Alisa Weilerstein | |
|---|---|
 Weilerstein in 2012 | |
| Background information | |
| Born | April 14, 1982 Rochester, New York, US |
| Genres | Classical |
| Instrument | Cello |
| Website | www |
Alisa Weilerstein (born April 14, 1982) is an American classical cellist. She was named a 2011 MacArthur Fellow. [1]
Weilerstein was born in Rochester, New York. [2] to a secular Jewish family. [3] She started playing the cello at age four. She made her debut at age 13 with the Cleveland Orchestra playing Tchaikovsky's Variations on a Rococo Theme . As a soloist she has performed with a number of other major orchestras on four continents. She also is active in chamber music and performs with her parents, violinist Donald Weilerstein [4] (the founding first violinist of the Cleveland Quartet) and pianist Vivian Hornik Weilerstein, as the Weilerstein Trio. The trio currently resides at the New England Conservatory in Boston. Her brother is the violinist and conductor Joshua Weilerstein (born in 1987). She is married to Venezuelan conductor Rafael Payare. [5]
Weilerstein has received a number of honors. In 2000–01, she won an Avery Fisher Career Grant and was selected to play in the ECHO "Rising Stars" program and Chamber Music Society II, the young artists' program of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. In 2004 she graduated from Columbia University in New York City with a BA in Russian history. [6] In 2006 she was awarded the Leonard Bernstein Prize at the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival. In 2011 she received a MacArthur Foundation "genius grant". [7]
A champion of contemporary music, Weilerstein has worked extensively with composers Osvaldo Golijov, Lera Auerbach and Joseph Hallman. [8] She performed the New York premiere of Golijov's Cello Concerto "Azul" at Lincoln Center's Mostly Mozart Festival, the world premiere of Auerbach's 24 Preludes for Cello and Piano at the Caramoor International Music Festival, Auerbach's transcription of Shostakovich Op. 34 for Cello and Piano at the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival, and Hallman's Cello Concerto with the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra. [9]
In May 2016, she premièred Outscape , Pascal Dusapin's second cello concerto, with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, to positive critical reception. [10] [11]
In March 2017, at Symphony Hall, she performed the world premiere of Matthias Pintscher's concerto for cello and orchestra "un despertar" with the Boston Symphony Orchestra to critical acclaim. [12] She plays a 1730 Domenico Montagnana cello.
Since 2013, she has been married to Venezuelan conductor Rafael Payare. They have two daughters. [13]
In 2023, she began a six-chapter series of concerts called "FRAGMENTS," multisensory solo cello productions combining 27 new commissions with Bach’s solo cello suites. [14]
Franz Ignaz Danzi was a German cellist, composer and conductor, the son of the Italian cellist Innocenz Danzi (1730–1798) and brother of the noted singer Franzeska Danzi.
Andrew Manze is a British conductor and violinist, noted for his interpretation of Baroque violin music.
David Geringas is a Lithuanian cellist and conductor who studied under Mstislav Rostropovich. In 1970 he won the gold medal at the International Tchaikovsky Competition. He also plays the baryton, a rare instrument associated with music of Joseph Haydn.
Arabella Miho Steinbacher is a German classical violinist.
Mats Lidström is a Swedish solo cellist, recording artist, chamber musician, composer, teacher and publisher.
Daniel Müller-Schott is a German cellist.
Ralph Henry Kirshbaum is an American cellist. His award-winning career combines the worlds of solo performance, chamber music, recording and pedagogy.
Tsuyoshi Tsutsumi is a world renowned Japanese cellist. In an international career which began in 1954, Tsutsumi has performed and recorded all of the principal standard works in the cello repertoire, both solo and concerto. He has appeared as soloist with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam, the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, the London Symphony Orchestra, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and the National Symphony Orchestra of Washington D.C..
Laszlo Varga was a Hungarian-born American cellist who had a worldwide status as a soloist, recording artist, and authoritative cello teacher.
Mari Kodama is a classical pianist who has performed in Europe, North America and Japan.
Johannes Moser is a German-Canadian cellist who has played with leading orchestras internationally.
Andrew Shulman is an English virtuoso cellist, conductor and composer. He is currently the principal cellist of the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra and maintains his cello studio at the University of Southern California's Thornton School of Music in Los Angeles, California.
Lawrence Power is a British violist, born 1977, noted both for solo performances and for chamber music with the Nash Ensemble and Leopold String Trio.
Alissa Firsova is a Russian-British classical composer, pianist and conductor.
Joseph Hallman is an American composer. A functional orphan, Hallman was born and raised in the Kensington neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He attended Girard College from first to twelfth grades. Based in Philadelphia, Hallman's works have been performed internationally. His music has been described as eclectic, merging classical, Renaissance, and contemporary popular styles. Hallman also teaches composition at Drexel University.
Inon Barnatan is an American/Israeli classical pianist.
Martin Helmchen is a German pianist. He has played with international orchestras and has recorded discs of many classical composers.
Jesús Castro-Balbi is a cellist, pedagogue, higher education and community leader. As of July 2022, Dr. Castro-Balbi assumed the position of Interim Associate Dean at Kennesaw State University Journey Honors College.
Outscape is a cello concerto written by the French composer Pascal Dusapin for the cellist Alisa Weilerstein in 2014–2015. It was premièred by Weilerstein and the co-commissioning Chicago Symphony Orchestra under conductor Cristian Măcelaru on May 26, 2016. Following its creation, Weilerstein gave the first European performances of the work with the Stuttgart and Paris Opera Orchestras in 2016 as well as the UK première at the Proms with the BBC Symphony Orchestra on July 19, 2017.
Kristin Merscher is a German classical pianist and professor at the Hochschule für Musik Saar in Saarbrücken, Germany.
Media related to Alisa Weilerstein at Wikimedia Commons| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Academics | |
| Artists | |
| Other | |
