On the final day of the festival, Romaeuropa anticipates the celebrations for Philip Glass’s 90th birthday, which will fall in January 2027, with Philip Glass Afternoon Sessions, an entire afternoon dedicated to one of the composers who most radically reshaped the sonic landscape of our time.
Within this horizon, the presence of Vanessa Wagner—one of the most original and authoritative pianists on the contemporary French scene—takes center stage in a complete performance of Philip Glass’s twenty Piano Études, unfolding over approximately three hours as an experience of listening, endurance, and immersion. Winner of a Victoire de la Musique and an interpreter equally at ease in the classical repertoire and contemporary music, Wagner approaches this monumental cycle not as a display of virtuosity, but as a constantly shifting soundscape, where repetition, variation, suspension, and drift construct a deeply hypnotic dramaturgy of time. Composed between the 1990s and early 2000s, the Études condense one of the most intimate yet architecturally rigorous forms of Glass’s writing, revealing his musical thought in its most stripped-down, exposed, and essential dimension. A river-like concert that is both tribute and reactivation: a way of returning to the beating heart of a work that continues to redefine the way we listen.
Vanessa Wagner è una delle pianiste più originali e autorevoli della scena francese contemporanea, interprete capace di attraversare con naturalezza il grande repertorio classico e i territori più aperti della musica d’oggi. Vincitrice di una Victoire de la Musique e direttrice dei festival di Chambord e Giverny, ha costruito un percorso che unisce rigore interpretativo, curiosità radicale e una costante attenzione verso i linguaggi del presente. Alle letture di Mozart, Debussy, Tchaikovsky e Pascal Dusapin affianca da anni un’intensa esplorazione della musica minimalista e post-minimalista, sviluppata anche attraverso collaborazioni con artisti come Murcof e Rone. Per l’etichetta InFiné ha dedicato numerosi progetti discografici a figure centrali di questo orizzonte, da John Adams, Meredith Monk, Brian Eno e Ry?ichi Sakamoto fino a Caroline Shaw, Bryce Dessner e Nico Muhly. In questo percorso si inserisce naturalmente il suo incontro con Philip Glass, di cui ha inciso integralmente i <em>Piano Etudes</em>, affermandosi come interprete capace di restituire la scrittura contemporanea come esperienza di ascolto insieme fisica, meditativa e profondamente trasformativa.
Vanessa Wagner is one of the most original and authoritative pianists on the contemporary French music scene, an interpreter who moves with ease between the great classical repertoire and the more open territories of contemporary music. Winner of a Victoire de la Musique and artistic director of the Chambord and Giverny festivals, she has built a career that combines interpretative rigor, radical curiosity, and a constant attention to the languages of the present. Alongside her readings of Mozart, Debussy, Tchaikovsky, and Pascal Dusapin, she has long pursued an in-depth exploration of minimalist and post-minimalist music, also developed through collaborations with artists such as Murcof and Rone. For the label InFiné, she has dedicated numerous recording projects to key figures of this landscape, from John Adams, Meredith Monk, Brian Eno, and Ry?ichi Sakamoto to Caroline Shaw, Bryce Dessner, and Nico Muhly. Within this trajectory, her encounter with Philip Glass arises naturally, leading to her complete recording of the Piano Etudes, establishing herself as an interpreter capable of rendering contemporary writing as an experience of listening that is at once physical, meditative, and profoundly transformative.
