Martha Argerich (born 5 June 1941 in Buenos Aires) is an Argentine concert pianist widely regarded as one of the greatest living pianists. She won the International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw in 1965 - the first pianist from the Western Hemisphere to do so - and built a career defined by ferocious technical brilliance and spontaneous emotional depth. After releasing only two solo albums, she devoted most of her recording life to chamber music and duo partnerships, collaborating closely with Gidon Kremer, Mischa Maisky, Nelson Freire, and Daniel Barenboim, with the bulk of her catalogue on Deutsche Grammophon.
Argerich performed Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 2 with the Munich Philharmonic under Lahav Shani at the BBC Proms in London, to a sold-out Royal Albert Hall; the concert was broadcast on BBC Four on 6 September 2026.
Deutsche Grammophon released a comprehensive A-Z digital library of Argerich's complete DG and Philips recordings, spanning six volumes, to mark her 85th birthday.
Argerich canceled her appearance at the Engadin Festival in St. Moritz on 2 August 2025, citing health reasons, days after performing at the Verbier Festival in a Shostakovich program.
Reports of Argerich's hospitalization were denied by her daughter Annie Dutoit, who confirmed her mother was resting but had not been hospitalized.
