SPINA & BENIGNETTI / Piano Duo
• BIOGRAPHY
"Spina and Benignetti’s playing offers performances here that rank up there with the luminaries like Badura-Skoda and Demus. Their ensemble, especially in the ever-present dotted rhythms is truly as one."
James Harrington - American Record Guide
Fusion pianists with velvet playing, the duo Spina & Benignetti are acclaimed throughout the world, winning numerous international awards along the way.
Repeatedly invited to play in South Africa, Australia and New Zealand, their tours have always been surrounded by great success with audiences and critics. To quote the South African newspaper Potchefstroom Herald: “Their two pianos recital will be long-remembered”. On the occasion of their 2019 tour in Oceania, the newspaper SBS Australia writes: "Eleonora and Michele enchant Sydney”. In October 2023, they begin a new tour of Central America for a series of concerts and masterclasses in El Salvador, Mexico, Guatemala and Costa Rica.
Awarded with the Gold Medal at the Manhattan International Music Competition in New York and at the Global Music Awards (USA), they were winners of numerous competitions dedicated to chamber music and piano duo, among which, we recall, the Pietro Argento Competition (Italy), London Piano Masters - Royal College of Music (UK), Virtuoso Grand Prize Competition (France) Concours Musical de France (France), International Artists Competition in Vienna. Such international achievements have led them to perform in the radio studios of Radio France, Rai Radio3, Radio Classica, SBS Australia, Art Sound FM Canberra.
Their concert activity has seen them perform in concert halls throughout Europe and across the Globe: Salle Cortot, Auditorium Opera Bastille, Maison de la Radio in Paris and Palais Acropolis in Nice (France), Hijstekzaal Maastricht and Linburgzaal Heerlen (The Netherlands), Grosser Konzertsaal in Munich (Germany), Izumi Hall Osaka (Japan), Musaion Pretoria University and Johannesburg Mozart Festival (South Africa), Auditorium Galindo Blas, Auditorium Conservatorio Nacional and UNAM in Mexico City, Guangzhou Royal Opera House, Tianjin Grand Theater, Shandong Grand Theater and Auditorium Nankai University (China), Turner Center de Kerikeri and Wanganui Royal Opera House (New Zealand), Teatro Nacional de San Salvador (El Salvador) to name just a few.
In June 2014, they were unanimously awarded the prestigious ‘Diplôme Supérieur d’Exécution’ at the Ecole Normale De Musique Alfred Cortot in Paris, under the supervision of Chantal De Buchy. Lifelong learners, they received master’s degrees with honors, at the Maastricht Conservatorium of Music under professors Igor Roma, Henk Guittart, and Enrico Pace. They also studied at the Universität für Musik in Graz (Austria) with Sivan Silver and Gil Garburg.
Eleonora and Michele are also professors who currently teach at the Cité de la Musique et de la Danse in Soissons (France). Additionally, they are often invited to give masterclasses at the Summer International Academy of Colombes and at the Summer Arts Academy of Flaines (France), at the Beijing International Music Institute and Tianjin School of Music (China), at Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music in Melbourne (Australia), UNAM Facultad de Musica and Conservatorio Nacional in Mexico City, at the University of Costa Rica and Conservatorio Nacional in Guatemala City.
The duet Spina & Benignetti has recorded 4 albums (Piano Classics, Sheva collection) including the complete works of Brahms for two pianos. In September 2022, the new album “Schubert’s Music for Piano Four Hands” is released with Apple Digital Masters certification, by UK label Ulysses Arts, featuring Schubert’s major works for piano duet and a transcription of the Trout Piano Quintet D667 for piano four hands. All their albums are unanimously praised by the international press and have won numerous awards in the United States.
The Spina-Benignetti Piano Duo is an Official Yamaha Artist and has been proudly sponsored by them since December 2017.
SPINA & BENIGNETTI / Piano Duo
• Discography
SPINA & BENIGNETTI / Piano Duo
• PRESS
"Spina and Benignetti’s playing offers performances here that rank up there with the luminaries like Badura-Skoda and Demus. Their ensemble, especially in the ever-present dotted rhythms is truly as one.
These two pieces would be reason enough to get this disc. Another, even more compelling one is the world premiere recording of the “Trout” Quintet, arranged for piano duet. It is both a well-known masterpiece and an arrangement that sounds quite natural in a convincing duet performance.That this recording sounds so well with four hands at one piano is a testament to the pianists.
This is a Schubert piano duet recital to enjoy over and over.
Five stars: A Schubert piano duet disc to savor"
James Harrington - American Record Guide
"The Fantasia, however, is, and this performance of it by Eleonora Spina and Michele Benignetti is indispensable. Therefore, it’s deserving of the highest recommendation.
Five stars: Here is a performance of Schubert’s four-hand Fantasia that really matters"
Jerry Dubins - Fanfare
"Once again, the performers’ sharply-honed synchronicity and elegant articulation and phrasing yield great dividends.
The final portion’s grand fugue is expertly sculpted and articulated, resolving to a heartbreaking, sotto voce reprise of the work’s opening. A worthy performance of a late Schubert masterwork. Overall, a fine recital, most certainly worthy of consideration"
Ken Meltzer - Fanfare
"Both recordings impress on performance grounds and are worthy of recommendation; both likewise testify to the excellence of the duo’s playing and musicality,
making Spina & Benignetti Piano Duo an act one should definitely catch whenever the opportunity arises"
Ron Schepper - Textura
“Their ensemble is spot on, and there is a wonderful flow to the music under their fingers”
(James Harrington - American Record Guide)
2017 Global Music Awards Winner
Best Album, Best Emerging Artists, Best Duo
Lifetime - CD for Sheva Collection Label (Mozart, Rachmaninov and Barber)
"Four magic hands for a piano"
(SBS Australia)
"Por más de una hora y media el público, quien se dio cita desde temprana hora, gozó al máximo de este concierto, además de corroborar el gran talento que existe en los dos integrantes de este dúo de piano."
(El Sol del Bajio, Mexican Newspaper)
"Their two pianos recital will be long remembered"
(Potchefstroom Herald, South African Newspaper)
"Mozart’s Fantasy in F minor K608 is a musical miracle.
The Italian Duo interpreted this work with a impetus that transported us
immediately into the composer’s highest level of genius"
(Paul Boekkooi, Beld, South African Newspaper)
"An excellent recording by a young Italian piano duo winner of many
international chamber music competition"
(Brilliant Classics)
"Eleonora Spina e Michele Benignetti curano con attenzione il suono, rendono in modo preciso il gioco cotrappuntistico della variazione n. 4, scolpiscono un finale in cui sembra davvero di sentire un’orchestra”
(Luca Segalla, Musica, Magazine Italien)
"Eleonora Spina e Michele Benignetti sono da considerarsi tra i più interessanti duo pianistico in Italia"
(Monica Guerci, Il Giorno, Italian Newspaper)
“Les interprètes tiennent parfaitement les équilibres, assurant la fluidité du mouvement et la clarté d’une architecture regorgeant de couleurs"
(Pierre Massé, Pianiste, French Magazine)
"Emozionante il primo tempo con il profondo eloquio brahmsiano fatto emergere dagli esecutori come un sotterraneo filo conduttore"
(Marino Mora, Amadeus Magazine Italien)
"The duo Spina and Benignetti imbue the work’s clarion textures with a
series of lovely characterizations, of which the prized seventh variation –
grazioso – emanates an exquisite loveliness entirely appropriate to a seductive siciliano"
(Gary Lemco, Audiophile Audition, international online magazine)
"Ne deriva un’attenzione ai dettagli, una certa voluta spigolositá che elude le tentazioni di compiacimento fino a se stesso, una scioltezza sonora che richiama quanto Brahms fosse un compositore nato esecutore e camerista"
(Angelo Foletto, Suonare News)
“Last Thursday the audience appreciated a concert chosen and delivered to perfection by the duo of Eleonora Spina and Michele Benignetti”
(Grocott’s Mail, South African Oldest Independent Newspapers)
