Hungarian-born pianist Andras Schiff is finally coming back to Buffalo. Way back in February 1988 he was the soloist with the BPO in the Bartok Piano Concerto No. 2 in a pair of concerts under the baton of guest conductor David Zinman. His striking performance is still remembered by those who had the good fortune to be there.

At 8pm this Friday evening, Schiff presents a solo piano recital at Holy Trinity Lutheran Church on Main Street in Buffalo. The concert is the opening event in the Ramsi P. Tick Concert Series, and the only way to get a ticket for this program is by subscribing to the entire series. Tickets are not available for any single event.

The series is named in honor of the late Ramsi Tick, who had started the former QRS Music Series. That series aimed to bring the very finest classical performers in the world to Buffalo, a goal in which it succeeded admirably. As successor to the QRS Series, the organizers of the current RPT Series, who are all volunteers, made the decision a few years back that the only feasible way to continue the tradition was to cut down on administrative costs by offering subscriptions only, and not selling individual tickets. Holy Trinity Lutheran also helps make the series possible by donating the use of the church as the concert venue. If you want to hear Schiff, or any other of the outstanding artists on the five concert series, you must buy a season subscription.

The London-based Schiff is one of the outstanding concert pianists in the world. He is noted for his performance in the recital hall of the major keyboard works of J.S. Bach, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Chopin, Schumann and Bartok. Schiff played all of Bach’s keyboard works, from memory, at venues around the world during the worldwide celebration of the 250th anniversary of the death of Bach in 2000. He has won two Grammy Awards, one for his recording of Bach’s English Suites, another for the song cycle Schwanesgesang with tenor Peter Schreir. Named Hueterin des Erbes (Guardian of the Heritage) at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Mozart’s birthplace, Schiff is currently working on a new edition of all 27 of Mozart’s piano concertos.

Last year, Schiff played the 32 Beethoven piano sonatas in chronological order, in a sold-out series of concerts in Wigmore Hall, the most prestigious recital venue in London. Remarkably, on the afternoon of the day before each concert, Schiff delivered a lecture demonstration about the works he would perform the next day. One attendee described the lectures, also sold-out and some lasting over two hours, as a “riveting mixture of erudition, analysis, passion, wit and memory.” While Schiff will not be repeating his lecture before his Friday evening performance of the first four Beethoven sonatas (op. 2/1, 2, 3 and op. 7), the entire lecture series can be downloaded free of charge from the Guardian Unlimited Web site (http://music.guardian.co.uk/classical).

For his work as an interpreter of Beethoven, Schiff was named an honorary member of the Beethoven House in Bonn in June 2006. Schiff is an artist who is all about the music, not about himself. One interviewer described him as “a musician in pursuit of truth, irked by those he believes to be wrong or behaving falsely, not frightened to criticize those he thinks have sold out, setting up art as sacred, and willing to make enemies.”

Other concerts in the RPT Series include Cantus, the unaccompanied male chorus, on December 5, the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra with special guest violinist Nikolaj Znaider on January 30, pianist Gabriela Montero, noted for her improvisatory skills, on April 29, and cellist Alisa Weilerstein on May 13.

RPT Series subscriptions are still available by phone (694-0521 or 866-6883) or on Friday night at the door.