Blog Archives • Wael Farouk

My Perfect Hands: Lecture at the American Association of Hand Surgery

on January 20, 2022February 19, 2022 By Wael Farouk

A few weeks into 2022, I did something I hadn't ever planned to do. I gave a lecture to a ballroom full of hand surgeons about what makes hands perfect. In the spring of 2021, I was approached by Dr. Nash Naam, the President of the American Association of Hand Surgery, after he had read [...]

Forget Memorization

on December 11, 2021February 1, 2022 By Wael Farouk

I am always asked how I am able to maintain such a large repertoire at my fingertips or perform from memory in a short span of time numerous hours of music. I realize that this question originates from the common misunderstanding that we pianists rely only on muscle memory. The truth is that muscle memory [...]

Egyptian Piano Music, A New and Unique Voice

on November 28, 2021February 1, 2022 By Wael Farouk

Gave a lecture on Egyptian piano music as a part of Roosevelt University Chicago College of performing Arts PianoFest last week. I was very moved by the reactions of piano students and professors alike. Here are some of the pieces used in the lecture: Aziz El Shawan piano concerto https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PlWea5elXw&t=934s Abu Bakr Khyrat Four Etudes: [...]

Category: Blog

My Perfect Hands: Lecture at the American Association of Hand Surgery

Forget Memorization

Egyptian Piano Music, A New and Unique Voice

One of the best renditions of the Rachmaninoff Third Concerto I’d ever heard. – New York Concert Review

Here is piano playing that brings chills to the flesh, performed with a rare virtuoso technique. – David Dubal

Pianist Wael Farouk is a ‘super-virtuoso.’ – New Jersey Star-Ledger

Tremendous music making, the kind that defies and transcends any and all challenges. – New York Concert Review

Breathtakingly poetic – New York Concert Review

Absolute virtuosic mastery. – Westfalen-Blatt Bielefelder Zeitung

An audacious and inventive pianist. – La Tribune Le Progrès

Mr. Farouk daringly showed his mastery and discipline over all sorts of technical hurdles and was even more impressive in making a breathtakingly poetic, singing tone. – New York Concert Review

Absolute pianistic brilliance. Technically, one can hardly imagine more pearly runs and differentiated articulation and arpeggios. – Westfalen-Blatt Bielefelder Zeitung

With his history-making concert, pianist Wael Farouk speaks to social inequities and is ready to reach higher. – Chicago Tribune

The way Mr. Farouk sailed through the piece, as if daydreaming out loud, made masses of notes seem merely incidental. That is how it should be, but only when one hears it does one realize how rare it is. – New York Concert Review

A very special musical genius. – Al Ahram Weekly

A virtuosity and an expression without equal. – La Tribune Le Progrès

Mr. Farouk simply lived and breathed the music with the poetry of a born artist. – New York Concert Review

Wael Farouk is a completionist… a marathon man in music world -Chicago Tribune

Completely the virtuoso. – Wilhemshavener Zeitung

Wael Farouk played the highly virtuoso, technically challenging solo part with absolute mastery. – Nordwest Zeitung

Wael Farouk imposed from the first chords of Bach’s Partita in C Minor a gravity of tone, a height of view that belongs only to the greatest. – La Tribune Le Progrès

Wael Farouk is, without a doubt, a formidable and magnificent pianist . . . Of the most interesting and individualistic I have heard in a long time. – New York Concert Review

Here was . . . absolutely masterful playing. – New York Concert Review