16), a required piece, was described by Paul Hume of The Washington Post as "the most fiery and thunderous of any of the six finalists".

[12] Shortly after the competition, in April 1967, Lupu made his debut at Carnegie Hall in New York City in a program of Beethoven, Schubert, and Chopin.

[18] The following month, in November 1969, Lupu made his solo debut in London; Joan Chissell of The Times wrote about his performance of the second movement of Beethoven's Piano Sonata No.

15) with the BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Edo de Waart at the Royal Albert Hall.

3 with the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Lawrence Foster;[24] he also recorded Beethoven's 32 Variations in C minor (WoO 80).

[22] Lupu's first major American appearances after his Leeds Competition victory were in February 1972 with the Cleveland Orchestra in the Brahms Piano Concerto No.

1 with Daniel Barenboim conducting at Carnegie Hall in New York City,[25] and in October 1972 with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in the Beethoven Piano Concerto No.

However, he added that "yet through all the eccentricities came the feeling of two young musicians trying hard to get out of the rut and once in a while actually succeeding", but that "in future years this kind of approach may jell for them.

5 with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Lawrence Foster at Carnegie Hall, writing, in The New York Times, that Schonberg added: The following year, Lupu recorded the piano concertos of Schumann (Op.

16) with the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by André Previn, a recording described by Gramophone as "grandly commanding".

That, indeed, is just about what he did, for he has that mysterious something that goes beyond technique, erudition and general musicality to reach into the sensibilities of listeners.In November 1974, Lupu made his debut with the New York Philharmonic, performing Mozart's Piano Concerto No.

[31][d][32] In 1975, Lupu debuted with the Concertgebouw Orchestra and gave the premiere of the André Tchaikowsky Piano Concerto, Op.

119), which was described by Stereo Review as "a glowing realization of what Brahms set down that leaves one at a loss for words and simply glad to have ears.

"[11] In 1978, he gave his debut with the Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Herbert von Karajan at that year's Salzburg Festival.

John Rockwell wrote in The New York Times that Lupu's "singing tone here must be heard to be believed.

"[36] In addition, Gramophone said about the recording:[37] To all eight pieces he brings insights all his own betokening acute awareness of the visionary in Schubert, while as piano playing pure and simple it could scarcely be lovelier in phrasing or tone.

[41] In 2006, Lupu was awarded the Premio Internazionale Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli and in 2016 was named a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2016 New Year Honours for services to music.

[42] In June 2019, Lupu's agent announced that the pianist would retire from the concert stage at the end of the 2018–2019 season.

[1] He told Clavier in 1981 that while sitting on a bench he tended to lean forward, raise his shoulders, become impossibly stiff and develop pains all over.

[11] Lupu said in regards to tone production that "everything in music comes from the head", adding: "If you have any concept of sound, you hear it in your inner ear.

He further described tone production as a "matching process for which [one] practices", and the physical contact of the keyboard as "a very individual thing determined by the color or timbre you hear and try to get, the piece you are playing, the phrase".

[11] Lupu's playing garnered admiration not only from music critics, but also by fellow major artists.

[3] Other pianists who expressed admiration for Lupu or cited him as an inspiration in their music-making include Emanuel Ax, Daniel Barenboim, Seong-Jin Cho (who named Lupu's recording of the Schubert Impromptus as his favourite),[49] Kirill Gerstein, Stephen Hough, Robert Levin, Maria João Pires,[50] and Daniil Trifonov.

[51] In addition, the conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin cited Lupu as an inspiration while he was a piano student, saying that listening to recitals and recordings by Lupu "shaped my conception of sound from a very young age", and the cellist Steven Isserlis called him "one of the greatest artists I have ever heard or known".

Lupu's solo recordings, which have received considerable acclaim, include works by Beethoven, Brahms, Grieg, Mozart, Schubert, and Schumann.

16) and Mozart (K. 452) with Han de Vries, George Pieterson, Vicente Zarzo, and Brian Pollard;.

23 with Rudolf Kempe conducting and Beethoven's Choral Fantasy with Lawrence Foster as well as three solo piano pieces by Chopin, a composer Lupu never recorded commercially.

It also includes works of a more modern vintage than we find elsewhere in Lupu's output: the Piano Quintet of Shostakovich with the Gabrieli Quartet and the brief Humoresque of Rodion Shchedrin.

4 contains recordings of the Piano Sonata by Aaron Copland and another performance of Bartók's Out of Doors Suite.

[61] In 1994, Chicago Tribune noted that Lupu's press kit then contained one single interview he granted to Clavier magazine in 1981.