Roger Vignoles is internationally recognised as one of the world’s most distinguished piano accompanists and musicians of today. He regularly partners the finest singers in major venues around the world and is regarded as a leading authority on the song repertoire, both as an art and execution.
Originally inspired by the playing of Gerald Moore, Roger Vignoles decided to pursue a career as a piano accompanist, and completed his training with the renowned Viennese-born teacher Paul Hamburger. Since then reviewers worldwide have consistently recognised his distinctive qualities as a player. In a career already spanning four decades he has collaborated with such leading singers as Elisabeth Söderström, Dame Kiri Te Kanawa, Sir Thomas Allen, Olaf Bär, Barbara Bonney, Kathleen Battle, Christine Brewer, Brigitte Fassbaender, Bernarda Fink, Susan Graham, Thomas Hampson, Wolfgang Holzmair, Lorraine Hunt Lieberson, Dame Felicity Lott, Mark Padmore, John Mark Ainsley, Joan Rodgers and Sarah Walker and performs regularly at major venues such as the Wigmore Hall, Philharmonie Cologne, Vienna Konzerthaus, Vienna Musikverein, the Royal Concertgebouw, Musee d’Orsay, Frankfurt Oper, Schubertiade Schwarzenberg, Bonn Beethovenfest, and Teatro del Zarzuela in Madrid. Recently he also made extended tours of North America with Kate Royal and Measha Brueggergosman, and of Japan with Mihoko Fujimura.
Apart from giving recitals, Roger Vignoles is frequently active in devising and directing programmes and festivals of song. He has created several series at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London, including “Young Brahms”, “Landscape into Song” (a celebration of Schubert) and “Scenes from Schumann”. From 1998 to 2002 he was artistic director of the Nagaoka Winter Festival in Japan, and since 2002 has devised and directed the annual Ciclo de Lied Galega at Santiago de Compostela in Spain.
Roger Vignoles’ extensive discography includes many highly-acclaimed recordings, from German Lieder and French Melodies to Spanish Canciones and Cabaret Songs. Among recent highlights are Schumann and Brahms with Bernarda Fink on Harmonia Mundi; Britten, the ongoing Hyperion Strauss series with Christine Brewer, Anne Schwanewilms, Andrew Kennedy, Christopher Maltman and Alastair Miles; and Schubert’s Schwanengesang with Robert Holl on Hyperion. Future releases include Britten’s Donne Sonnets and Winter Words with Mark Padmore on Harmonia Mundi and solo album by Renata Pokupic with Altara Music.
Roger Vignoles is also an outstanding teacher, and has given masterclasses in Amsterdam, Brussels, Copenhagen, Stockholm, New York, Boston, Baltimore, Montreal and Toronto. He is a regular visitor to the University of Indiana, Bloomington, as well as to the Britten-Pears Young Artists’ Programme at Snape, and is Prince Consort Professor of Accompaniment at the Royal College of Music in London. Since 2004 he has been director of Sommer Lied Weinberg, an international workshop for singers and pianists in Upper Austria.
This season Roger appears in recitals with Christine Brewer, Angelika Kirchschlager, Werner Güra, Florian Boesch, Camilla Tilling, Daniela Lehner, Elizabeth Watts, Allan Clayton, Marlis Petersen, Kate Royal and Mark Padmore. He will also present his Strauss series at the Wigmore Hall.
Roger Vignoles is represented by Intermusica.
May 2010 / 485 words. Not to be altered without permission. Please destroy all previous biographical material.
ROGER VIGNOLES, PIANO ACCOMPANIST
"...with Roger Vignoles at the piano, extraordinary things can happen"
The Times, 2006
"...a taste of heaven - literally so and pianistically"
International Record Review, 2007
Strauss Songs Series / Christine Brewer, soprano
Wigmore Hall
“The Christ Child is not yet born, but the Wise Men are already resolutely on their way. And, judging by their sombre footfall in the piano playing of Roger Vignoles, it was certainly a cold coming they had of it. Christine Brewer left Die heiligen drei Könige to the end of her all-Strauss recital and it was certainly worth the wait.
The mystic darkness of the song’s piano prelude, with its sudden starlike trembling high in the right hand, prepared the way for Brewer’s soprano at its most lustrous. And the crescendo of stellar light was, after the folk-like simplicity of the start, well-nigh operatic. It took only a final, Dionysian Rite of Spring (Strauss’s late Heine setting, Frühlingsfeier) to make the Wigmore Hall audience roar for an encore. This was lunchtime — so one only. But the heavy fragrance of Brewer’s Allerseelen lingered long in the air and the memory.
It was with a song often given as an encore that Brewer and Vignoles had begun their recital. The roll and rise of Vignoles’s expansive accompaniment radiated the vocal glow of gratitude within Brewer’s soprano in Zueignung. A palpable exhalation of audience contentment wafted through the hall as she unleashed a flood-tide of Strauss’s love songs to the soprano voice: from solemn worship in Breit’ uber mein Haupt to the gentle simplicity of Gluckes genug. Brewer found the tint and tone of voice unique to each song.”
Hilary Finch, The Times, December 2009
Schubert Lieder / Elizabeth Watts, soprano
Sony BMG 88697329322
“Vignoles's playing is stunning (listen to his uncanny imitation of a harp in "Im Abendrot"), and he supports Watts's rhythmic flexibility throughout the recital. The artists find both movement and stillness in an ethereal interpretation of Rückert's "Sei mir gegrüsst," and they capture the fun of such novelties as Schubert's tiny faux-Spanish piece "Aus 'Diego Manzanares'" and the personality piece "Die Männer sind méchant."
Judith Malaronte, Opera News, August 2009
Britten: 'Before Life & After' / Mark Padmore, tenor
Harmonia Mundi
"Padmore is a master of the difficulties of the dark and dangerous world of Britten's John Donne... Between Padmore's range of vocal expressions and Vignoles' alternately playful and poignantly illuminated effects... we have a truly remarkable dramatic experience that's worth many repeat hearings." - Rating: 10/10
David Vernier, Classics Today, June 2009
“On top of it all we have superb notes and even better playing by that Gerald Moore accompanist incarnate—but with better sound—Roger Vignoles, truly without peer these days. Absolutely recommended with much enthusiasm!” - 5 stars
Steven Ritter, Audiophile Audition, July 2009
Strauss The Complete Songs Vol. 4 / Christopher Maltman, baritone & Alistair Miles, bass
Hyperion Records
“Roger Vignoles captures well the expansiveness and generosity of the writing for piano. He is also a sensitive accompanist in songs where the piano part is relatively simple.”
John Steane, Gramphone, June 2009
"Roger Vignoles can do no wrong in my book, his playing as adept and fresh as ever, strolling through his prime"
Steven Ritter, Audiphile Audition, June 2009
Recital with Ian Bostridge / Aldeburgh Festival
“Roger Vignoles’s playing was beautifully articulated and, in Schumann’s extraordinary postludes, he seemed not only to reflect on the feelings that the singer had invoked but also to encompass an extra dimension in these potent closing bars… Vignoles’s Brahms was also deeply felt."
Rian Evans, Classical Source, June 2009
“…with Roger Vignoles in elegant attendance on the piano.”
Richard Morrison, The Times, June 2009
Mahler Des Knaben Wunderhorn recital / Joan Rodgers and Roderick Williams
King’s Place
“Roger Vignoles’s piano… which commented, threaded and crystallised with expected poetry and finesse”
Geoff Brown, The Times, December 2008
Schubert Schwanengesang / Robert Holl, baritone
Hyperion Records
“Roger Vignoles’ accompaniments are always sensitive…”
Geoff Brown, The Times, October 2008
Schubert Schwanengesang / Robert Holl, baritone
Hyperion Records
“Roger Vignoles’ accompaniments are always sensitive…”
Geoff Brown, The Times, October 2008
Mahler Des Knaben Wunderhorn / Stephan Genz, baritone
Hyperion Records CDA67645
“Genz is partnered, as in his previous recitals for Hyperion, by Roger Vignoles, whose playing is so sharply characterised and finely weighted that I hardly missed the better-known orchestral version. Indeed, his playing is far more substantive and compelling… (Vignoles) treats his part as colourful, texturally detailed piano music. And his extensive booklet-notes are unusually perceptive, too. As usual with Hyperion, the recorded sound is beyond criticism.”
Andrew Farach-Colton, Gramophone, July 2008
Recital with Measha Brueggergosman, soprano
King’s Inns, Dublin / Music in Great Irish Houses Festival
“Whatever the subject matter, Measha Brueggergosman catches it perfectly. She is marvellously partnered by the ever-articulate Roger Vignoles, and when required, he is subtly supportive or dashingly demonstrative.”
Pat O’Kelly, The Irish Independent, June 2008
“Brueggergosman effortlessly gilded through them, accompanied by strong, yet unobtrusive guidance, from piano accompaniment Roger Vignoles.”
Dick O’Riordan, The Sunday Business Post, June 2008
Christine Brewer Recital
Wigmore Hall Live label
“Lots of pleasure in Vignoles’s multihued accompaniments.’
The Times, May 2008
“Roger Vignoles is the immaculate pianist.”
The Sunday Telegraph, May 2008
Grieg: Complete Songs Vol. 6
Monica Groop, mezzo soprano
BIS records CD-1657
“Roger Vignoles, her masterly and eloquent accompanist, matches her artistry to perfection.”
Robert Layton, International Record Review, January 2008
These are featured projects related to Roger Vignoles:
Profile
By Matthew GurewitschPublished on 30 March 2008For Star Singers, a Worthy PartnerIN late November the British accompanist Roger Vignoles visited the Juilliard School for his first New York master class. It was not the sort of public star turn often marketed under that name, but an internal, properly educational affair. Five students sang, accompanied by five student pianists preparing for careers as collaborative artists. Mr. Vignoles...