Vittorio Ceccanti began studying the cello at the age of five and worked with Mischa Maisky, David Geringas and Natalia Gutman, graduating with honours as a pupil of the last at the Hochschule für Musik in Stuttgart.

Winner of several international prizes, he made his début as a soloist at the age of seventeen, performing the Lalo Cello Concerto with the Austrian Radio Symphony Orchestra (ORF) conducted by Pinchas Steinberg at the Musikvereinsaal in Vienna, and the Saint- Saëns Cello Concerto No. 1 at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples, televised by RAI-TV. Since then, he has been regularly invited to perform as a solo artist in Europe, the Americas and Asia.

He has a number of recordings to his credit including Beethoven’s Cello Sonatas for EMI Classics, and Chopin’s complete works for cello and piano and the Trio Op. 8 as part of the Chopin Edition for Brilliant Classics. He has recorded Mendelssohn and Fauré’s complete works for cello and piano with the pianist Bruno Canino and the complete works for cello by Peter Maxwell Davies for Naxos on three CDs.

Vittorio Ceccanti is the founder and artistic director of the Livorno Music Festival. He plays a cello made in Venice in 1720 by Carlo Tononi. In 2005 he was presented with the silver medal of the Italian Republic by President Carlo Azeglio Ciampi.

For more information, please visit www.vittorioceccanti.com.