Mario Brunello is one of the most accomplished and charismatic Italian musicians of his generation. A soloist, conductor, chamber musician, and pioneer in exploring new soundscapes with the violoncello piccolo, he was the first European to win the International Čajkovskij Competition in Moscow in 1986. Since then, he has pursued an international career that combines virtuosity, interpretative depth, and a continuous search for new artistic paths.
He has worked with conductors such as Antonio Pappano, Valery Gergiev, Myung-Whun Chung, Yuri Temirkanov, Zubin Mehta, Ton Koopman, Manfred Honeck, Riccardo Muti, Daniele Gatti, Seiji Ozawa, Riccardo Chailly, and Claudio Abbado, performing with some of the world’s leading orchestras including the London Symphony, London Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, NHK Symphony Tokyo, Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Filarmonica della Scala, Munich Philharmonic, and Venice Baroque Orchestra.
His concert activity regularly takes him to major international venues such as Wigmore Hall in London, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Berliner Philharmonie, Kioi Hall in Tokyo, the Muziekgebouw in Eindhoven, Vredenburg in Utrecht, the Fundação Gulbenkian in Lisbon, Sala Verdi in Milan, Auditorium Lingotto in Turin, Parco della Musica in Rome, as well as prominent festivals such as Gstaad, Bachcelona, and La Chaux-de-Fonds.
He plays a precious early 17th-century Maggini cello, and for several years has also performed on the four-string violoncello piccolo, tuned an octave below the violin. Widely used in the Baroque era (and by J.S. Bach in many of his cantatas), the instrument has inspired Brunello to explore early violin repertoire from a new timbral and interpretative perspective.
For ARCANA/OUTHERE, he has recorded a trilogy dedicated to Bach: the complete Sonatas and Partitas for solo violin performed on the violoncello piccolo (2019); Sonar in Ottava, with Giuliano Carmignola, Accademia dell’Annunciata and Riccardo Doni (awarded Best Concert Recording 2020 by BBC Music Magazine); and Bach Transcriptions (2023), featuring Bach concertos transcribed for violoncello piccolo and orchestra. To these are added Sei Suonate a cembalo certato e violino solo by Bach, transcribed with Riccardo Doni, and a 2020 album dedicated to Giuseppe Tartini, which received the Diapason d’Or.
In 2024, his new album devoted to Mieczysław Weinberg’s Sonatas for Solo Cello was released to enthusiastic critical acclaim from publications such as Diapason, Musica, Rondò, and Amadeus (which awarded it the “Amadeus d’Oro”), as well as the prestigious “Exceptional” rating from Scherzo magazine.
Among his most significant collaborations is the one with Gidon Kremer and the Kremerata Baltica, with whom he recorded The Protecting Veil by Tavener and Searching for Ludwig (2020), a project that juxtaposes two Beethoven string quartets (in versions for string orchestra) with contemporary works by Léo Ferré and Giovanni Sollima inspired by the German composer.
Mario Brunello is Artistic Director of the Arte Sella and I Suoni delle Dolomiti festivals, and since 2020, of the Stresa Festival, succeeding Gianandrea Noseda.