John O'Conor

Born in Dublin, O'Conor attended Belvedere College in that city. During his early Dublin studies, his main piano teacher was J. J. O'Reilly. Later he was awarded an Austrian Government scholarship that enabled him to study in Vienna with the pedagogue Dieter Weber. He also made a special study of Beethoven with the German pianist Wilhelm Kempff. In 1973 O'Conor was awarded First Prize at the International Beethoven Piano Competition in Vienna which launched his international career, and in 1975 he won First Prize at the Bösendorfer Competition.

O'Conor has given recitals in many of the world's most notable halls including New York's Lincoln Center, the Kennedy Center in Washington, the Wigmore Hall and South Bank Centre in London, the Musikverein in Vienna, the Dvořák Hall in Prague and the Bunka Kaikan in Tokyo. He has performed in Europe, North America, Asia, Africa, Australia and New Zealand, and has appeared with such orchestras as the London Symphony, Royal Philharmonic, Czech Philharmonic, Vienna Symphony, l'Orchestre National de France, the Scottish and Stuttgart Chamber Orchestras, the Israel Camerata, the NHK, Yomiuri, Kyushu, Kyoto and Sapporo Symphonies in Japan, the KBS Symphony in South Korea, the Singapore Symphony, the New Zealand Symphony and the orchestras of Cleveland, San Francisco, Atlanta, Boston, Dallas, Detroit, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Seattle, Montreal, Toronto, Tampa and Washington, D.C., in North America. He has performed the complete sonatas of Beethoven in a cycle of eight recitals in one season on a number of occasions in many venues including Dublin (National Concert Hall), New York (Metropolitan Museum of Art) and Boston (Gardner Museum).

O'Conor was a co-founder of the Dublin International Piano Competition, of which he is artistic director and chairman of the Jury. He has been invited to serve on the juries of many international piano competitions, including those in Leeds, Moscow (Tchaikovsky), Vienna (Beethoven), Warsaw (Chopin), Tel Aviv (Rubinstein), Beijing, Shanghai, Munich, Bolzano (Busoni), Cologne, Vevey (Clara Haskil), Cleveland (Cleveland International Piano Competition), Salt Lake City (Gina Bachauer), Sydney, Pretoria, London, College Park (William Kapell), Valencia (Jose Iturbi) and Seoul. He was involved in the organisation of the 2015 Dublin International Piano Competition.

For his services to music, O'Conor has been awarded Honorary Doctorates by the National University of Ireland, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin Institute of Technology and Shenandoah University, an Honorary Fellowship by the Royal Irish Academy of Music, and honorary membership of the Society for Musicology in Ireland. He has been decorated with the title "Officier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres" by the French Government, has been awarded the "Ehrenkreuz für Wissenschaft und Kunst" by the Austrian Government, and has also been decorated by the Italian and Polish governments. In 2011, he was awarded the "Order of the Rising Sun" by the Emperor of Japan.