Performer Biography

Can Sağlam, piano

Turkish pianist Can (pronounced Jahn) Sağlam is the Grand Prize winner of the 2021-2022 Vendome Prize for Piano, where he also won the CD Recording Prize.

Can Sağlam has performed in concert halls such as Morgan Library & Museum’s Gilder Lehrman Hall in New York, Wiener Saal in Salzburg, and in other venues in cities such as Paris, Nice, Brussels, Cleveland, Verona and Istanbul. He has appeared in festivals such as the Gümüşlük Classical Music Festival, Antalya Piano Festival, Bellapais Music Festival and Cayman Arts Festival.

Born in 1999 in Ankara, he began his musical education with Gamze Kırtıl at the Bilkent University’s Music and Ballet Primary School at the age of seven. After studying with Antonio Pompa-Baldi and Sergei Babayan at the Cleveland Institute of Music, he received his bachelor’s degree from The Juilliard School, where he was a recipient of the Ahmet Ertegün Memorial Scholarship and the Susan W. Rose Piano Fellowship twice.

In 2018, he was accepted as a scholar of “Young Musicians on World Stages” (YMWS), led by Güher-Süher Pekinel. During his studies, he has had the chance to work with musicians such as Jacques Rouvier, Pavel Gililov, Boris Berman, Ilya Itin, Michel Beroff, Jean-Francois Heisser and Emanuel Ax. He is currently pursuing graduate studies at the Cleveland Institute of Music under the direction of Maestro Babayan.

His first studio album, featuring works by Scriabin, Handel, Granados and Rachmaninoff will be released by the Sono Luminus label in 2023.