John Lill's career has taken him to over fifty countries, both as a recitalist and as a soloist with the world's greatest orchestras. His rare talent emerged at an early age - he gave his first piano recital at the age of nine. At eighteen he performed Rachmaninov's 3rd Piano Concerto under Sir Adrian Boult, followed by his much-acclaimed London debut playing Beethoven's 'Emperor' Piano Concerto at the Royal Festival Hall. His success was reflected in many prestigious international prizes and awards, and in 1970 he won the most coveted of these, the Moscow International Tchaikovsky Competition, further consolidating his already busy international concert schedule.

John Lill's extensive repertoire includes more than seventy concertos, and he is acclaimed in particular as a leading interpreter of Beethoven, whose complete sonata cycle he has performed on several occasions in the UK, USA and Japan. In Britain he has given over 30 BBC Promenade concerts and regularly appears with all the major symphony orchestras. He has toured overseas with the London Symphony, London Philharmonic, BBC Symphony, City of Birmingham, Hallé, Royal Scottish National and BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestras.

Most recently John Lill has performed with, among others, the Seattle Symphony, St Petersburg Philharmonic, London Philharmonics and Czech Philharmonic Orchestra.

John Lill has recorded for Deutsche Grammophon, EMI (Complete Beethoven Piano Concertos with RSNO and Gibson), ASV (both Brahms Concertos with the Hallé and Loughran) plus the complete Beethoven Sonatas and Pickwick Records (Tchaikovsky l with the LSO and Judd).

John Lill has been awarded eight Honorary Doctorates from British universities as well as several Fellowships from the leading musical colleges and academies. He lives in London and was awarded the OBE in 1977 and the CBE for his services to music in the 2005 New Year’s Honours List.