"Scott Watkins is a polished player in his prime." - Folio Weekly "Watkins plays with great sweeps and washes of sound ... with a vivid imagination and fire ... this was a highly praiseworthy concert – a fulfilling musical evening." - New York Concert Review "Watkins plays authoritatively and expressively." - The Dallas Morning News
Scott Watkins is an American classical pianist and graduate of The University of Cincinnati’s College-Conservatory of Music with a degree in piano performance where he held the Van Cliburn Scholarship and studied with Bela Siki. He was also a student of Canadian pianist Raymond Dudley at The University of South Carolina where he earned the Master of Music degree. He holds a Doctor of Music degree in piano performance from The Florida State University where he studied with Edward Kilenyi. He won the prestigious Artistic Ambassador Award in 1985, and the Patricia D’Angelus Award at the Memphis Beethoven International Piano Competition in 1999. Since those early days his career has taken him to many of the world's concert stages, and he has enjoyed frequent collaborations with some of the finest orchestras and noted soloists, including soprano Elizabeth Futral, tenor Stanford Olsen, violinists Eugene Fodor and Hillary Hahn, cellists Alexei Romanenko, Yehuda Hanani, and Silver Ainomäe, and clarinetists Stanley Drucker, Dominique Vidal, and André Moisan. He has worked with conductors Fabio Mechetti, Andrew Lloyd Jones, Heping Liu, Michael Krajewski, Christopher Confessore, Phillip Spurgeon, Christopher Wilkins, Marguerite Richardson, and Daniel Dominick among many others.
Called “a polished player in his prime,” by Folio Weekly, his performances have been described as “fresh, forceful, and exciting” (Tallahassee Democrat) … and “colossal, with instances of delicate lyricism” (La Nacion, Buenos Aires). As a collaborative artist he gave "a rousing, virtuosic performance, excitingly played with finesse and spirit. This was, in sum, a performance of distinction” (The State, Columbia, South Carolina), and hailed as “superb” by the Chicago Sun Times. As a recitalist, his playing has often been described as sophisticated: "Watkins keeps one ear open at all times for the composer’s voice” (Daily Bulletin, Tryon, North Carolina) …“a versatile interpreter with ethereal and delicate touches of color" (Die Welt, Frankfurt) … “always seeks to penetrate the depths of the music." (La Hora, Quito, Ecuador) … "a sparkling performance, from the flourishes of the passage work and finely articulated voicing, to the full, lush sound of romanticism ... a splendid performance" (The Press Journal, Vero Beach, Florida). His most recent Carnegie Hall recital included the complete Préludes Book II by Claude Debussy, and “were a good match for Mr. Watkins’ gifts. Despite the tendency of many pianists to use the excuse of “impressionism” to run wild and drown some of these twelve pieces in pedal, we know that Debussy was against such abuse, and Mr. Watkins gets it right. He plays with the requisite clarity, but with great sweeps and washes of sound when required. These were excellent performances. It was a highly praiseworthy concert - a fulfilling musical evening" (New York Concert Review).
Keyboardist with the Jacksonville Symphony in Jacksonville, Florida, Watkins held the position of Visiting Foreign Scholar at Beifang University’s Conservatory of Music and Dance in Yin Chuan, China, where he performed, taught, and lectured from 2011 to 2019. Watkins’ latest recording, American Piano Sonatas, was released in September on the Dolphinium Records label, and includes music by Howard Hanson, William Schirmer, and Carlisle Floyd. Peter Burwasser, music critic for Fanfare Magazine writes that Watkins plays “splendidly, bringing a fine balance of colorful tonality and elegance” to the works. Scott Cantrell of The Dallas Morning News was equal in his praise writing that "Watkins offers an enterprising triptych of formally traditional but stylistically varied sonatas spanning seven decades [which] he plays authoritatively and expressively." In 2016, Watkins discovered the unpublished manuscript of American composer Howard Hanson's "Symphonic Rhapsody" - composed in 1919. Carl Fischer published Watkins' edition of the work in December, 2017.
CONCERTO REPERTOIRE
JS Bach No. 1 in D minor
JS Bach No. 4 in A major
Beethoven No. 2 in B-flat major
Beethoven No. 3 in C minor
Beethoven No. 4 in G major
Beethoven No. 5 in E-flat major
Beethoven Choral Fantasy
Beethoven Triple Concerto
Chopin Variations on Mozart's “La ci darem la mano”
Chopin No. 1 in E minor
Gershwin “Rhapsody in Blue”
Gershwin Second Rhapsody
Grieg Concerto in A minor
Hanson Concerto in G major
Khachaturian Concerto in D-flat major
Liszt Concerto No. 2 in A major
MacDowell Concerto No. 1 in A minor
Mozart No. 12 in A major
Mozart No. 17 in G major
Mozart No. 20 in D minor
Mozart No. 27 in B-flat major
Rachmaninoff No. 2 in C minor
Rachmaninoff "Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini"
Schumann Introduction and Allegro appassionato
Tchaikovsky No. 1 in B-flat minor