Bright Shiny Things Releases Tulevaisuus, Pianist Mackenzie Melemed's Debut Album

BRIGHT SHINY THINGS RELEASES TULEVAISUUS, 
PIANIST MACKENZIE MELEMED’S DEBUT ALBUM

“Melemed’s crystal-clear pianism landed right on target at every moment.”
– The Boston Musical Intelligencer

“Melemed’s technique is dazzling, his tone rich and warm, and his musical savvy was on full display.”
– Suburban Times

NEW YORK, NY–On November 21, 2025, Bright Shiny Things releases Tulevaisuus [BSTC-0227], Avery Fisher Career Grant-winning American pianist Mackenzie Melemed’s debut album. Titled after the Finnish word for “future,” the album pairs works that have significantly shaped Melemed’s development as a pianist by Bach, Liszt, and Brahms with new works he commissioned from Laura Kaminsky, Stephen Hough, and Avner Dorman, each of which respond in some way to the earlier works. The later works are envisioned as being in conversation with the earlier ones, “reimagining their spirit in today’s world,” as the pianist says, in the hope that “tradition, memory, and new voices can come together to shape what lies ahead.” Tulevaisuus is available for pre-order here. 

Stephen Hough’s Prelude and Fugue (Aeolian) responds to what the composer calls “one of Bach’s darkest works,” the Prelude and Fugue in B-flat minor from the first book of The Well-Tempered Clavier. Despite the gravitas of the music, Bach chose to end his fugue with a major sonority, and Hough does the same, but with a twist: his composition is a basically bright piece using mostly white keys, only indulging in a darker mood when it quotes Bach’s material for dramatic contrast. Drawing his fugue subject from the letters of Melemed’s last name, Hough highlights the pianist’s role as facilitator of this dialogue across the centuries. 

Laura Kaminsky’s Threnody…October 2024 reflects on Liszt’s “Funérailles” from Harmonies poétiques et religieuses. Melemed calls Kaminsky’s work “a raw, urgent expression of today’s anxiety and grief,” echoing Liszt’s own passionate treatment of the 1848–49 Hungarian Revolution. Liszt wrote the piece in October 1849 after the Hapsburgs decisively ended the Hungarian uprising against their rule; the composer said it was in tribute to three of his friends who suffered or died in that cause, but it has also been linked to the death that same month of Liszt’s friend Chopin. 

Grief is also the starting point for Avner Dorman’s Lament and Variations, dedicated to the victims of the October 2023 attack in Israel. Responding to Brahms’s Variations on a Theme by Robert Schumann, Op. 9, which Melemed characterizes as “a work marked by introspection and devotion,” Brahms wrote the work in 1854 after being introduced to Robert and Clara Schumann the year before. Robert had high praise for the younger composer and Brahms wrote the variations to thank him, though their somber tone also suggests the circumstance of Robert’s attempted suicide in early 1854 and confinement to a sanatorium. The variations are dedicated to Clara, who Brahms took care of along with her children in Robert’s absence. The emotional arc of Dorman’s piece moves from sorrow to a climactic expression of resilience, before the lament material returns transformed in a section called Finding Peace in Stillness.

ABOUT THE ARTIST:

Recipient of the 2022 Avery Fisher Career Grant, 30-year-old American pianist Mackenzie Melemed has emerged as one of his generation’s most distinctive musical voices. A child prodigy, Melemed gave 500 concerts before age 13, including an appearance on The Rosie O’Donnell Show as well as five performances at The White House. A laureate of the 2021 American Pianists Awards and the 1st China International Music Competition, Melemed has collaborated with conductors Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Gerard Schwarz, Michael Stern, Mei-Ann Chen, Yoel Levi, and many others. He has performed with the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Helsinki Philharmonic, and the KBS Symphony at venues like Beijing’s National Centre for the Performing Arts, the Helsinki Music Centre, and Warsaw’s National Philharmonic. Melemed is a Steinway Artist and graduate of The Juilliard School’s prestigious Artist Diploma program, where he studied with Robert McDonald and Emanuel Ax.

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