“A Steinway with its color possibilities and its ability to sing and roar, allows me to put the music first and to play my best.”
Susan Svrcek
Steinway Artist Susan Svrček (1950 - 2022) led a versatile career that encompassed critically acclaimed solo, chamber, and orchestral appearances in the United States and abroad. A winner of the Concert Artists’ Guild International Competition in New York, she made her debut in Carnegie Recital Hall. She also had solo engagements from the Boston Museum of Fine Art to Tokyo’s Zero Hall, Art Hall in Seoul, and Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles. She was a featured soloist with the Pasadena and Long Beach Symphonies, among others, and performed with the Los Angeles Philharmonic New Music Group. She was a featured artist on National Public Radio, Bavarian National Radio, and NHK Radio (Japan).
As a founding member of Piano Spheres, Dr. Svrček premiered works by Joan Huang, Benjamin Lees, Frederick Lesemann, Hyo-shin Na, Jeffrey Holmes, and Sean Heim. She was noted for her wide range of repertoire, from Mozart and Beethoven to Xenakis and Boulez. She achieved mastery in her performances, as noted in the Los Angeles Times, “because she has probed so carefully into, and brought so many facets out of the massive repertory for the solo piano, one comes to her recitals with high expectations, new thrills, rediscovered gems, unknown masterpieces.”
An avid teacher, Dr. Svrček gave master classes across the U.S., as well as in Japan and Korea. She served on the piano faculties of Scripps College, Claremont Graduate University, and California State University Fullerton. She was Artist Faculty of the Piano Department at the Pasadena Conservatory of Music, where she also coached chamber music. Her students perform as soloists, as chamber musicians, and in piano ensembles. They have been accepted to the major music schools in the United States, and many are prizewinners in festivals and competitions.
To promote music throughout the community and its school system, Dr. Svrček performed in several Los Angeles Philharmonic productions of “Beethoven’s in the House”, an educational program sponsored by Toyota.
Dr. Svrček recorded for CRI, Cambria, and ORFEO. Her performance of John Cage’s Sonatas and Interludes was released by Centaur. She held two degrees from CalArts, a master’s degree from Yale University, and a doctorate from the University of Southern California Thornton School of Music.