Mr. Kazune SHIMIZU will be with us, and there will be no change in the program.

To those who were looking forward to the collaboration of Mr. Achúcarro and Sapporo Symphony Orchestra, we apologize deeply for this change and ask for your kind understandings.

We thank Mr. Kazune Shimizu accepting this sudden request, and we hope Mr. Achúcarro early recovery.

【668th Subscription Concert】（after change）

Date and Time：Saturday, June 26 from 5pm and Sunday, June 27 from 1pm

Venue：Sapporo Concert Hall Kitara

with Mo. Tadaaki Otaka, conductor laureate and Mr. Kazune Shimizu, piano

Program: Grieg／Lyric Suite, op. 54; Grieg／Piano Concerto; Elgar／Serenade for Strings and Elgar／Enigma Variations, op. 36

Tickets for this concert are not refundable due to the change of the appearing soloist.

Kazune Shimizu

Shimizu took first prize of the Marguerite Long-Jacques Thibaud International Competition and also a recital prize in 1981. In 1986 he performed with the London Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Gennady Rozhdestvensky, for his London debut. From 1995 to 1997, Shimizu performed all Beethoven piano sonatas in Tokyo. These concerts were recorded and released as a complete set under the Sony Classical label. From 2004, he started to record the complete Chopin piano works, and 5 CDs from Octavia Records have been released. Shimizu performed with Vladimir Ashkenazy in Tokyo (NHK Symphony Orchestra) and Sydney (Sydney Symphony Orchestra). He has performed with many of the world’s orchestras including the London Symphony Orchestra, Czech Philharmonic Orchestra and Mariinsky Orchestra, and has performed with conductors including Vladimir Ashkenazy, Gianandrea Noseda, Zdeněk Mácal, Michael Tilson Thomas, and Valery Gergiev. To celebrate the 30th anniversary of his debut, Shimizu performed his beloved Rachmaninov piano concertos 1-4, and the Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, in a single concert in August 2011 and every spring, he produces "Feast of the Three Great Piano Concertos," namely Beethoven's Emperor, Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No. 1 and Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No., 2 in one night. These amazing achievements proved that he continues to be a leading pianist on the world stage. He is currently a professor at the Toho College of Music.