Menu

Release of ‘Grace City’ (feat. Deborah Dicembre) (E.P.)

Another facet of Mark Isaacs’ musical world: a turnaround to his major debut as a songwriter and producer, writing all the lyrics as well as composing and arranging the music, and playing piano and keyboards. Featuring the strings of the Czech National Symphony Orchestra conducted by Mark and the astonishing vocals of Deborah Dicembre.

“The Grace City EP is a thing of beauty. Exquisite songs, singing and musicianship. Spend time with it – it’s time that will bring glorious and wonderful rewards.” STUART COUPE music journalist and author

“Part Leonard Bernstein, part Burt Bacharach as interpreted by Dionne Warwick and Dusty Springfield – it’s almost symphonic pop!” Michael George Smith RHYTHMS MAGAZINE

Released November 11, 2024 and available on major digital music platforms.

This recording was assisted by the NSW Government through Create NSW

Concert: World premiere of Mark Isaacs’ ‘BODHI: Chaconne for solo violin’ (2024)

Distinguished New Zealand violinist Amalia Hall will perform the world premiere of my very recent composition ‘BODHI: Chaconne for solo violin’ at this concert, for which it was especially commissioned. The concert celebrates the work of one of my favorite Australian composers, Miriam Hyde, as well as the sesquicentenary of the Sydney suburb of Burwood where she lived.

For more information see here.

MARK ISAACS: SOLO PIANO “NEW STANDARDS” – Brisbane Thursday October 12, 2023

October 12 @ 8:00 pm – 10:00 pm
JMI Live, 10 Exhibition St, Bowen Hills, Brisbane
$20

More information & bookings here.

Mark Isaacs’ solo piano program is a reimagining of much-loved classic melodies. All are new-to-jazz choices from the 1960s & 70s including by songwriters such as Paul McCartney, Joni Mitchell and the late Burt Bacharach.

“Isaacs, with every release, has refined his systematic approach to post-modernity jazz to the point that his sound defines what jazz should sound like at the advent of the 21st Century” – ALL ABOUT JAZZ (USA)

“Here were dialogues to restore the faith. As the world crumbles into vulgarity, vitriol and worse, one felt blessed – privileged, even – to hear solo performances by pianists of the calibre of Mark Isaacs” – SYDNEY MORNING HERALD

“He wrestled melody and song out of silence” – AUSTRALIAN BOOK REVIEW

“The audience was silent and motionless, spellbound – somewhere between awe and anticipation” – CLASSIC MELBOURNE

Mark Isaacs writes symphonies, concertos, records and performs as a classical pianist and conducts orchestras. He’s composed and conducted film & TV music and even writes songs (including the lyrics).

Classical music luminary Vladimir Ashkenazy described Mark’s classical work as “masterful” and “highly inventive and inspiring”.

Alongside all this, his brilliant jazz output, over more than four decades now, has seen him collaborating with some of the most legendary international jazz stars, including Roy Haynes, Dave Holland and Kenny Wheeler, recording numerous lauded jazz albums (with two ARIA Award nominations for his previous Australian ‘Resurgence’ band), and touring the world including playing major festivals such as Tokyo Jazz Festival and Finland’s Pori Jazz.

Jazz master Pat Metheny described Mark as “A serious musician looking to solve deep questions” and the Los Angeles Times spoke of his “splendid musical mind”.

Mark Isaacs’ solo shows in Sydney and Melbourne major performance venues like Melbourne Recital Centre and City Recital Hall, Sydney, have received glowing reviews.

Now he presents a unique program of his own individual solo piano takes on “standards”, or “heritage” melodies from the worlds of jazz, film, Broadway, pop and occasionally ‘folkloric’ songs.

‘Waves’ Cartoon

Many years ago I created this cartoon in my mind to illustrate a profound idea which resonates with me. And now some generous and talented people have helped me bring it to life, and so I’d love to share it with you. – Mark Isaacs

SONATA release on ABC Classic June 30, 2023

,

SONATA: Solo Piano Works Composed & Performed by Mark Isaacs

Recorded for the ABC Classic label, this album is an intimately authentic selection of recent solo piano classical compositions by Mark Isaacs, performed by the composer. It features a suite of six Songs Without Words, a set of variations on the English folksong The Snow It Melts the Soonest, and his Sonata.

“Both in life and in his music, pianist and composer Mark Isaacs is searching in the darkness for truth; a profound intelligence guides him but never stands in the way of his heart. These probing, introspective solo works are deeply moving, gracefully played, and filled with humanity.”
—JAMES GAVIN biographer and journalist

“Music, at its absolute best, touches the realm of infinity. This is the feeling I have always had with Mark Isaacs’ music, delirious with the beauty and depth of his masterful storytelling, sensitive technique and razor-sharp intelligence.”—SIMON TEDESCHI concert pianist and author

“In the 19th century it was normal that composers would play their own piano music—one thinks of Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Liszt…(a line of which perhaps the last was Rachmaninov). It is a mark of the originality of Isaacs’ project that he can surmount the considerable technical demands of his own piano music and present these works in performances so carefully sculpted that their changing moods strike us with an intimate authenticity. A performer’s job is to make any music he performs his own—well, here the music, being Isaacs’ own, leaps off the page under his fingers.”
—NICHOLAS ROUTLEY composer, pianist, conductor, musicologist

CD AUD$24.95

Shipping at ‘Buy Now’ button above to Australia only: International customers please order here (prices are in Australian dollars)
Available on major digital music platforms.

Ravel: Ondine – Music video and audio release by Mark Isaacs

,

New solo piano classical repertoire single & YouTube music video
from Mark Isaacs
 
Ravel: Ondine
 
Available on all major digital music platforms
plus YouTube music video of the recorded performance. 
 
Mark Isaacs’ 2020 classical repertoire album Intimacies (Gracemusic/MGM) received lavish accolades:
 
"Few would dare reinvent such icons of the Western canon. But for Mark Isaacs, to perform is to reinvent…he not only remakes the wheel, but sends it spinning merrily down the road less travelled…even the most familiar of phrases seem to be at Isaacs’ beck and call, their cautious new identities almost convincing us that Isaacs is the composer, making it up as he goes along….just tender admiration and a striking vision" SYDNEY MORNING HERALD (4½ stars)
 
“Exquisitely judged by Isaacs….transfigured beauty….a melody which, in Isaacs’ hands soars" LIMELIGHT Magazine
 
“His debut solo classical release comes with all the warmth that one would expect of his jazz performances”
ABC CLASSIC “Feature of the Week”
 
Now, recorded in Adelaide’s superb Elder Hall, with concurrent multicam video shoot, comes his brand new interpretation of Ravel’s Ondine, a masterwork of French Impressionism which sumptuously evokes the manifold levels of emotion brought forth by the mysterious and sensual spirit of the water
 

New solo piano classical repertoire album from Mark Isaacs “INTIMACIES”

,

Music by Chopin, Rachmaninov, Scriabin, Debussy, Satie & Poulenc

Release date Sept 11, 2020, by Gracemusic/MGM on CD & major digital music platforms


Order Intimacies CD (with 16-page booklet): AUD$24.95
Shipping to Australia only at “Buy Now” button below. International customers please order here (prices are in Australian dollars)

“Why should we listen to Mark Isaacs playing this wonderful treasure-chest of well-known, gorgeous pieces, rather than, say, Martha Argerich, or Lang Lang? My answer is this: Every performance by a complete musician is different, and gives an insight into the music not found elsewhere. Isaacs is a complete musician.He is not about nimbleness of fingers, though he has this. Beethoven once accused contemporary pianists of losing all feeling in the nimbleness of fingers. Isaacs believes rather, with Beethoven, and indeed Argerich, that music which is played from the heart will go to the heart: Von Herzen – Möge es wieder – Zu Herzen gehen! (Beethoven’s epigraph to the score of the Missa Solemnis).”
Dr NICHOLAS ROUTLEY – Associate Professor of Music, University of Sydney

“Here is an album of sparklingly fresh, warmly intimate and deeply personal takes on some of the most lyrical and beloved solo piano works in the entire classical repertoire. These precious gems of unrestrained lyricism are given singularly personal and engaging treatments by one of Australia’s most accomplished musicians, internationally-renowned pianist and composer Mark Isaacs. Following two ARIA-nominated albums in jazz, this is his keenly-anticipated debut release of solo classical repertoire.

“The world would have more musical polymaths like Leonard Bernstein, André Previn, and indeed, Mark Isaacs, if more of we classical musicians were able to compose, improvise and play jazz.”
LACHLAN BRAMBLE– Intimacies Recording Producer; Associate Principal 2nd Violin, Adelaide Symphony Orchestra; Benaud Trio

 


Load More