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Biographies

Joshua Bell

With a career spanning over thirty years as a soloist, chamber musician, recording artist, conductor, and director, Joshua Bell is one of the most celebrated violinists of his era. Since 2011, Bell has served as Music Director of the Academy of St Martin in the Field. Bell’s interests range from the repertoire’s hallmarks to commissioned works, including Nicholas Maw’s Violin Concerto, for which Bell received a GRAMMY® award. He has also premiered works of John Corigliano, Edgar Meyer, Jay Greenberg, and Behzad Ranjbaran.

Committed to expanding classical music’s social and cultural impact, Bell has collaborated with peers including Chick Corea, Wynton Marsalis, Chris Botti, Anoushka Shankar, Frankie Moreno, Josh Groban, and Sting. Recently, Bell joined cellist Steven Isserlis and pianist Jeremy Denk to record Mendelssohn’s piano trios, slated for release in early 2020. He also collaborated with the Singapore Chinese Orchestra on a record featuring the Butterfly Lovers’ Violin Concerto, to be released in fall 2020.

Bell maintains an avid interest in film music, commemorating the 20th anniversary of The Red Violin (1998) in 2018-19. The film’s Academy-Award winning soundtrack features Bell as soloist; in 2018, Bell brought the film with live orchestra to various summer festivals and the New York Philharmonic. In addition to six Live From Lincoln Center specials, Bell is also featured on a PBS Great Performances episode, “Joshua Bell: West Side Story in Central Park.”

An exclusive Sony Classical artist, Bell has recorded over 40 albums garnering GRAMMY®, Mercury®, Gramophone and OPUS KLASSIK awards. Sony Classical’s June 2018 release, with Bell and the Academy, features Bruch’s Scottish Fantasy and G minor Violin Concerto and received a GRAMMY® nomination.

Bell advocates for music as an essential educational tool. He maintains active involvement with Education Through Music and Turnaround Arts, which provide instruments and arts education to children who may not otherwise experience classical music firsthand.

Born in Bloomington, Indiana, Bell began the violin at age four, and at age twelve, began studies with Josef Gingold. At age 14, Bell debuted with Riccardo Muti and the Philadelphia Orchestra, and debuted at Carnegie Hall at age 17 with the St. Louis Symphony.

Bell performs on the 1713 Huberman Stradivarius violin, with a François Tourte 18th-Century bow.

 

Alessio Bax

Combining exceptional lyricism and insight with consummate technique, Alessio Bax is without a doubt “among the most remarkable young pianists now before the public” (Gramophone). He catapulted to prominence with First Prize wins at both the Leeds and Hamamatsu International Piano Competitions, and is now a familiar face on five continents, not only as a recitalist and chamber musician, but also as a concerto soloist who has appeared with more than 100 orchestras, including the London, Royal, and St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestras, the Boston, Dallas, Cincinnati, Sydney, and City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestras, and the NHK Symphony in Japan, collaborating with such eminent conductors as Marin Alsop, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Sir Andrew Davis, Sir Simon Rattle, Yuri Temirkanov, and Jaap van Zweden.

Bax explores many facets of his career this season. Fall brings the release of his eleventh Signum Classics album, Italian Inspirations, whose program is also the vehicle for his solo recital debut at New York’s 92nd Street Y. A further debut follows with the Milwaukee Symphony, where he plays Beethoven’s Emperor Concerto. He undertakes Beethoven’s Fourth Concerto and Choral Fantasy with the Santa Barbara Symphony; plays the same composer’s complete works for cello and piano with the Emerson String Quartet’s Paul Watkins, at Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center (CMS) and on a forthcoming recording; performs trios in Santiago and Rio de Janeiro with Berlin Philharmonic concertmaster Daishin Kashimotoand French horn virtuoso Radovan Vlatković; and embarks on multiple U.S. and European recital tours with superstar violinist Joshua Bell. After headlining the North Carolina Symphony’s season-opening concerts together, Bax and his regular piano partner, Lucille Chung, give duo recitals in New York, New Haven, Atlanta, and South America. He rounds out the season with a full summer highlighted by his fourth season as Artistic Director of Tuscany’s Incontri in Terra di Siena festival.

Bax’s celebrated Signum Classics discography includes Beethoven’s “Hammerklavier” and “Moonlight” Sonatas (a Gramophone “Editor’s Choice”); Beethoven’s “Emperor” Concerto; Bax & Chung, a duo disc with Lucille Chung; Alessio Bax plays Mozart, recorded with London’s Southbank Sinfonia; Alessio Bax: Scriabin & Mussorgsky (named “Recording of the Month … and quite possibly … of the year” by MusicWeb International); Alessio Bax plays Brahms (a Gramophone “Critics’ Choice”), among many others.

At age 14, Bax graduated with top honors from the conservatory of Bari, his hometown in Italy, and after further studies in Europe, he moved to the United States in 1994. A Steinway artist, he lives in New York City with pianist Lucille Chung and their daughter, Mila. He joined the piano faculty of Boston’s New England Conservatory in fall 2019.