.jpg "Panos Karan")
If I can leave this world even a bit better than I found it, then mine is a life worth living.
PANOS KARAN (Panayotis Karanikolos) was born in Chania, Greece and graduated from PIERCE in 2000. In high school, he proved to be an all-around prodigy with a special affinity for music and sports. He is a pianist, conductor and humanitarian whose ideas are fast shaping the understanding of classical music in the 21st century.
Born in Greece and educated at the Royal Academy of Music in London, Panos has taken music from the world’s top concert halls into the Amazon jungle, to the most impoverished districts of Kolkata, to prisons of war-torn Sierra Leone, and to the evacuation centers of post-tsunami Japan.
Most recent performances include four solo recitals at Carnegie Hall, New York, Symphony Hall, Boston, Queen Elizabeth Hall, London, Suntory Hall, Tokyo, Sydney Opera House and Tokyo Opera City, at the presence of Empress Michiko of Japan. In September 2010, Panos founded the charity Keys of Change, helping bring music to young people living under extraordinary circumstances around the world. In 2014 he founded the Fukushima Youth Sinfonietta in Japan, and in 2019 the Accra Youth Sinfonietta in Ghana and the Chennai Youth Sinfonietta in India. He has recorded Rachmaninov Piano Concerto No. 3 and the 24 Chopin Etudes in a live recital at London’s Cadogan Hall.
Panos Karan has visited more than 130 countries, lived in Barcelona, Buenos Aires, Athens, Tokyo and currently resides in London. He speaks seven languages.
