Chiara Bertoglio was born in Turin in 1983, and began her piano education in 1986. She studied with Maria Rezzo, Ilonka Deckers, Emmy Henz-Diémand, Paul Badura Skoda, Sergio Perticaroli, Eugenio Bagnoli and Konstantin Bogino.
In 1999 she graduated at Turin Conservatory summa cum laude and with honours. At the age of 17 she obtained the Swiss Diploma of “Virtuosité” with honours, followed in 2003 by the highest Italian degree (Accademia di Santa Cecilia in Rome), summa cum laude. She was the youngest woman ever to obtain this degree. In 2004 she was awarded the Fellowship at Trinity College London and a Master’s degree in 20th-century Musicology at the University of Rome. In 2006 she obtained an MPhil in Musicology at the University of Venice summa cum laude. In 2012 she obtained a PhD in Music Performance Practice at the University of Birmingham (UK), under the supervision of Prof. Kenneth Hamilton. She also obtained a Master’s Degree in Theology at the University of Rome, summa cum laude, in 2008.
She took part to piano and chamber music master classes given by A. Lonquich, E. Henz-Diémand, K. Bogino, A. Ciccolini, C. Zacharias, M. Voskressenskij, L. Fleisher and P. Badura-Skoda.
Following her first piano recital, at the age of 8, Chiara Bertoglio performed extensively in Europe, USA and Middle East, in venues including the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, London’s Royal Academy (Messiaen Festival 2008) and the Royal College of Music, Salzburg (Mozarteum), Warsaw (Chopin Institute), Rome (Academy of S. Cecilia, Rome Philharmonic etc.), Florence (Maggio Musicale Fiorentino), Montepulciano (“Cantiere”), Cervo (Festival), Palermo (Politeama), Turin (including MITO Settembre Musica, Unione Musicale, Polincontri Classica), Milan (Società dei Concerti, Conservatory etc.), and festivals including “Festival Mozart” in Rovereto, “Opera Barga”, “Imago Sloveniae”, “Wörthersee Classics” etc.
In 2005 her performance of a Mozart Piano Concerto at Carnegie Hall, with Leon Fleisher and the Curtis Chamber Orchestra, was greeted by The New York Times with words of appraisal. She performed in Italy, France, United Kingdom, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Poland, Israel, Denmark, Norway. The Netherlands, Slovenia, Montenegro, with live and recorded broadcasts on radio and TV (including RAI, Canale 5, Radio3, Radio Vaticana, ORF, AVRO Klassiek, Polish and Slovenian Radio and TV, Sat2000 etc.).
Following her debut as a soloist with orchestra, at the age of eight and with Ferdinand Leitner, she performed solo concertos in Italy, Germany, The Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, Austria and Switzerland, with, among the others, Rome Symphony Orchestra, European Union Chamber Orchestra, Curtis Chamber Orchestra, Orchestra Filarmonica Italiana, Aargauer Symphonie Orchester, GAMS Ensemble, Ensemble Le Musiche, Orchestra Sinfonica Giovanile del Piemonte and many others, with conductors such as Francesco La Vecchia, Claudio Maria Micheli etc.
She premiered works by important Italian composers, among whom Carlo Boccadoro, Nicola Campogrande, Flavio Colusso, Carlo Galante, Massimo Graziato, Carlo Alessandro Landini. Her performance of Boccadoro's Landscape with Shadow has been included within a CD published by RAI-ERI. Several of the above mentioned composers have dedicated some of their works to her.
She was awarded the First Prize at numerous competitions, including Muzio Clementi – Kawai, Franz Schubert, Schenk-Stiftung 2000, Forum pianistico internazionale di Chioggia 2003, XIII Concorso Pianistico Internazionale “Vanna Spadafora” and many others, including the “2000 Best Italian Graduate of the Year”.
She was also awarded the “Orpheus” and “Bruson” medals for her artistic accomplishment.
She recorded many CDs; one of them was published by Panorama (two Mozart Piano Concertos for the 2006 celebrations with the Italian Philharmonic Orchestra), and another was published in 2013 by Brilliant Classics (Respighi’s Toccata for solo piano and orchestra with Rome Symphony Orchestra).
She is an appreciated chamber music partner; among the others, she played with Konstantin Bogino, Marco Rizzi, Claudio Ronco, Elena Denisova, Cristiano Gualco, Giovanni Ricciardi, The Gustav Mahler Ensemble etc.
Following her first book on musicology, about Mozart’s piano and opera music (“Voi suonate, amici cari”, Marco Valerio, 2005), other volumes appeared for Effatà, including “Musica, maschere e viandanti” (2008, about Schubert and Schumann’s philosophy), “Logos e Musica” (2009, about the Christ in selected musical works) and “Per Sorella Musica” (2009, about the Canticle of the Sun in 20th-century music).
She wrote musicology articles that were published by “Musica e Storia”, “AAA-TAC”, “Atti dell’Istituto Veneto di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti”, “Divus Thomas”, “British Postgraduate Musicology”, “TRANS”, “Archivio Teologico Torinese”, “Quaderni del Centro di Richerche Storiche di Rovigno”, “Reportata”. An essay by her was included in the Schnittke Anniversary Collection (“Schnittke-Studien”).
She presented papers at many international conferences of musicology, including the “Purcell, Haendel, Haydn and Mendelssohn” conference in Oxford, the Messiaen festival at the Royal Academy of London and many others. She lectured for the University of Turin, at the University of Birmingham, and for other higher education institutes in Italy and abroad.
She was invited as a Guest Professor of piano at the International Festival of Maribor (Slovenia, 2006-08). Since 2007 she regularly lectures at the Summer School of the “Studio Filosofico Domenicano” University. She is Professor of Piano at the “Istituto Perosi” in Biella (Italy) and Professor of Musicology at the FTER University in Bologna.