Featured as BBC Music Magazine’s Rising Star in June 2011, Alexandra Dariescu is an outstanding communicator, hugely popular with audiences. 

During the 2011/12 season she makes her debut at the Weill Recital Hall in Carnegie Hall, performs Beethoven’s Emperor Concerto with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra at the Barbican, Shostakovich’s Concerto No.1 with the St. Paul’s Orchestra at the South Bank, the Elgar Quintet with the Elias Quartet and gives the world premiere of a piano concerto by Emily Howard with the Liverpool Mozart Orchestra. This autumn she records her first CD for Champs Hill Records.

Recent concert appearances have included Wigmore Hall, City of London Festival, the International Piano series at the Royal Concert Hall Nottingham and Schumann with the Belcea Quartet. In summer 2011 Alexandra gave a series of recitals in Argentina including the Mozarteum in Buenos Aires and returned to give masterclasses and concerts at the Geneva International Summer Festival and Academy. She is one of the first artists to take part in the RPS/YCAT Philip Langridge Mentoring Scheme with Imogen Cooper. The scheme pairs exceptional young professional musicians with the leading stars of the classical world, providing the chance to learn and exchange ideas over an extended period with those at the top of their game.

Selected by YCAT in 2008, last summer Alexandra was a Laureate at the Verbier Festival Academy where she won the CUBS Bank Verbier Festival & Academy Prize. She went on to win the Guildhall School of Music & Drama Wigmore Hall Prize, the jury including John Gilhooly (Director Wigmore Hall), Adam Gatehouse (BBC Radio 3) and Nicholas Mathias (IMG) and the Romanian Ambassador’s prize for her outstanding contribution to promoting Romania’s image in the UK. 

As a soloist Alexandra has appeared with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Sinfonia ViVA, Northern Chamber Orchestra, the Nottingham and York Symphony Orchestras, the European Union Chamber Orchestra in Germany and the International Orchestra for Freedom at St. John’s Smith Square London. She has given recitals at major festivals and venues throughout the UK including Wigmore Hall, Barbican, Leeds International Series, Jacqueline du Pré Music Building, the Bath, Ryedale, Chester, Leicester, Ribble Valley and Exeter Festivals, among many others. 

Committed to chamber music, Alexandra has collaborated with the Sacconi Quartet at Wigmore Hall, the Idomeneo Quartet at the City of London Festival and with violinist Alina Ibragimova in London. She made her UK debut at Bridgewater Hall in the 2006 Piano Festival with the RNCM Chamber Orchestra conducted by André de Ridder, broadcast live by BBC Radio 3. Further afield she has given recitals in the USA, Italy, France, Switzerland, Germany, Spain and Moldavia and broadcast for BBC Radio 3 and Classic FM, radio and television stations across Romania, Manx Radio, Isle of Man and Nevada Radio in California. In 2008 she won the prestigious Prix Maurice Ravel at the Academie Internationale de Musique Ravel in France, returning to give a recital at the Ravel Festival in 2009.

Born in Romania in 1985, Alexandra Dariescu studied in Iasi, Romania, Pocklington School in York and the Royal Northern College of Music (where her teachers included Nelson Goerner, Mark Ray and Dina Parakhina) graduating in 2008 with distinction. She went on to complete her Masters at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama with Ronan O’Hora.   

During her studies at the RNCM Alexandra won all the major prizes and awards including the Gold Medal, Chopin Prize and Peter Donohoe Prize and in 2006 won 2nd Prize in the Adila Alieva Competition in Gaillard. She has appeared regularly with the State Philharmonic in Romania, Kisinev Philharmonic, Eastbourne Symphony, Liverpool Mozart Orchestra, Blackburn, York and Sheffield Symphony Orchestras.

Alexandra is very grateful for support from the Music Foundation, John S Cohen Foundation, Hattori Foundation, Ratiu Foundation, Craxton Memorial Award and the Worshipful Company of Cordwainers.