Rinaldo Zhok

Rinaldo Zhok was born in Trieste in 1980, and received his first piano lessons from his mother at the age of seven. He then studied for five years with Clara Lenuzza, with whom he owes much of his formation, and earned his diploma when he was 18 with top marks under her guidance from the Giuseppe Tartini Conservatory of Trieste. He earned his diploma with lauds under the guidance of Sergio Perticaroli and Stefano Fiuzzi from Santa Cecilia in Rome. He has always been passionate about chamber music, in particular piano four hands. In duo with Crstina Santin in fact he has had a substantial carrier and has studied at the Music and Theater Hochschule of Munich, under the guidance of the famous duo Yaara Tal e Andreas Groethuysen. He was able to continue his studies with Boris Bloch, one of the more important heirs of Dmitri Bashkirov's piano school, earning a "Konzertdiplom" at the Folkwang Universität in Essen. Other important encounters with musicians include with Lazar Berman, Aldo Ciccolini, Dario De Rosa, Pier Narciso Masi, Mauro Minguzzi e Riccardo Zadra.

He has held concerts in Italy, Austria, France, Spain, Germany, Norway, Poland, Slovenia and Hungary as a soloist, chamber musician, and performing with orchestras, always to great critical acclaim. In 2012 he had more than twenty concerts in Spain alone, and others in Norway and Italy. For his great experience with chamber and vocal music, he is considered one of the most eclectic and complete pianists of his generation by the critics.

He has collaborated with young emerging talents such as Massimiliano Milani, first clarinet of the Slovenian Philharmonic Orchestra, and the violinist Ana María Valderrama. He has won prizes in soloist (“F. Mendelssohn” International Competition for young pianists Munich 2003, Halina Czerny-Stefańska in memoriam International Piano Competition Poznan 2008, International Piano Competition “Performance without limits” Lodz 2013) and chamber music competitions (“Giulio Viozzi” International Competition Trieste 2001, “Camillo Togni” International Competition for piano duet and chamber music, “Roma 2005” International Competition for piano duet, T.I.M. Torneo Internazionale della musica 2006).

He recorded two CDs for Rainbow Classics featuring piano music of Mario Zafred and Antonio Bibalo, as well as a CD for Odradek Records with Liszt's Paraphrases and Transcriptions of works of Giuseppe Verdi