent Aimard performs Book II of Johann Sebastian Bach’s towering The Well-Tempered Clavier. A renowned interpreter of a wide classical music repertoire, Aimard’s immersion in contemporary music and ongoing exploration of the ideas of composers including Boulez, Messiaen, Ligeti, and others informs his own ideas about Bach and what he brings to his music. Audiences will hear one of the most revered pianists of our time perform one of the greatest keyboard works of all time.

Program

J.S. Bach The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book II

“A brilliant musician and an extraordinary visionary” (The Wall Street Journal), Pierre-Laurent Aimard is widely acclaimed as an authority on music of our time while also recognized for shedding fresh light on music of the past.

This season, Aimard celebrates the 100th birthday of longtime friend and collaborator György Kurtág with recitals at the Budapest Music Center, Philharmonie Luxembourg, and as part of his residency with Madrid’s Centro Nacional de Difusión Musical. J.S. Bach’s The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book II, is also a season mainstay, following the October release of Aimard’s recording, 11 years after the success of his Book I release. Scheduled performances include Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, London’s Southbank Centre, Konzerthaus Dortmund, Stockholm Konzerthaus, Seattle’s Benaroya Hall, Chamber Music Detroit, and the Boston Celebrity Series. Aimard’s recital schedule includes performances at the Louvre, in Taipei, Beijing, and Shanghai. He makes solo appearances with the New York Philharmonic, Berlin and Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestras, Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra, NDR Radiophilharmonie, Concerto Budapest Orchestra, Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Hamburg, Barcelona, São Paulo State, and Singapore symphony orchestras.

Aimard has enjoyed close collaborations with leading composers and given many notable premieres, most recently DIVISONS for piano four hands by George Benjamin, which he repeated in the 2025/26 season at 92NY, the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., and London’s Wigmore Hall. He also continues his associations with regular chamber music partners, most notably Isabelle Faust, Jörg Widmann and Jean-Guihen Queyras, touring with Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time.

In 2025, Aimard released Kurtág: Játékok, the latest in a series of critically acclaimed collaborations with Pentatone. It follows Schubert: Ländler (2024), the complete Bartók Piano Concertos with Esa-Pekka Salonen and San Francisco Symphony Orchestra (2023), Visions de l’Amen (2022) with Tamara Stefanovich, Beethoven’s Hammerklavier Sonata & Eroica Variations (2021), and Messiaen’s magnum opus Catalogue d’oiseaux (2018),which garnered multiple awards.

Aimard is recognized as an innovative curator and significant interpreter of piano repertoire from every age. Previous residencies include the complete cycle of Beethoven’s piano concertos for Musikkollegium Winterthur, groundbreaking projects at Porto’s Casa da Musica, Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, and Konzerthaus Vienna, among others, and as artistic director of the Aldeburgh Festival, 2009 to 2016.

Honors include the International Ernst von Siemens Music Prize, recognizing a life devoted to the service of music, and the Leonie Sonning Music Prize, Denmark’s most prominent music award. In 2020, he re-launched a major online resource in collaboration with the Klavier-Festival Ruhr, Explore the Score, which centers on performance and teaching of Ligeti’s piano music.

About The 92nd Street Y, New York: The 92nd Street Y, New York (92NY) is a world-class center for the arts and innovation, a convener of ideas, and an incubator for creativity. 92NY offers extensive classes, courses and events online including live concerts, talks and master classes; fitness classes for all ages; 250+ art classes, and parenting workshops for new moms and dads. The 92nd Street Y, New York is transforming the way people share ideas and translate them into action all over the world. All of 92NY’s programming is built on a foundation of Jewish values, including the capacity of civil dialogue to change minds; the potential of education and the arts to change lives; and a commitment to welcoming and serving people of all ages, races, religions, and ethnicities. For more information, visit www.92NY.org.