Marcia Hadjimarkos performs, records, and teaches on a variety of keyboard instruments from the earliest Florentine piano to its modern counterpart, with particular interest in clavichords and historic pianos both grand and square. A native of Oregon, she has lived in Burgundy for many years. She studied fortepiano with Jos Van Immerseel at the Paris Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique after earning degrees in piano performance and French from the University of Iowa.
Career highlights include song recitals with Emma Kirkby, Beth Taylor, and Julianne Baird, the commemoration of Hélène de Montgeroult’s 250th anniversary at the Paris Conservatoire, a concert series on a facsimile of the Cristofori piano, a clavichord concert at the Institute for Advanced Study, an 8-recital performance of the complete Haydn sonatas on several early keyboards, and the premiere of a clavichord suite written for her by American composer John Harbison. Marcia also enjoys working with actors and singers to co-create programs that combine words and music, such as ‘The Intimate Mozart’ (based on the Mozart family letters) and ‘Entre Deux Feux’ (commemorating popular and art songs of the World War I era). She plays the four-hand piano and two-keyboard repertoires with Brice Pauset, and is a member of L’Académie des Cosmopolites ensemble.She gives frequent master classes on historic pianos and clavichords in conservatories, museums, universities, and festivals.
Her performances are described as “imaginatively realized, full-blooded, and loving”, “brilliantly intelligent”, and “dynamic, free, and powerfully shaped”. She has played at the International Piano Festival in La Roque d’Anthéron, La Folle Journée de Nantes, the Sablé Festival, l’Arsenal de Metz, the Journées Musicales d’Automne, the National Music Museum, Rencontres Internationales Harmoniques, the Nordic Historical Keyboard Festival, the Cobbe, Finchcocks, Bad Krozingen, Fenton House and Russell Collections, the San Diego Early Music Society, MusicSources…Her recordings of Mozart Sonatas and Rondos, Haydn Sonatas, Character Pieces by C.P.E. Bach, Haydn songs & cantatas with Emma Kirkby, Viennese music with Hugo Reyne (czakan), and Schubert Dances and Sonata have been enthusiastically received, and have earned various awards including a Diapason d’Or. A recording of solo piano and the complete chamber works by Hélène de Montgeroult, played on an 1817 square piano, with mezzo-soprano Beth Taylor and violinist Nicolas Mazzoleni, was released in October 2023 on the Seulétoile label. The album Murmurations, released on the Outer Marker label and available for downloading via NativeDSD, was recorded on an 1889 New York Steinway B. It reflects Marcia’s return to more modern keyboard instruments and their repertoire: Satie, Pärt, Cage, Monk, Glass, Mompou, Tailleferre, and Skempton.