Francesco begins the month in London, where he performs in recital at the Southbank Centre‘s Queen Elizabeth Hall on 2 May. He begins the evening with Johann Sebastian Bach’s Italian Concerto, which is complemented by a selection of Busoni’s famous arrangements of the composer’s works. Francesco also performs a less well-known arrangement of the Siciliano from Bach’s Flute Sonata BWV.1031 by the great German pianist Wilhelm Kempf. In the second half, Francesco performs Set 2 from Debussy’s Images and the original 1913 version of Rachmaninov’s Sonata No.2.
Francesco returns to the programme later in the month for a short recital tour of the United States. He begins his tour at New York’s Lincoln Center on 19 May and also visits Herbst Theater in San Francisco and California State University on 21 and 24 May. He rounds off his trip to the US with two performances of Rachmaninov’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini with the National Symphony Orchestra and Gianadrea Noseda at Washington DC’s Kennedy Center on 30 May and 1 June.