Biography
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Born
26 August 1973
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Born In
Sankt-Peterburg, Russian Federation
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Died
17 September 2019 (aged 46)
Dina Ugorskaja (* 26 August 1973 in Leningrad, Soviet Union; † 17 September 2019 in Munich was a Russian-born German pianist.
Dina Ugorskaja grew up in a family home that was marked by music. Her mother, Maja Elik, is a musicologist who had taken on the role of a speech-singer at the Soviet premiere of Arnold Schönberg's Pierrot Lunaire. Her father, the renowned pianist Anatol Ugorski, gave her her first piano lessons. Dina Ugorskaja made her first public appearance at the age of seven at the Leningrad Philharmonic. From 1980 to 1990 she took piano and composition lessons at the Special Music School attached to the Leningrad Conservatory. In addition, she received singing lessons with a focus on early music. At the age of 14 she performed her first orchestral concert with Beethoven's 4th Piano Concerto. At the age of 15 she made her debut as a composer when her string quartet was performed at the Leningrad Philharmonic.
During the Perestroika period, Dina Ugorskaja, a 16-year-old Jewess, was massively threatened by members of the anti-Semitic organization Pamjat. This was the reason for the Ugorski family's departure to Berlin in 1990 (which also laid the foundation for her father's international career). Dina Ugorskaja first enrolled at the Hochschule für Musik "Hanns Eisler" Berlin before studying piano at the Hochschule für Musik Detmold in the master class of Nerine Barrett and completing her concert exam. From 2002 to 2007 she worked as a lecturer at the Detmold Academy. In the winter semester 2016/17 she accepted an appointment as professor for piano at the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna.
Dina Ugorskaja died of cancer in September 2019 at the age of 46, leaving behind her husband and a daughter.
Artistic Meaning
Dina Ugorskaja's concert activities have taken her to Russia, France, Austria and the Ukraine. She has performed at the Gewandhaus Leipzig as well as at the Schwetzinger Festspiele and the Sommerliche Musiktage Hitzacker and has played under conductors such as Wladimir Jurowski. Peter Gülke and Frank Beermann. She regularly plays with the Radio Symphony Orchestra of the MDR and the Northwest German Philharmonic.
Together with Anatol Ugorski, Dina Ugorskaja has recorded a CD with double concertos by Johann Sebastian Bach (Concerto in C minor BWV 1060), Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (Concerto in F major KV 365) and Dmitri Shostakovich (Concertino for two pianos op. 94). For another CD she has recorded Beethoven's 1st Piano Concerto with the Südwestdeutscher Kammerorchester under Vladislav Czarnecki. In the Handel Year 2009 she recorded his Piano Suites No. 2 to 6 HWV 427 to 431.
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