Recanati, Italy: Anna Fiorito, a sophomore at New Canaan High School, won an award of distinction in the Conero International Piano Festival this summer. She played multiple pieces, including Rachmaninoff’s Prelude and Mozart’s Piano Concerto no. 23, and ultimately performed in their final open-air concert for a vast audience. From the early age of 5, Anna has been practicing, auditioning, and competing. But this was her first experience playing with an orchestra. At times, she says, “it was as though her left ear was soaking in the sound of the other instruments, while her right ear was attuned to her gentle, bright notes”.
In addition to high-level competitions in Connecticut and New York (Schubert Club Awards, Piano Teachers Congress of NY) Anna has played at Carnegie Hall, Steinway Hall (New York City), and Swarthout Recital Hall (Kansas University). One of her dreams is to play Beethoven’s Concerto 3 with an orchestra, and also a solo piece, Chopin’s Ballade No. 1 in G minor, which she is currently working on. She hopes to enter the 28th International Piano Festival in Poland this summer. She is inspired by her mother, Svitlana Fiorito, who is a piano teacher, and an accomplished pianist herself.