"I was able to bring out the polyphonic structures of Bach's Goldberg Variations beautifully on a C. Bechstein grand piano. Its poetic and differentiated sound makes it an ideal partner"
Sophia Weidemann
Born in Filderstadt in 1994, pianist Sophia Weidemann began playing piano at the age of 10. Five years later, she enrolled as a junior student at the State University of Music and Performing Arts Stuttgart (HDMK) in the class of Florian Wiek. Trained at the HDMK, the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna, and the Jāzeps Vītols Latvian Academy of Music in Riga, she earned her bachelor's and master's degrees with highest marks. In 2020, she was admitted to the concert exam degree program, a postgraduate course that serves to train highly talented students, in which she was taught by Péter Nagy and Florian Wiek. The Goldberg Variations and Johannes Brahms's Second Piano Concerto were part of her final exams. For her interpretation of these two masterpieces, Sophia Weidemann received the honor of "passed with distinction" by the commission. She also gained important artistic inspiration from Alfred Brendel, who taught her at the Virtuoso & Belcanto Festival.
Sophia Weidemann is a winner of national and international competitions, both as a soloist and as a chamber musician. With her chamber music ensemble Kyklos Chambers, she won first prize at the Virtuoso & Belcanto Festival in Italy in the summer of 2022. As a soloist, she has won first prizes at the International Piano Competition "Alexander Scriabin" in Paris (2019) and at the International Béla Bartók Piano Competition in Vienna (2015). In addition, she is a scholarship recipient of Live Music Now, the International Lyceum Club Stuttgart, the Jürgen and Helga Drews Foundation, and Jeunesses Musicales Germany.
In 2024, her first CD album featuring works by Fanny Hensel was released by GENUIN and received glowing reviews. On this recording she combines music and language – a passion that also lends a distinctive quality to her concerts. She recorded her second CD of Johann Sebastian Bach's Goldberg Variations, released in 2025, on a C. Bechstein concert grand.
photos © Peter Adamik