Zuzana Simurdova and Mikolaj Warszynski met as artists-in-residence at the Banff Centre for the arts in the Western Canadian Rocky Mountains, in winter 2005.

 

The ZUMI Piano Duo (formerly known as Warszynski – Simurdova) was subsequently formed in 2007 in Montreal. Alongside their individual training, they were also studying piano duo for 3 years with Jean-Eudes Villancourt at the Université de Montréal – himself a pupil of Perlemuter in Paris.

 

Both concert pianists are versatile performers who enjoy playing a wide range of genres, as well as offering a unique alternative approach to traditional presentation. In addition to performing piano duo for four-hands and two pianos, they enjoy to alternate solo repertoire and/or chamber music.

 

Since inception, ZUMI duo has been regularly featured in the performance of music by contemporary composers. In 2007, they gave the Canadian premiere of Claude Vivier’s Disintegration for two pianos, at the Theatre de la Gésu in Montreal, as part of the Serie Hommage of the Société de musique contemporaine du Quebec.

 

In 2009, they made their debut recital in Poland, during the prestigious contemporary music festival Swietokrzyskie Dni Muzyczne, held annually in the Philharmonic Hall in the city of Kielce. In 2015, we returned to Kielce Philharmonic to perform the Poulenc Piano Concerto for Two Pianos.

In 2010, the Duo actively promoted the music of Chopin in a series of multimedia concerts on the occasion of the 200th Anniversary of the composer’s birth, produced by Mazurka Music and Art & Chopin2010 Alberta.

 

The Duo has since went on to perform 2 Canadian Tours (2011 & 2015), 4 European Tours (2013 & 2014, 16, 19), and China Tours (2015 & 2017). The ZUMI duo has since went on to perform in Canada, France, Poland, Czech Republic, Italy, China, and in South Korea - where they were both piano professors at the Catholic University of Daegu.

 

ZUMI duo performed at New Music Edmonton’s ‘Hear This Now’ festival with works commissioned for performance for two pianos or four-hands by contemporary Canadian composers, and later premiered on tour in China. 

Recently, they have performed in Czech Republic at the Janacek Academy in Brno & the Festival Janacek Hukvaldy; and in Warsaw at the Canadian Embassy. 

 

During the year of 2020/21, ZUMI Piano Duo was able to live-stream series of concerts from the Chopin Piano Studio, in collaboration with Music at Southminister Ottawa, the SVU Czech Society Alberta, TKP Edmonton, the Wirth Institute for Austrian and Central European Studies at the University of Alberta & the Winspear Centre for the Arts.

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In 2022, ZUMI Piano Duo received a grant from the Canada Council for the Arts towards a Contemporary Composers Audio/Video Recording Project. In addition to the performances, there will also be an interview with the composer following the respective pieces performed. Follow the links: