On Saturday, January 30, 7:30 p.m. at the Santander Performing Arts Center, the Reading Symphony Orchestra continues its exciting season with a program featuring works from northern Europe and Russia.
The concert will open with a depiction of the sun rising over the Aegean sea in Danish composer Carl Nielsen’s Helios Overture, Op. 17, followed by Israeli violinist Vadim Gluzman performing Tchaikovsky’s passionate Violin Concerto in D Major, Op. 35. Following intermission, the RSJSO (Reading Symphony Junior String Orchestra) will perform a selection under the direction of Brian Mishler. The concert concludes with Igor Stravinsky’s magical Firebird Suite 1919. The pre-concert lobby performance, starting at 6:30 p.m., will be provided by the Boyertown Area High School Chamber Ensemble under the direction of Christopher Cinquini.
Vadim Gluzman
Israeli violinist Vadim Gluzman’s extraordinary artistry brings back to life the glorious violinistic tradition of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Mr. Gluzman appears regularly with major American and European orchestras and his performances are heard around the world through live broadcasts and a striking catalogue of award-winning recordings for the BIS label.
Gluzman’s artistry brings back to life the violinistic tradition of the 19th and 20th centuries. His wide repertoire embraces contemporary music and his performances are heard around the world through live broadcasts and a striking catalogue of award-winning recordings exclusively for the BIS label.
The Israeli violinist appears regularly with major orchestras such as the Chicago Symphony, London Philharmonic, Israel Philharmonic, London Symphony, Leipzig Gewandhaus, Munich Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony, Minnesota Orchestra and NHK Symphony; and with leading conductors including Neeme Jarvi, Michael Tilson Thomas, Andrew Litton, Marek Janowski, Itzhak Perlman, Tugan Sokhiev, Paavo Jarvi, Rafael Fruhbeck de Burgos, Hannu Lintu and Peter Oundjian. His festival appearances include Verbier, Ravinia, Lockenhaus, Pablo Casals, Colmar, Jerusalem, and the North Shore Chamber Music Festival in Northbrook, Illinois, which was founded by Gluzman and pianist Angela Yoffe, his wife and long-standing recital partner.
In this 2013-14 season, Mr. Gluzman begins a new collaboration as Creative Partner and Principal Guest Artist of the ProMusica Chamber Orchestra in Columbus, Ohio. As Artist of the Year with the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra, he performs a series of three concerts with conductor Andrew Litton, which will result in a new album of concertos by Shostakovich and Gubaidulina.
In the United States Vadim is making his debut with the Philadelphia Orchestra under Tugan Sokhiev, and in the United Kingdom, Gluzman’s highly anticipated Wigmore Hall recital follows last year’s acclaimed Proms debut. Vadim Gluzman has given live and recorded premieres of works by composers such as Giya Kancheli, Peteris Vasks, Lera Auerbach and Sofia Gubaidulina. In recent seasons, he has given the UK premieres of Michael Daugherty’s Fire and Blood concerto with the London Symphony Orchestra under Kristjan Jarvi; and of Balys Dvarionas’s Violin Concerto with the BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Thomas Sondergard.
Gluzman’s latest CD features Sergey Prokofiev’s Sonatas No. 1 and 2 as well as three transcriptions from Romeo and Juliet. Accolades for his extensive discography under the exclusive contract with BIS Records include the Diapason d’Or of the Year, Gramophone’s Editor’s Choice, Classica Magazine’s esteemed Choc de Classica award, and Disc of the Month by The Strad, BBC Music Magazine, ClassicFM, and others.
Born in the former Soviet Union in 1973, Vadim Gluzman began violin studies at age 7. Before moving to Israel in 1990, where he was a student of Yair Kless, he studied with Roman Sne in Latvia and Zakhar Bron in Russia. In the US his teachers were Arkady Fomin and, at the Juilliard School, the late Dorothy DeLay and Masao Kawasaki. Early in his career, Mr. Gluzman enjoyed the encouragement and support of Isaac Stern, and in 1994 he received the prestigious Henryk Szeryng Foundation Career Award.
Gluzman plays the 1690 ‘ex-Leopold Auer’ Stradivari, on extended loan to him through the generosity of the Stradivari Society of Chicago.
Andrew Constantine, RSO Music Director
Constantine was appointed Music Director of the Reading Symphony Orchestra in April 2007 following a two year search involving nearly three hundred conductors. Constantine served as Associate Conductor of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra for three years following an appointment by Yuri Temirkanov in 2004. Temirkanov has described Constantine as, “The real thing. A serious conductor!” The legendary teacher Ilya Musin also called Constantine, “a brilliant representative of the conducting art.”
Born in England he studied firstly with John Carewe and Norman Del Mar, then later with Ferdinand Leitner at the Accademia Chigiana in Siena and Leonard Bernstein at the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival. As a result of winning first prize in the Donatella Flick/Accademia Italiana Conducting Competition he furthered his studies at the Leningrad Conservatory with Musin and worked as assistant to the late Giuseppe Sinopoli.
This was soon followed by his London debut at the Royal Festival Hall conducting the London Philharmonic. Critical acclaim was unanimous.
Constantine works regularly with nearly all of the finest British orchestras including the Royal Philharmonic and the Philharmonia Orchestra as well as having strong relationships with a number of European and Scandinavian orchestras including the St. Petersburg Philharmonic.
In the U.S.A. Andrew Constantine has developed a reputation for imaginative and compelling programming as well as a profound commitment to music education. In 2003 he was awarded the degree of Honorary Doctor of Music by the University of Leicester for his “contribution to music” and was also awarded a highly prestigious British NESTA Fellowship.
Please visit his website at andrewconstantine.com.
