Matteo Fossi

Matteo Fossi, born in Florence in October 1978, began studying piano at the age of eight at the Fiesole School of Music, graduating in 1999 from the Ferrara Conservatory with top marks. He later refined his training with Maria Tipo and Pietro De Maria, and subsequently with Pier Narciso Masi. In 2001 he attended, as an active student, Maurizio Pollini’s seminar at the Accademia Chigiana in Siena.

Highly active as a performer from a very young age, he is now regarded as one of Italy’s leading chamber musicians. He studied with artists such as Piero Farulli, Pavel Vernikov, Alexander Lonquich, the Trio di Milano, and Mstislav Rostropovich. He has long performed in duo with violinist Lorenza Borrani, graduating under Pier Narciso Masi at the Imola Academy with the Master program awarded as “the best ensemble of the last decade,” and winning prizes in major international competitions. In 1995 he founded the Quartetto Klimt, one of the most active Italian chamber groups in Italy and abroad, and for the past ten years he has also performed in piano duo with Marco Gaggini, with whom he has undertaken the first complete world recording of the works for two pianos by Brahms, Bartók, Ligeti, Poulenc, and Schönberg, alongside an extensive international concert career.

With these ensembles, and as a soloist, Fossi has performed at all major Italian festivals and concert seasons (including Ravenna Festival, Venice Biennale, Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Bologna Festival, Ravello Festival, Serate Musicali and Società dei Concerti in Milan, Amici della Musica in Florence, Padua, Verona, Modena, Palermo, Campobasso, Associazione Scarlatti in Naples, Musica Insieme and Accademia Filarmonica in Bologna, Lingotto in Turin, Accademia Filarmonica in Rome, and IUC in Rome), as well as in leading theatres and festivals in Germany, France, Austria, Switzerland, Hungary, England, Spain, Poland, the United States, Brazil, China, and South Korea.

He regularly collaborates with internationally renowned artists including pianists Federica Ferrati, Pier Narciso Masi, and Roberto Plano; violinists Laura Marzadori, Massimo Quarta, Marco Rogliano, Cristiano Rossi, and Pavel Vernikov; cellists Vittorio Ceccanti, Francesco Dillon, Alexander Ivashkin, Othmar Müller, Andrea Nannoni, Erica Piccotti, and Giovanni Sollima; flautists Mario Ancillotti, Mario Caroli, Hansgeorg Schmeiser, and Luciano Tristaino; clarinettists Riccardo Crocilla, Carlo Failli, Anthony Pay, Calogero Palermo, and Giovanni Riccucci; oboists Francesco Di Rosa and Domenico Orlando; bassoonists Paolo Carlini and Andrea Zucco; horn players Luca Benucci, Guido Corti, Paolo Faggi, Gabriele Falcioni, and Geremia Iezzi; singers Monica Benvenuti, Leonardo De Lisi, and Laura Polverelli; actors Sonia Bergamasco, Sandro Lombardi, Moni Ovadia, and Milena Vukotic; dancer Suzanne Linke; as well as the Quartetto Adorno, Quartetto di Cremona, and Quartetto Savinio.

Fossi has always had a strong dedication to contemporary music, collaborating closely—including in world premieres—with composers such as Mauricio Kagel, Peter Maxwell Davies, Sofia Gubaidulina, Krzysztof Penderecki, and Ivan Fedele. He is also the dedicatee of works by major Italian composers including Solbiati, Vandor, D’Amico, and Antonioni.

His extensive discography includes over twenty solo and chamber recordings for labels such as Decca, Universal, Brilliant, Naxos, Hortus, Nimbus, Tactus, Stradivarius, Amadeus, UNICEF, and Fenice Diffusione Musicale. Many of these are world premiere recordings, ranging from Brahms’ symphonies in the composer’s own version for two pianos to Morton Feldman’s Piano, Violin, Viola, Cello, and have received numerous awards and critical acclaim. His first solo piano album, dedicated to Brahms, was released in 2014 by Editions Hortus to enthusiastic critical reception, followed in 2015 and 2016 by solo albums dedicated to Schumann and Schubert. In 2017 he released the complete chamber music of Poulenc for Brilliant Classics, as well as a solo album dedicated to Debussy for Hortus.

He is also active in musical organisation and dissemination, serving as artistic director of the association “Nuovi Eventi Musicali,” founded in 2001, through which he has brought major international figures to Florence, including Rostropovich, Penderecki, Sofia Gubaidulina, Natalia Gutman, the Kronos Quartet, and Mario Vargas Llosa. He is president of the chamber orchestra “I nostri tempi” (inaugurated in 2006 by a concert conducted by Piero Bellugi), and was for two years artistic director of the classical section of the Estate Fiesolana festival, the oldest open-air festival in Italy.

Matteo Fossi teaches principal piano at the “Rinaldo Franci” Institute of Higher Musical Studies in Siena and chamber music at the Fiesole School of Music, where he previously served as vice-president. For over ten years he has been regularly invited to give masterclasses and seminars in piano and chamber music in Italy and abroad.

In 2019 he was awarded the prestigious Laurenzian Medal by the International Medici Academy of Florence.

Matteo will take part in Trame Sonore 2026 both as a soloist and as a member of the Quartetto Klimt.