Guitarist Marko Topchii -"Guitar Recital" - CD Review, September 12^th, 2024

Pieces by Agustín Barrios Mangoré, Angelo Gilardino, John Dowland, and Graeme Koehne.

As part of the "Records of the Year 2024" project, this album features solo guitar music performed by a renowned musician who has won no fewer than 55 international guitar competitions across North and South America, Europe, and Asia. Ukrainian guitarist Marko Topchii, who in 2023 took first place at the 5th edition of the Guitar Foundation of America Competition, was given the opportunity to record this new solo album as part of the Laureate Series collection released by Naxos Records.

The CD, recorded in January 2024 at St. Paul's Anglican Church in Ontario, Canada, showcases a wide range of musical genres and styles. It explores the technical and expressive possibilities of the guitar, spanning from a Renaissance piece by John Dowland to contemporary compositions by Konstantin Bliokh, Frederic Hand, and Graeme Koehne. The album also includes modern and neo-Romantic 20th-century works by composers like Albert Roussel, Francis Poulenc, and Angelo Gilardino.

Born on January 7th, 1991, in Kyiv, into a family of musicians, Marko Topchii began studying guitar at the age of four under the guidance of renowned teacher and guitarist Volodymyr Homeniuk. He later honed his skills at the Kharkiv Conservatory and the National Music Academy of Ukraine in Kyiv, where he was Vladimir Dotsenko and Yuri Aleksik's student. Since 2018, he has pursued professional studies at the San Francisco Conservatory under musician Judicaël Perroy, who continues to mentor him in the Master's Program at the Haute École de Musique in Geneva. Alongside his studies, Topchii maintains an active competition schedule, winning the prestigious "Tino Andersen" competition in Bergen, Norway, in June 2024.

The musician also performs recitals and concerts at major venues, including Carnegie Hall in New York, Yamaha Ginza Hall in Tokyo, and Salle Cortot in Paris. His impressive repertoire encompasses solo guitar pieces and concertante works across diverse stylistic realms, earning him acclaim from both audiences and critics for his virtuosity and musicality. For his recent album, Topchii played a guitar from the German Julian Dammann collection, a choice that greatly enhances the recordings' sound quality.