Eric Chumachenco performs a rich repertoire from Bach to the present, as a soloist, chamber musician and lied accompanist. Since 1990 he has been active as a lied accompanist and artistic collaborator of the vocal classes at the Mozarteum University.
Eric Chumachenco learned to play the piano from an early age. Numerous recitals and chamber music evenings with his father Nicolas and his aunt Ana Chumachenco made him familiar with the literature for strings and piano from an early age. He studied with Sava Savoff at the Zurich Conservatory and with Edith Picht-Axenfeld in Freiburg i. Br.; After receiving his teaching diploma in Zurich in 1983, he continued his training with Maria Curcio in London and graduated with Vitalij Margulis in Freiburg in 1987. Further studies led him to Christoph Lieske at the Mozarteum University, he completed master classes with Nikita Magaloff, Homero Francesch and György Kurtág. Eric Chumachenco repeatedly supervised the violin class of Sándor Végh, under whose direction he performed as a soloist with the Camerata Academica Salzburg. As a soloist, Chumachenco has performed with the Winterthur City Orchestra (1983, Piano Concerto by Grieg), the Zurich Chamber Orchestra (Mozart's Concerto KV 453 under Edmond de Stoutz, 1984), the Camerata Lysy (1988 tour with the Mozart Concerto KV 414 under Alberto Lysy) and the Lithuanian Chamber Orchestra (1991 Mozart's Concerto KV 467, conductor Saulius Sondeckis). Solo recitals took him to Germany, Austria, England and Switzerland of Carl Orff's "Carmina Burana" was enthusiastically received by a wide audience and by the press. In the Orff Year 1995 he played his version extremely successfully, e.g. at the Munich Piano Summer. In 1997 he gave guest performances as a teacher and concert pianist in China (Hong Kong and Beijing), in 2000 he performed at the Carinthian Summer in Ossiach with Marjana Lipovsek and Benjamin Schmid on. In October 2002 and January 2003 he performed in Paris, in February 2004 at the Hitzacker Music Week (FRG) with Mozart's Piano Concerto KV 453 together with the Virtuosi Saxoniae under the direction of Ludwig Güttler. In August 2004 he presented himself at the Salzburg Festival with Wilhelm Furtwängler's Sonata No. 2 for violin and piano.
press reviews
"The renowned artist played Mozart's concerto KV 414 beautifully sparkling and with an extraordinary warmth of touch." (Bertrand Boesch, Sierre) "Chumachenco is not only the outstanding interpreter of his own transcription, which is as knowledgeable as it is virtuoso, but he also opens up new, fascinating perspectives on a work's architecture that has never been seen before (...) in its basic aesthetic patterns in such a way could "look at" sensitively." (GP, FonoForum 4/93 on "Carmina Burana") "A pianist of a special, personal character, whose playing is characterized by exceptional sensitivity. The (...) 4 mazurkas op. 33 by Chopin conveyed wonderful poetry." (FvApell, Bad Lauterberg) "The lightness of Chumachenco's playing, his brilliance and the subtle virtuosity, which broke ground both in the cadence of the first movement and in the realization of the concluding variation movement, seemed like pianistic manifestations of that bright, wild and extraterrestrial laughter, which Hermann Hesse attributes to the composer in "Steppenwolf." (T. Janssen, Elbe-Jeetzel-Zeitung Feb. 2004 regarding the Mozart concerto KV 453 in Hitzacker/Elbe with the Virtuosi Saxoniae under Ludwig Güttler)
