Mahan Esfahani

JS Bach The Complete Keyboard Concertos with Britten Sinfonia (Hyperion)

June 2026

“it’s an electric recording because Esfahani states quite clearly that Bach was the first composer of the keyboard concerto and in trimming down the forces and bringing the keyboard front and centre we really hear the brilliance of that sound…It was Mendelssohn that said that every generation has a duty to redefine Bach, and Mahan Esfahani and his colleagues are rising to the challenge with something brilliant, immediate and vital….Esfahani wants us to think of this music as being absolutely contemporary, and he wanted to find a group of players with whom he could make it feel like that.”

Andrew Matthews-Owen , BBC Radio 3 Record Review

“A bold switch-up from Esfahani, and yet not out of character - a harpsichordist as well-known for his explorations of the contemporary repertoire as he is for his accounts of the Baroque classics pairing with the Britten Sinfonia for a modern-instrumental performance of Bach's complete keyboard concertos. Fans of Esfahani's Bach series will not want to miss this - a real treat of an album.”

David Smith, Presto Music (New Release Round-up)

“these are hugely enjoyable performances, superbly balanced, one big gain being that the strings never feel subservient, the keyboard always in a dialogue with equals. Take the bright opening movement of Concerto No. 3, violinist Jacqueline Shave and colleagues singing like birds while Esfahani purrs away underneath. The major-key concertos have rarely sounded so upbeat, No. 4’s elegant finale one of the highlights of the set. No. 6, a joyous recasting of Bach’s 4th Brandenburg Concerto, features Michala Petri alongside Ian Wilson on recorders… Especially intriguing is Esfahani’s reconstruction of an unfinished 8th Concerto in D minor, based on material from the cantata Geist und Seele wird verwirret, two sinfonia movements linked by a harpsichord cadenza. The A minor Triple Concerto is included, despite Esfahani’s doubts about its authenticity, Shave and flautist Thomas Hancox on terrific form in the central “Adagio”. This is a wonderful, set, stylishly played and directed, beautifully recorded and very well annotated.”

Graham Rickson, The Arts Desk

Artist in Residence, Leipzig Bach Festival

Leipzig, June 2026

“he played Bach's Partitas — a sequence of stylized dances — with masterful concentration and precision on modern grand pianos. In the late-night recital, Iranian-American harpsichordist Mahan Esfahani interpreted Bach's Partita No. 1 on the harpsichord in a completely different, yet highly sophisticated manner… Esfahani breathed new life into Johann Sebastian Bach's Partitas during the concert, bringing evident joy to the audience.”

Gaby Reucher, Deutsche Welle

JS Bach Das Wohltemperirte Clavier, Book 1 (Hyperion)

September 2025

“Mahan Esfahani’s reading is lucid and illuminating” ***** 

Andrew Clements, The Guardian

“he plants the music’s power firmly in the realm of performance, and backs himself up with an interpretation that emphasises its flexible, human features”…“the music never sounds as if it is playing itself, but it is always alive, always has personality”

Lindsay Kemp, Gramophone

“The character of the instrument plays only one (considerable) part in influencing the overall character of the performances. The other, of course, is in the delivery. There is no better example of these two forces at work than the C major Prelude and Fugue that open the set. The harpsichord’s sound is friendly on the ears, amplified with Esfahani’s rich legato…thoughtful tone and smooth monophony in the opening subject. The theme speaks to solitude, and as other voices join in later, he creates a dialogue that centers around solemnity…Esfahani writes that Bach ‘spoke’ counterpoint so fluently that it became a vehicle for the expression of his innermost philosophical thoughts. Indeed, the harpsichordist’s attention to detail, the movement of each line of counterpoint, speaks to an intelligent realization. There is hardly a single moment when a voice carelessly trails off into oblivion. All this takes place while many of his fugues reveal harmonic pairings, colorful dissonances, and textural facets that we may not always catch in piano performances.”

Azusa Ueno, The Classic Review

“Mahan Esfahani is unquestionably a latter-day philosopher of the harpsichord… he is always interesting, never boring. So, he proves again here, with his epic new recording of a cornerstone of the keyboard repertoire, Book I of JS Bach’s The Well-Tempered Clavier. It’s quite the ride. Esfahani combines philosophy with theatre while insisting on the integrity of the 24 preludes and fugues as a whole… the playing? Fabulous, of course – effortlessly virtuosic yet outstandingly musical – and definitely compelling enough for the recording to be devoured at one sitting, as Esfahani intends. There’s the expressive flexibility in tempo towards both extremes – for example in the E-flat minor and F minor preludes, or the G major prelude and B-flat major fugue. The dramatic and narrative shaping via tension, momentum and contrast, as in the C minor and D minor preludes and the D minor and B minor fugues.

There’s spaciousness and clarity, with plenty of room around voices – listen to the C-sharp minor prelude or the F-sharp minor fugue. There’s rhetorically alert rubato, a deliciously lyrical use of the instrument’s sonority and colours and, perhaps best of all, a real improvisatory character to much of the playing.

… Esfahani’s take on WTC Book I embraces diverse performing traditions, historicism, modernism and the capacity for Bach’s music to be different things to different people – and thus for all people, for all time.” 

Will Yeoman, Limelight

“Such a satisfying harpsichord sound—Mahan Esfahani playing a modern copy of an early eighteenth-century German double-manual instrument and approaching the first book of Bach’s Well-tempered Clavier with a feeling of gentle exploration, stepping on to this well-travelled pathway as though he’s embarking on it for the first time. And that sense of discovery keeps the whole set alive with wonder and freshness and the dramatic qualities that Mahan prefers to the academic commentaries that he’s studied, as he tells us in his fascinating notes. He’s such an intriguing guide, never sacrificing meaning and interrogation for sheer speed or empty virtuosity. Excellent recording as well … a lovely idea to end with a reprise of Prelude 1 as well; it gives it that sort of Goldbergs circularity” 

BBC Record Review

Festival of Early Music of Seville ‘Domenico Scarlatti and the Spanish Enlightenment’

Seville, March 2026

“From Jean Rondeau to Francesco Corti, from Justin Taylor to Céline Frisch, from Benjamin Alard to Diego Ares or Pieter Jan Belder, some of the world's most brilliant figures of the harpsichord have paraded through the Espacio Turina in recent years, offering solo recitals of high and unforgettable musical and emotional impact. Mahan Esfahani (Tehran, 1984) on Sunday has not detracted from any of them. The Iranian-born, but raised in Washington D.C., Stanford-trained and currently living in Prague, gave a recital around the figure of Domenico Scarlatti that was completely dazzling…. the Iranian harpsichordist shares with the new generations of harpsichordists the absolute virtuosic precision that for a long time was only attributed to pianists.

But his virtuosity was not only of fingers, but also of a musical conception that allowed him to offer a reading of enormous richness in nuances. His ability to articulate the discourse through contrast was especially admirable: not so much on the basis of obvious effects as through a very fine, flexible phrasing, which allowed each motif to breathe naturally. To this was added a very intelligent use of the instrument's timbral resources, with a constant play of keyboard couplings and decouplings that generated authentic dynamic gradations – illusory, if you like, but fully effective – without breaking the continuity of the discourse at any time; In the end he even played with extraordinary subtlety with a lute register that he had not appreciated throughout the concert. In Scarlatti, passages of repeated notes and chords are common: in them, Esfahani avoided any hint of mechanism by means of subtle variations of accentuation and colour, while the ornamentation, profuse but never gratuitous, always appeared integrated into the line, as an expressive extension of the musical fabric itself.”

Diario de Sevilla, Pablo J. Vayón

Sunday Afternoon Baroque Series recital

Amsterdam Concertgebouw, March 2025

Esfahani made his melancholic Pavan MB 16 sound meditative and dreamy, emphasized the humour and impetuosity of the lively The Woods so Wild MB 8 and gave free rein to his imagination in the virtuoso Fantasia on the Second Tone, in which no instrumental obstacle – runs, sequences, ornamentations, trills – cost him any effort...

As a born storyteller, Esfahani gave each sonata its own character, as if they were mini-scenes from a frame narrative with which Scarlatti already pointed ahead to the imminent 'Sturm und Drang' period. It sounded beautiful.

Wenneke Savenije, De Nieuwe Muze

Preludes, Inventions & Sinfonias, Hyperion (CDA68448)

Released August 2024

With five predecessors in the bag, you might think that Mahan Esfahani’s latest survey of Bach’s keyboard music only contains odds and ends. True, the items, variously played on a harpsichord and clavichord, are brief: the album contains 55 tracks, the shortest, capturing a surviving fragment, lasting 32 seconds. But Bach’s genius is so pervasive in these preludes, inventions and sinfonias, and Esfahani’s playing so lively and subtle, that no one should bemoan the absence of grand musical architecture. Hyperion’s recording and engineering spread their own delight by treasuring the dying reverberation of a piece’s last note and taking a helpful breath before plunging us into the next jewel. This is the kind of album you wish would never end.

Geoff Brown, The Times

Recital at Edinburgh International Festival

Queen’s Hall, Edinburgh, August 2024

Iranian-American soloist Mahan Esfahani is among the foremost harpsichordists of his generation, committed to keeping the instrument alive today. Here he explored varied dimensions of middle and late Baroque repertoire with deep sensitivity, musicality and considerable technical mastery.

Esfahani opened with Wilhelm Friedemann Bach’s Fantasia in E minor F21. Negotiating a flurry of notes with smoothness and aplomb, he moved straight on to Handel’s contrasting Chaconne in G HWV 435, full of ornamentation and swagger in its 21 variations on a sarabande. The main feast was Bach senior’s definitive, seven-movement Partita No 4 BWV 828. This was a masterclass. Esfahani’s main focus is contemporary harpsichord music, but he is a fine exponent of high Baroque chromaticism too.

After the break attention turned to companion influences on Bach and Handel. Pachelbel’s Chaconne in F minor is slow and tender. C P E Bach’s Fantasia II in C lives up to its name, exuding elements of carnivalesque lightness and mischief. Perhaps the highlight of a compelling recital was Buxtehude’s La Capricciosa, 32 demanding variations on a Bergamasca melody and chord progression. These include hints of Bach’s Goldbergs and huge stylistic shifts, ending with a gothic stomp. Esfahani excelled in it all.

Simon Barrow, The Scotsman

Mahan Esfahani met with only cheers at his Edinburgh International Festival appearance. With daylight banished by curtains, Esfahani and his titanic, self-commissioned harpsichord, “Queen Mary” basked in the spotlight. Opening with the continually cascading Bach Fantasia in E minor F21 certainly set his stall out. His hands danced across the keys with speed and precision, the singular sound of hammer on strings raising nostalgic feelings in children of the 80’s and 90’s...

Esfahani slips from the intimate to the extrovert with ease, and it’s infectious to be part of.

Closing with Buxtehude’s La Capricciosa BuxWV 250, Esfahani dived into a sea of variations which almost certainly were on Bach’s mind when he sat down to pen his Goldberg Variations. More than 30 short variations proved no challenge to Esfahani who constantly listens to his instrument as part of an evolving conversation. As demonstrations of skill and touch go, it’s hard to imagine a better, or less heard, test.

WJQuinn, The Quinntessential Review

Brandenburg Concertos with the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra

Milwaukee, March 2024

Most of the focus was on Mahan Esfahani, an elite harpsichordist, who dazzled in the first movement’s kaleidoscopic cadenza. The Affetuoso second movement, pared down to a violin/flute/keyboard trio, allowed all the lines to be heard. Wong and Slocum played wonderfully together, their movements and emotions in sync. The finale once again belonged to Esfahani, his harpsichord burbling and trilling as an assertive member of the ensemble...

Between the two concerts, a panel discussion took place in the upper atrium with Wong, Esfahani, Masur, and MSO choir director Cheryl Frazes Hill. The talk covered topics from the communal nature of performing Bach to the composer’s legacy and long history of neglect. Mahan Esfahani’s input was the most provocative, challenging the very concept of festivals that put composers on a “pedestal” or trying to assign universal claims to their music, but then he reiterated his appreciation for Bach in the most poetic terms. Based on his probing thoughts, I would be interested to hear him speak at length on any musical topic...

As soloist in Bach’s Harpischord Concerto No. 4, Mahan Esfahani was authoritative and engaging. I enjoyed hearing how he unfurled the solo lines in the slow movement against the ensemble’s stark accompaniment.

Brendan Fox, Shepherd Express

Recital at Stanford

Stanford, March 2024

Esfahani opened with Tomkins’s “Pavana FvB CXXIII,” playing with remarkable control, beautifully highlighting its melancholy nature...Following the lighthearted “Courante,” the “Sarabande” provided an incredible contrast. Esfahani presented the movement’s heavy anguish and penetrative longing with remarkable authenticity and touch. His range in musical expression truly shone through in this movement, with an air of dark solemnity providing for an incredible listening experience...The second half of the concert revealed some of the most exciting and unique renditions of the music of Domenico Scarlatti I have ever heard. The explosiveness and energy that Esfahani brings to his music were truly at their best here. For instance, in “Sonata K. 28,” Esfahani created incredible vigor through the imitations of Spanish guitar technique Scarlatti embedded in the piece, offering a thrilling adventure through the lively work. I’ve never heard a more convincing and exciting rendition of the piece, and I absolutely loved it.  In the final “Sonata K. 436,” Esfahani coupled his playfulness with virtuosity. He showcased his astounding ability to play with audience expectations by withholding cadential resolutions or playing moderately-paced scales that quickly snowballed into surprising eruptions.

Eric Wang, Stanford Daily

Recital at Bath Bachfest

Bath Guildhall, Feb 2024

The next day, harpsichord superstar Mahan Esfahani played a programme of Handel (Suite No 2 in F major), Buxtehude (La Capricciosa) and JS Bach (English Suite No 6 in D minor). The expressivity of the Handel and the sheer virtuosity of the Buxtehude – a set of variations in which Esfahani seemingly turned a million black dots into a murmuration – led, with well-judged logic, to the Bach: palindromes, enigmas and a “mirror” fugue to make your head hurt (despite Esfahani’s lucid advance explanation), but finally, and unquestionably, best heard as music.

Fiona Maddocks, The Guardian *****

Mahan Esfahani - sample programmes