Pierre-Laurent Aimard

He made his American debut with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra at the age of twenty, performing the piano solo part in Olivier Messiaen's Turangalîla-Symphonie.

He was the soloist in several premieres of works such as Répons by Pierre Boulez, Klavierstück XIV by Karlheinz Stockhausen, and the eleventh and thirteenth piano études of György Ligeti.

He has also performed the work of contemporary composers such as George Benjamin, Roberto Carnevale and Marco Stroppa.

[8]In 2009, Aimard became the Artistic Director of the Aldeburgh Festival in England, for an initial contract of 3 years.

[10] Aimard was featured recording Bach's The Art of Fugue in the 2009 award-winning German-Austrian documentary Pianomania, about Steinway & Sons' piano technician Stefan Knüpfer, which was directed by Lilian Franck and Robert Cibis.

The film premiered theatrically in North America, where it was met with positive reviews by The New York Times,[11] as well as in Asia and throughout Europe, and is a part of the Goethe-Institut catalogue.