Dr. Axel Schmitt - Pianist
Born in Germany in 1975, Axel Schmitt received his Doctor of Musical Arts degree in piano performance at the University of California, Los Angeles in 2004. As the first prize winner of the Los Angeles Liszt Competition and the national German competition Jugend musiziert, he has performed as a concerto soloist, recitalist, and chamber-musician throughout the United States, Germany, France, Switzerland, Austria, Italy, Hungary, and Russia.
Reviews describe him as "a great pianistic talent" of an "amazing artistic range with a singing sound quality, tasteful power, noblesse, and calmness." He is an "artist of mature, extremely rich ability of expression" who possesses "virtuosity, temperament, but also a great sense of melody and poetry.” In 2007, he was granted permanent residency by the United States government as an artist of extraordinary ability.
A member of the Music Teachers Association of California, Dr. Schmitt is sought after as a piano teacher in the San Francisco bay area. He leads a successful private studio in Sunnyvale and serves as a faculty at the Community School of Music and Arts in Mountain View and at the Google Music Program. His students participate in the merit scholarship program at CSMA, have won prizes at the U.S. Open Music Competition, and consistently receive merit or distinction marks at the ABRSM music exam.