Edmund Battersby graduated from the Juilliard School with distinction. His teachers included Barbara Holmquest, Sascha Gorodnitzki and Artur Balsam. Battersby was a member of the piano faculty at Montclair State University before joining the faculty at the Jacobs School of Music He was married to Christian Claessens, dancer, teacher and choreographer and had two children, Justine Olivia Battersby and Julian Henry Battersby by a previous marriage to Lucy Guerlac.
Recordings
In 2006, the American Record Guide wrote that his recordings of Beethoven's Diabelli Variations, on modern and period instruments, put him "in the company of Brendel, Serkin, Schnabel, and Pollini.". This recording was also reviewed in the Irish Times and the Toronto Star described it as, "one of those must-get albums for anyone interested in Beethoven or piano music". Battersby's many recordings for Musical Heritage Society, Naxos, Koch, and the Schoodic Sound label have been widely reviewed and recognized: the 1992 Grammy Short list for Goyescas of Granados among them. In 2013, Battersby re-released previously unavailable archival Musical Heritage Society recordings of Felix Mendelssohn's, Songs Without Words, Franz Schubert's, Shorter Works for Piano and The Early Romantic Piano on the Schoodic Sound digital label which was described as "...quite simply a beautiful recording that should be heard by everyone." This was performed on a replica of an 1824 instrument by Conrad Graf crafted by Rodney Regier of Freeport, Maine. Edmund Battersby's From Iberia was released by Schoodic Sound in 2014.
Selected discography
Granados: Goyescas; Nin-Culmell: Tonadas
Rachmaninoff: Preludes and Etudes Tableaux, Opp. 22, 33 and 39
New York Times, reviewing a concert at the 92d Street Y
New York Times, reviewing Battersby's performance accompanying Barbara Stein Mallow, describing him as "a pianist of uncommon refinement"
The Irish Times, reviewing a recital of works by Mozart, Schumann, and Chopin at Dagg Hall where Battersby's "fluent" and "faithfull" playing gave "a fresh insight into a bygone world"
The Herald Times, reviewing a concert at Auer Hall in Bloomington, IN described him as a "superb pianist" and "master of the keyboard"
International Piano, reviewing his masterclass at The Piano Academy of Ireland: Battersby is quoted as telling a student, "'Your technique is in your ear, it's not in your hands.' and given the transformation he had just wrought, the point was well made."
Festivals and masterclasses
Battersby performed at a number of festivals around the world, and gave masterclasses in the art of playing piano:
The Art of the Romantic piano, Edmund Battersby on What Early Instruments can teach us and Rachmaninoff Roots in Keyboard Classics
Battersby is included as an authority in Robert Cunningham's biography of Sergei Rachmaninoff, as well as being a contributing author for Remembering Horowitz: 125 Pianists Recall a Legend by David Dubal. Battersby was interviewed about his career by Heidi Waleson in Early Music America, and in 2013 by Jerry Dubins for the January 2013 issue of Fanfare Magazine.
Commentary
Battersby is included in: "Piano Lessons: Music, Love and True Adventures", by Noah Adams, two reference books by David Dubal devoted to pianists, "The Art of the Piano; its Performers, Literature and Recordings and The Art of the Piano; an Encyclopedia of Performers'' by David Dubal and in the Routledge Studies in Musical Genera series on 19th Century Piano Music by Larry Todd
