Bio
ILYA GRINGOLTS, violin
Winner of the 1998 International Violin Competition “Premio Paganini”, Ilya Gringolts also received two additional prizes for the youngest first prize winner in the history of the competition and the best interpreter of Paganini’s Caprices. He studied violin and composition in Saint Petersburg with Tatiana Liberova and Jeanna Metallidi and at the Juilliard School with Itzhak Perlman. He was one of twelve young artists selected by the BBC for their New Generation Artists Programme.
In recent years, Ilya Gringolts has performed throughout Europe, Asia, North America and Australia, as well as South Africa and Israel. Highlights include the Mahler Chamber Orchestra under Claudio Abbado, a tour of Germany and Spain with the NDR Orchester Hannover and another of Japan with the NHK Orchestra, and engagements with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, the Birmingham Symphony, Deutsches Symphonie Orchestra Berlin, the São Paulo Orchestra, Israel Philharmonic, London Philharmonic, Saint Petersburg Philharmonic, and the Melbourne Symphony. In North America, Mr. Gringolts has performed with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the National Symphony, and the Philadelphia Orchestra, all under Itzhak Perlman. He has also performed with the orchestras of Chicago, Atlanta, Minnesota, Indianapolis, Detroit, Phoenix, Tucson, North Carolina, Santa Rosa, Utah, and Buffalo. In Canada, Ilya Gringolts has been engaged by the Montreal and Toronto Symphonies, and Ottawa’s National Arts Centre Orchestra. Mr. Gringolts has worked with some of the leading conductors of today, including Daniel Baremboim, Gustavo Dudamel, JoAnn Falletta, Alan Gilbert, Eliahu Inbal, Neeme Jarvi, Jeffrey Kahane, James Levine, Grant Llewellyn, Kent Nagano, Peter Oundjian, Stefan Sanderling, Joseph Silverstein, Leonard Slatkin, Osmo Vanska, and Pinchas Zuckerman.
Ilya Gringolts is also in great demand as a recitalist. His repertoire runs the gamut from the baroque to the contemporary. In summer 2010 he performed the complete cycle of Bach sonatas for violin and cembalo with Masaaki Suzuki at the Verbier Festival. He has a continued commitment to period instrument performances and often plays baroque repertoire with a baroque violin and bow, sometimes switching between modern and baroque violin within a single program. He has also worked with many contemporary composers and has premiered works by Peter Maxwell Davies, Augusta Read Thomas, Christophe Bertrand and Michael Jarrell. He is a regular guest at festivals in Lucerne, Kuhmo, Colmar, Bucarest, Milano, and Monte Carlo, and at the BBC Proms, Wigmore Hall, and the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic.
As a chamber musician, Mr. Gringolts works regularly with artists such as Yuri Bashmet, Lynn Harrell, Diemut Poppen, Vladimir Mendelssohn, Peter Laul, and Itamar Golan. In 2008, he founded the Gringolts String Quartet. Following numerous, highly praised CD recordings for Deutsche Grammophon and Hyperion, Mr. Gringolts dedicated himself to Robert Schumann for his two most recent CD releases: the Violin Sonatas 1-3 with Peter Laul (2010) and the Piano Trios with Dmitry Kouzov and Peter Laul (2011). He won a Gramophone Award in 2006 for his Taneyev Chamber Music recording with Mikhail Pletnev, Vadim Repin, Nobuko Imai and Lynn Harrell.
In addition to his position as professor of violin at the Hochschule Basel, Ilya Gringolts is also a Violin International Fellow at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama in Glasgow.
June 2011
Biography
KMI
