GRAMMY Award-Nominated Pianist Han Chen Releases New Naxos Recording: Anton Rubinstein Piano Sonatas Nos. 3 & 4, May 22, 2026

Naxos is releasing Grammy Award-winning pianist Han Chen’s newest recording, the Piano Sonatas Nos. 3 & 4 of Anton Rubinstein on May 22, 2026. This album (catalog number 8.574706) completes Han Chen’s survey of Anton Rubinstein’s four piano sonatas, following his 2020 Naxos recording of the composer’s first two piano sonatas.

Reviewing the 2020 release for the American Record Guide, critic James Harrington wrote, "These are big works with tons of notes on every page. Chen's ability to sort through it all and bring out the big romantic melodies and fairly straight-forward harmonies with the utmost of musicality and, of course, the requisite virtuosity is superb." (May 2020) Michael Schuman commented in his article on The WholeNote: “Chen successfully conveys the music’s varied moods, from tender to agitated to triumphant. I found all these attractive works…a pleasure to listen to. I think you may, too.” (April 2020)

Anton Rubinstein was a profound influence on generations of Russian musicians, including Tchaikovsky. His piano sonatas reveal a composer intent on uniting intellect and passion within a symphonic conception of the keyboard. The Third Piano Sonata was the composer’s favorite; and the final piano sonata represents Rubinstein at the height of his creative command, pouring a lifetime of emotions into a single piece and distilling the paradoxical tensions between intellect and impulse, Germanic structure and Russian ardor.

This recording will be available on all major streaming platforms, including Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, and YouTube Music. For further information, please visit the Naxos recording page and pianist Han Chen's website.

A fearless performer with seemingly limitless imagination and possessed with uncanny energy, GRAMMY-nominated pianist Han Chen plays scores old and new with rare rigor and insight. Gold Medalist at the 2013 China International Piano Competition and a prizewinner at the 2018 Honens International Piano Competition, Mr. Chen has also been praised by Gramophone as “impressively commanding and authoritative” and further cited by The New York Times for his “graceful touch,” “rhythmic precision” and “hypnotic charm.”

Mr. Chen’s musical vision is manifest in his four solo albums focusing on Franz Liszt, Anton Rubinstein, Thomas Adès, György Ligeti, and a concerto album featuring Florence Price’s Piano Concerto in One Movement in D minor (conductor John Jeter, Malmö Opera Orchestra), which was nominated for a GRAMMY Award in the Best Classical Instrumental Solo category.

Alex Ross, classical music critic of The New Yorker, who selected Mr. Chen’s disc of the Ligeti Études and Capriccios as a “Notable Classical Recording of 2023,” characterized him as follows: “The Taiwanese pianist Han Chen, a noted interpreter of the Ligeti Études and other modernist repertory, has made a blistering album of the [Liszt] opera transcriptions.”—The New Yorker, September 4, 2023

Reviewing the Ligeti recording in the August 2023 issue of Gramophone, Jed Distler wrote “[He is] one of the few pianists who handles both gnarly contemporary scores and over-the-top Romantic showpieces with equal authority and style. … [He] surmounts the sophisticated rhythmic challenges of Ligeti's Études to a T, while infusing them with plenty of tonal allure and personality. … Chen aims for clarity and balance over sheer speed, yielding steadier results and more cogent interplay between the hands.”

Attending “Infinite Staircase,” Mr. Chen’s recent traversal of the 18 Ligeti Etudes and 18 commissioned companion pieces, George Grella titled his review: “Han Chen’s remarkable playing equal to the genius of Ligeti’s Etudes” and went on to exclaim: “He was astonishing, with some of the finest pianism one has ever witnessed. Beyond sheer dexterity, this was tremendously musical playing, with every phrase clear and pointed in a certain direction, fluid control of dynamics and form, a combination of articulation and force that was hard to believe. One had the feeling that Chen was deep inside the work, opening up every detail of Ligeti’s musical personality.”—New York Classical Review, September 25, 2023

Reviewing this event in I Care If You Listen, Lana Norris summarized it as a “marathon of canonical music and new works that displayed exquisite programming, stupendous technique, and forward-thinking expansion of classical music’s best traditions.”—September 28, 2023

Mr. Chen is equally a powerful performer of the classic piano repertoire. Reviewing Mr. Chen performing Beethoven’s Sonata No. 29 Op. 106 Hammerklavier, Lee Eiseman of The Boston Music Intelligencer had this to say: “Oxygenated by powerful intellectual bellows and endowed with muscular forearms, Chen didn’t just hammer Beethoven’s formidably relentless and ever-modern challenge to pianists and listeners; with fire and tempering plunges he alternately annealed, welded, sintered, and sensitively stretched the well-wrought iron into impressive curls and shapely forms. His carefully plotted interpretations conveyed nuance and compelling gesture through very well-graduated colorations and dynamics from white hot to warmly glowing. No two repeated chords sounded the same. Chen’s Beethoven seemed to anticipate Berg and Ligeti on this night.”—August 19, 2023

Mr. Chen has appeared as soloist with the Calgary Philharmonic, Fort Worth Symphony, Lansing Symphony, Lexington Philharmonic, Hong Kong Philharmonic, National Taiwan Symphony, Xiamen Philharmonic, among others. In December 2022 he made his Lincoln Center debut with Riverside Symphony at Alice Tully Hall performing Mozart’s early masterwork, the Piano Concerto No. 9 Jeunehomme. Mr. Chen has performed as solo recitalist internationally. In demand as a chamber musician, he has performed with New York Philharmonic String Quartet while regularly collaborating with Ensemble Échappé. In 2021, Chen launched Migration Music, an online series of performances and interviews with immigrant composers.

Han Chen has studied with Yoheved Kaplinsky, Wha Kyung Byun, and Ursula Oppens at The Juilliard School, New England Conservatory, and CUNY Graduate Center. He is represented by Black Tea Music. Mr. Chen is a Steinway Artist.

For further information, please contact Hemsing Associates at 212-772-1132 or visit www.hemsingpr.com.

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