“The most important thing is to play on a good instrument”, Antonii Baryshevskyi confided to Ukrainian journalist Olha Kizlova in an interview given in 2013. “Furthermore, you need truly good schooling – an environment that allows for music education. Our [Ukrainian] piano culture is based on the teaching of [Heinrich] Neuhaus, who paid special attention to timbre and tone quality. Sonority is extremely important for an interpreter – something I’ve been working on for a long time.” Baryshevskyi reflects further on the subject of piano literature: “The choice of repertoire has to be just right. But even that aspect wouldn’t be enough if one wasn’t capable of expressing oneself earnestly and authentically. If you’re able to hold all of those elements in balance, nothing can ever go completely wrong. But if an artist just wants to put himself on display and express himself by means of music, the result will be a caricature. The most important thing is to achieve balance between the composer’s written intentions and the performer’s inner world of reflections and emotions. If you get that balance right, everything is right.” In her magazine feature on the young pianist, Olha Kizlova wrote of his “thoroughly well-conceived, deeply felt, authentic interpretation. He is guided by his perfect taste; heart-warming, thrillingly enchanting playing and a seemingly endless palette of colours and dynamics all inspire his listeners to concentrate along with him, obtaining their trust from the very first note. This young soloist has incredible potential and will consistently follow his own path, always guided by a self-critical endeavour to achieve perfection.” Born in 1988 in Kiev (Ukraine), Antonii Baryshevskyi started studying the piano when he was seven and ventured his first steps at Donska State Specialized Music School No. 14. After having obtained his diploma at Lysenko Music School in 2007, he pursued post-graduate studies at the Tchaikovsky National Music Academy of Ukraine in the class of Valerii Kozlov. At the age of 16, Baryshevskyi was already selected as “A Man of the Year 2005” for a specialized training scholarship, and as one of the participants in the Euro Radio Youth Concert in Munich one year afterwards. Antonii’s musical path then took him to Paris, where he concluded his studies in 2015 in the class of Marian Rybicki at the École Normale de Musique (ENM). He also participated in masterclasses imparted by Alfred Brendel, Daniel Pollack and Lily Dorfman. In 2012, the National Philharmonic Society of Ukraine awarded him the “Soloist” distinction.
