Biography
“This release will delight Tchaikovsky aficionados … It demonstrates fresh music-making unadorned by superficial virtuosity or the encrustations of received wisdom”
Gramophone on The Seasons
Chinese-Canadian pianist Bruce (Xiaoyu) Liu burst onto the world stage in October 2021 when he won the International Chopin Piano Competition. The fresh, spontaneous dynamism and flawless technique that characterised his playing throughout the various stages of this most prestigious competition (“his Concerto in E minor … held poetry and virtuosity in wonderful balance” Daily Telegraph) not only convinced the jury but have since been winning over critics and audiences at sold-out venues worldwide. Liu has also impressed interviewers with his humility, sense of humour and intelligent interest in the history and culture of the many places he has visited since his victory in Warsaw.
He signed an exclusive agreement with Deutsche Grammophon on 29 March 2022 which, appropriately enough, was World Piano Day. Working in partnership with the Fryderyk Chopin Institute, the Yellow Label had already issued an album of live recordings captured during the various stages of the Chopin Competition. Released in November 2021, the album was met with a flood of rave reviews.
Bruce Liu’s recording of Chopin’s Nocturne in C sharp minor, KK IVa/16 was issued as a digital single in April 2022, just days after the DG signing. Further digital releases soon followed: Rameau’s Les tendres plaintes and La poule in June and August 2022, Chopin’s Étude Op. 10 No. 5 “Black Keys” in October 2022 and J.S. Bach’s French Suite No. 5 in April 2023.
His much-anticipated debut DG studio album, Waves: Music by Rameau · Ravel · Alkan, featured repertoire by three masters of French keyboard music who were active in consecutive centuries. The two works by Alkan, the Barcarolle and Le Festin d’Ésope, were new additions to DG’s catalogue. Released in November 2023, the album was followed in June 2024 by Waves: Music by Satie, presenting two versions of Liu’s readings of the Parisian composer’s Gnossiennes – one for grand piano, the other for upright piano. In the same month, Waves: Music by Rameau · Ravel · Alkan earned the artist a 2024 OPUS KLASSIK Young Talent of the Year award.
For his second studio recording, Liu chose the intimate and expressive solo piano music of Tchaikovsky. The album comprises The Seasons, a set of 12 character pieces, as well as the Romance, Op. 5, which appears as a bonus track on the CD, and a further five salon pieces which appear on the Deluxe Edition. Tchaikovsky: The Seasons was released in November 2024. The Guardian called Liu’s playing “exquisitely polished” and praised him for “never trying to impose a faux seriousness on music that does not need it, but at the same time treating it with enormous respect and obvious affection”.
Liu’s latest album is Lunaris, a collection of works associated with night-time and the moon. Alongside core repertoire pieces such as Beethoven’s “Moonlight” and “Waldstein” Sonatas, Scriabin’s Fourth Sonata and Debussy’s Rêverie, it includes gems by J.S. Bach, Mompou, Cage, Ligeti and Danish singer-songwriter Agnes Obel. Lunaris will be released on 7 August 2026.
Liu gives a solo recital of repertoire from Lunaris at this summer’s Verbier Festival (28 July 2026, livestreamed on STAGE+), as well as performing Prokofiev’s Third Piano Concerto (25 July, livestreamed on STAGE+) and Schumann’s Piano Quintet (29 July). Other forthcoming highlights include the Third Piano Concertos of both Prokofiev and Tchaikovsky for his debut at Québec’s Festival de Lanaudière; a Lunaris recital at Musikfest Bremen (25 August); Rachmaninov’s Paganini Rhapsody with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra at Philharmonic Hall, Warsaw (29 August); and Beethoven’s Concerto No. 3 with the London Symphony Orchestra and Sir Antonio Pappano at the Ljubljana Festival (2 September). He starts the new season with three performances of Prokofiev’s Third in Baltimore (2–4 October) and Lunaris recitals in Quebec City, Groton (Massachusetts), Seattle, Houston, Ann Arbor, Toronto, Chicago and Paris (16 October−3 November).
“What we all have in common is our difference,” Bruce Liu likes to say. Born to Chinese parents in Paris on 8 May 1997, he moved with his father to Montreal at the age of six but has always made regular visits to China and speaks fluent Mandarin. His artistry has therefore been shaped by his personal heritage: European refinement, North American dynamism and the long tradition of Chinese culture. He studied with Richard Raymond at the Montreal Conservatoire between 2011 and 2018, during which time he won the grand prize at the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal Competition when he was only 15, and thereafter with Dang Thai Son (winner of the 10th Chopin Competition).
He has already performed with some of the world’s leading ensembles, including The Philadelphia Orchestra, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg, Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, Philharmonia Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and Wiener Symphoniker at such prestigious venues as New York’s Carnegie Hall, the Royal Festival Hall in London, Paris’s Théâtre des Champs-Élysées and Philharmonie, the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, the Vienna Konzerthaus and Musikverein, and the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires.
Liu has adopted a healthy attitude towards the demands of touring and performing, balancing his practice time with his many other hobbies and interests, which include swimming, chess, cinema, jazz, history, karting and football. He also recognises that the focus required by practising or performing has many benefits: “When I play, I forget everything else in the world. Music has the power to help me clean my soul.”
7/2026