Ruggero Laganà
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Biography of Ruggero Laganà
Although common in the past, today it is rare to find a musician who is able to be both composer and concert artist. Ruggero Laganà, in addition to teaching, composes music and performs on the harpsichord, the fortepiano and the pianoforte. He has won eleven International Competitions for Composers of Contemporary Music: three-time winner of the Premio Rai (1979, 1982, 1985), the Guggenheim Prize for Music (1982), two-time winner of the Premio Varese (1978,1980), two distinct Premio Petrassi awards in 1993, one for chamber music and one for orchestra composition, the Premio Guido d'Arrezzo in 1992, the Viotti in 1994, and the Valentino Bucchi Roma in 1979. His success in these competitions led to his performing in and earning commissions from many important contemporary music program series and festivals: Biennale Venetia, Scala di Milano, Comunale di Bologna, Fondazione Dragoni and the Società del Quartetto of Milan, Centre Pompidou in Paris, Festivals in Avignon, Lille, and Berlin, as well as having performed in New York, Tokyo, Kyoto, Buenos Aires, Montreal, Vienna, London, Orleans, Geneva, City of Mexico, and others. His compositions are published by Suvini Zerbini-Sugar. He composed two musical works for the theatre, which were staged at the Piccola Scala (1982) and at the Piccolo Teatro di Milano (1992) respectively. Winner of numerous International Competitions for Harpsichord: Bologna (1987), Rome (1987), Paris (1987), in 1989, along with the most important harpsichordists in the world, he was part of the International Jury and he composed the obligatory piece for competition in the contemporary harpsichord section. With more than a thousand concert performances of both Contemporary and Ancient Music to his name – solo performances, in chamber music groups and with orchestras, collaborating with musicians and artists ofinternational fame, from many different disciplines – he has performed melologos with Lella Costa, Ugo Pagliai, Ottavia Piccolo. His compact discs and DVDs have been recorded with Amadeus, Stradivarius, FonitCetra, Concerto, in addition to radio and television performances with Italian and European broadcasters in Japan and Canada. In Francesco Leprino's DVD of Domenico Scarlatti (2007), he was the featured harpsichordist (performing 10 Sonatas elaborated by S. Sciarrino, A. Corghi, G. Gaslini, le Orme, M. Pisat, A. Cappelletti, G. Falzone, and others). He also composed a piece of his own inspired by one of the Neapolitan composer's sonatas. In 2010, he published a CD with Amadeus of Polish Songs, Mazurkas and Polonaises by F. Chopin executed on an original, 1940 Pleyel fortepiano with the mezzosoprano Urszula Kryger. Soon to be published is a DVD with his elaborations of L'Arte della Fuga by J. S. Bach (together with fellow composer and friend, A. Solbiati), this too directed by F. Leprino. He is Professor of Harmonyand of historical Keyboard instruments at the Conservatorio G. Verdi in Milan.