Ingrid Carbone

He encouraged me with the study of Composition and pushed me to go further, suggesting me to attend master courses and to apply for national and international competitions, such as the two-year international Master course I attended with the Argentinian pianist Hector Pell, ended with the Honour Diploma and a recital in the Red Hall of the Norman Castle of Barletta (Italy). Hector Pell lived in Rome: when I lived there, due to a two-year grant from the “Istituto Nazionale di Alta Matematica “F. Severi”, I went very often to his house for musical advices and discussions. At that time Francesco Monopoli stated that I was “his best student” and after more than 20 years, he made the same statement when we were assembled with all the jury of an international competition. He followed me over the years, and gave me the idea to study Bach concertos with string orchestra. I play these concertos with great pleasure and mastery, even if Bach concertos are the most difficult compositions I ever played.  I’m grateful to him. During the ten years at the Conservatory, I was also captured by chamber music (I played with a very promising student of violin who is now a professional) and opera. I can say that, when I left the Conservatory, I had a quite wide knowledge of Music.

I went to Florence to attend a masterclass with Lazar Berman, who was living in Italy at that time. Berman was a deep source of inspiration for my Liszt.
In the same period, I went to Rome twice a month to meet the Argentinian pianist and composer Eduardo Ogando, from whom I received advices on chamber music and musical analysis for several years. Duo violin-piano occupies an important part of my musical career, as afterwards I played duo for eight years.

On the occasion of the 2016 edition of the worldwide competition IBLA Grand Price, I attended a masterclass with the Serbian pianist and composer Julija Bal. We worked on Domenico Scarlatti and Villa-Lobos, and the New York IBLA Foundation awarded me the Scarlatti Special Mention.

I studied with Aquile delle Vigne for a long time: I went to his home in Brussels, I attended several masterclasses in Italy and two summer schools. I was part of his group during a Summer School at the Mozarteum of Salzburg, where I was selected to perform Three Fantasiestücke Op. 111 by Schumann during the final concert. I was in his group also at the Tel–Hai International Piano Master Classes in Israel, where I attended another summer school with the Polish pianist Andrzej Pikul and received advices from the Israeli pianist Emanuel Krasovsky and the English pianist Ronan H’Ora. The faculties were “impressed” by my interpretation of some Schubert-Liszt transcriptions, especially Erlkönig. Aquiles delle Vigne suggested me to study the Liszt’s masterpieces Après une lecture du Dante: Fantasia quasi Sonata, Lègende n. 2: St. François de Paule: marchant sur les flots, Les jeux d’eau à la Villa d’Este, considered among the most beautiful and difficult of the piano repertoire. All these compositions are contained in my two Liszt CDs.

But I must say that I owe a lot to Cristiano Burato. It was his pressure to start again with soloist repertoire after many years of duo violin-piano that persuaded me to take back my artistic career. Listening to my performance in duo with violin, he said that I had absolutely to dedicate myself to the soloist repertoire. During the several masterclasses I attended with him, I was overwhelmed by ideas, suggestions, advices I absorbed as a sponge, eager as I was to make up for lost time. He took care of my touch and my repertoire, focusing on compositions in which I could express my ideas and tools, and proposing me more and more difficult compositions: the Six Moments Musicaux op. 94, one of which goes back to my first year at the Conservatory of Music, and the Four Impromptus op. 90 by Schubert, recorded 2020, are his suggestions, as well as Consolations: Six Pensées Poétiques by Liszt, contained in my debut CD, and Vallée d’Obermann (contained in my second CD on Liszt).

In conclusion, I think I learned from my teachers how to be a good teacher.