Olivier Fadini

Olivier Fadini (b. 1968) is a French harpsichord maker and pianoforte restorer based in Méreville, near Paris; husband of pianist Aya Okuyama (b. 1973). He specializes in Romantic period instruments and particularly in restorations of Pleyel et Cie pianos made by Camille Pleyel (1788—1855). Fadini comes from a distinguished Italian family that lived in Spain for many years — he's a cousin of musicologist and harpsichordist Emilia Fadini (1930—2021) and a nephew of lawyer and patron of arts Amerigo Fadini (1878—1959), who was one of the core benefactors of Casa degli Italiani a Barcellona, the first "Italian house" abroad and served as its president five times between 1908 and 1944. In 2007, Olivier Fadini first encountered one of Frédéric Chopin's Pleyel pianinos in Majorca, Spain; since then, he primarily focused his career as a researcher and restorer on "Pleyel et Cie" instruments. In 2010, Fadini restored an XVIII-century Neapolitan harpsichord and Pleyel fortepiano that once belonged to Napoleon's younger sister, Caroline Bonaparte (1782—1839). Olivier traveled to Poland in 2015 to study a pair of notable Pleyel pianos at Kraków's Uniwersytet Jagielloński, which belonged to Jane Stirling (1804—1859), one of Chopin's students and admirers, and Countess Katarzyna Potocka, née Branicka (1825—1907), notable Polish art collector. Fadini restored another Pleyel instrument formerly owned by Chopin's close friend, Natalia Obreskova, née Sheremeteva (1795—1862). In August 2018, Alexei Lubimov gave a debut public recital on this piano at the Chopin Institute in Warsaw. Some of Olivier Fadini's restorations appeared on 21131275 CD from the French label Aparté, where Edna Stern plays the 1843 Pleyel piano, 22569827 (2008) by Yves Henry recorded on the 1839 instrument, and several other albums by Tobias Koch (2), François Verry, Alain Planès, and Ludovic Van Hellemont.