Press Reviews

(Selected press quotes below.  For full reviews and feature articles, please visit artist's Digital Presskit.)

What the Critics Say...

About Anthony de Mare's Live Performances

"The pianist Anthony de Mare specializes in new music, often with a theatrical twist, and he likes building his concerts around themes that make them into something more akin to a show than to a recital."
- Allan Kozinn, The New York Times, June 24, 2006

"Virtuoso Anthony de Mare took over for another Ginsberg text, "Sunflower Sutra" [by Jerome Kitzke]... commissioned by the remarkable de Mare...de Mare's level of commitment equals Kitzke's own and he brings gigantic technique to the table."
- Tom Strini, Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, April 3, 2004

"The multi-talented Anthony de Mare, for whom the work [De Profundis] was created, gave a virtuoso performance.  It's hard to imagine a more committed and compelling performance."
- Scott Cantrell, The Dallas Morning News, March 25, 2003

"The recital of American pianist Anthony de Mare was quite an event of the festival...a fascinating show since de Mare presents not only his extraordinary pianism, vocal-showman talents, rhythmic flexibility, but also a great imagination of sound and ease in the realization of extremely different aesthetic ideas."
- Marta Szoka, RUCH MUZYCZNY (Poland) - Issue No. 25, 2002, (on Mr. de Mare's performance at the Gaida Festival in Lithuania)

" 'Playing With MySelf' is at once a piano recital of 20th-century works and an abstract, autobiographical solo theater piece about how he came to choose the piano as his primary creative outlet.  Along the way, he gives gripping performances of 14 piano works...He is a remarkably uninhibited and physical performer...it provides an imaginative context for Mr. de Mare's impressive talents and personal story.  And you get to hear his ferocious pianism."
- Anthony Tommasini, The New York Times, May 10, 2001

"...de Mare has now gathered his talents into a one-man show, "Playing With MySelf"...which accomplishes the elusive feat of fusing concert music with theater...de Mare possesses genuine talents and noble ambitions, and he comes as close to pulling off this slippery fusion of forms as anyone I'm aware of."
- Justin Davidson, Newsday, May 7, 2001

"Every aspect of these works received vibrant handling by de Mare, whose attention to sonic shading and shapes was complete."
- Donald Rosenberg, The Plain Dealer, April 27, 1999

"...touchingly human, startlingly realist, these [Rzewski's De Profundis and Kreutzer Sonata] had a powerful impact, not least due to de Mare's astonishing ability to play complex textures while speaking dramatically.  In fact, Rzewski's music is a pianist's litmus test.  Only de Mare could bring enough weight to the keyboard to make it sound the way Rzewski plays it himself...His powerhouse tremolo chords in Piece No. 4 achieved a transcendent fusion of man and machine."
- Kyle Gann, The Village Voice, May 5, 1998

"Enthusiastic critics, world wide rewards: pianists Anthony de Mare is considered a leader of contemporary piano music...The American succeeded in doing something very unusual: he made it possible for his audience to hear music in a new way and unlocked an uncommon dimension of music...In addition to his music, de Mare's performance, too, shares much with the dramatic in theater and film...de Mare's piano creates images and a world of feeling and dreams; it is a living music and it returns music to our selves as a fascinating, new territory."
- Thilo Horvatitsch (translation by Roland Dollinger), Mainzer Rhein Paper (Mainz, Germany), March 14, 1998

"It is a performance which conceals its skill, its virtuosity and its brilliance in service of a very genuine dedication to an expressive task."
- Peter McCallum, The Sydney Morning Herald (Sydney, Australia), February 20, 1998

"Pianist Anthony de Mare took no prisoners on the Auer Hall stage Friday evening...He can romance the keyboard...he can attack the innards of the piano...and make an acoustic instrument sound electronic...he can weave magical shifts of mood...and de Mare can croon and cackle and spew comic lines while negotiating complicated piano music...A superb recital, highlighted by flawless technique."
- Peter Jacobi, The Herald-Times (Bloomington, IN), July 10, 1996

"de Mare is an amazing artist, and must be doing for contemporary piano literature what the Kronos Quartet has done for the contemporary string quartet.  He is sure-fingered and dexterous, and puts his whole soul into his work.  The results are remarkable."
- Jan Narveson, UW Gazette (Toronto, Canada), October 18, 1995

"Not one artist in a thousand can bare his heart before the public the way Wilde, Rzewski, and de Mare did to create this deeply affecting performance.  It was worth the entire rest of the marathon put together with a couple of New York Philharmonic seasons throw in."
- Kyle Gann, The Village Voice, June 20, 1995

"...a stunning performance, pianistically virtuosic as well as emotionally taut."
- Huddersfield Daily Examiner, November 20, 1993

"It seems that great teachers can, with their insight, help us to understand, and Anthony de Mare is one of those.  His choice of words and organization of his musical material incorporated some of the most profoundly spiritual music (Messiaen) with other influences, jazz, blues, and imagery of people, times and places, internal and external, in a way that illustrated the underlying humanity.  de Mare has achieved the Iveisan ideal: to retain the pieces intact, yet make perfect sense of the whole, including contradictions."
- Joan Hayden, The Maui News

"Mr. de Mare's protean talents fit his protean program.  'The Alcotts' - a movement from Ives's 'Concorde Sonata' - was played as eloquently as I have ever heard it..."
- Bernard Holland, The New York Times, March 2, 1989

About Anthony de Mare's Out of My Hands

"Anthony de Mare has found a niche as a contemporary music specialist.  That designation does him a disservice.  He is a formidable pianist by any standards.  His limpid tone, exquisite touch, and impassioned beauty of utterance imbue this program of vignettes by David Del Tredici and Aaron Jay Kernis with artistry of the highest order.  This is quite simply beautiful playing.  If only some of the power pounding competition winners listened to de Mare they might learn something.  de Mare plays superbly and is vividly recorded."
- Lawrence Budmen, American Record Guide, July/Aug 2005

About Anthony de Mare's Wizards and Wildmen

"...an audacious disk...de Mare, playing at the keyboard, strumming the strings, and even singing along, plumbs the lustrous beauty lurking in the challenging scores."
- The New Yorker; September 18, 2000

"This is the most illuminating and powerful CRI release I have heard in a very long time."
- Sullivan, American Record Guide; November/December 2000

"de Mare sinks his teeth into all of these pieces with the right balance of abandon, taste, and virtuosity.  One feels that he really understands where this music comes from, and is able to play into that legacy."
- Robert Kirzinger, Fanfare; November/December 2000

"de Mare triumphs in a long and demanding program; he even sings in a piece by Harrison called May rain.  Undoubtedly his technique and interpretations are impressive, but even more impressive is the program itself, and the intellect that assembled it."
- Raymond Tuttle, www.classical.net

"de Mare's incisive readings of the 18 works offered here...are definitely worth a hearing. ... de Mare, whose commitment to 20th-century music is laudable, gives compelling performances of these stylistically diverse works."
- Ira Rosenblum, newyorktoday.com; Sept. 27, 2000