Masterclass with cellist, Deborah Pae, and pianist Misha Namirovsky

Friday, April 8, 2016 - 4:00pm to Saturday, April 9, 2016 - 5:55pm

Open Masterclass with visiting artists, 
cellist, Deborah Pae,  and pianist Misha Namirovsky

 

World renowned musicians Deborah Pae and Misha Namirovsky are visiting the Music Performance Program at Columbia University for a mini residency starting with an open masterclass for our students and ending with a performance at Italian Academy featuring two of our own pianists.  

 

Masterclass

Friday, April 8 - 4PM
622 Dodge Hall

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Performance 

Featuring MPP pianists, Dongwon Lee and Yong Murray
Sunday, April 10, 2016 - 4pm
Teatro, Italian Academy

For performance details

 

*Both masterclass and performance events are FREE and OPEN to the public
 

 


 

 

BIOGRAPHIES

 

 Hailed by Gramophone Magazine as “exceptionally gifted” and “breathtaking," cellist DEBORAH PAE is captivating audiences with her “superb tone...high level of interpretative intelligence” and “tremendous technical assurance” (Transcentury Blog).

Since her orchestral debut at age sixteen with the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, Ms. Pae has enjoyed concerto appearances with Sinfonia Varsovia of Poland, Orchestre Philharmonique Royal de Liège, Orchestre Royal de Chambre de Wallonie, Ensemble Orchestral de Bruxelles, and the Westchester Philharmonic with conductors Vassily Sinaisky, Thomas Wilkins, Christian Arming, Augustin Dumay, and Itzhak Perlman.  In 2014, she ventured into new territory, conducting and playing Haydn’s Cello Concerto No.1 in C major with Orchestre Royal de Chambre de Wallonie at the Korean Cultural Center in Brussels, Belgium.

In 2005, Ms. Pae made her European recital debut at Musée du Louvre in Paris to an overwhelming response and since then, has appeared at the invitation of Palais des Beaux-Arts, Flagey Radio Hall, Musée de Grenoble, Amsterdam Cello Biënnale, Neue Galerie, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Van Wezel Foundation’s Young Artists Series.  Recognized for her artistic versatility, she has received major awards from the Frank Huntington Beebe Fund, Belgian American Educational Foundation, DoMusica Foundation, and National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts.

A devoted chamber musician, Ms. Pae has been a featured artist at renowned international festivals including Marlboro, Ravinia, Crans-Montana Classics, Schiermonnikoog Festival, Open Chamber Music at Prussia Cove, and Perlman Music Program.  She has been admired for bringing “vivid” and “novel vitality” to her interpretations (Boston Musical Intelligencer) and shared the stage with many of the world’s celebrated artists including Itzhak Perlman, Miriam Fried, Pamela Frank, Kim Kashkashian, Charles Neidich, and members of the Guarneri, Juilliard, Johannes, Pro Arte, Takács, and Cleveland String Quartets.  In 2012, she participated in the Musicians from Ravinia Steans Music Institute tour and later that year, garnered the silver medal at the Fischoff Chamber Music Competition with her piano trio, Trio Modetre.

Ms. Pae enjoys exploring new, overlooked, and undiscovered works.  Her debut recording, released by Zig-Zag Territoires in 2013, features the seldom-played Saint-Saëns Cello Concerto No. 2 in D minor with conductor Christian Arming and the Liège Royal Philharmonique. The CD has garnered praise from Supersonic Pizzicato, de Classica, and Gramophone Magazines and was the ‘Editor’s Choice’ of Diapason Magazine (France).  She has also given the world premieres of Fantasia Festa (2009) by Jonathan Crehan and Le Dormeur du Val (2012) by Roberto Kalb. Currently, award-winning American composer Jeffrey Mumford is writing a new concerto for cello and chamber orchestra titled “of radiances blossoming in expanding air”. This work will enjoy its world premiere in London with the English Symphony Orchestra (ESO) in 2018 followed by the U.S. premiere with the Boston (USA) based ensemble, Phoenix.

Ms. Pae’s performances have been televised on major media outlets throughout the United States and Europe, including the 2003 Grammy Awards in New York, the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences honoring legendary cellist Mstislav Rostropovich for his lifetime achievements, and the 75th Anniversary of the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapelle in Belgium.  She has also made radio appearances on Radio France, RTBF-MUSIQ3, Vermont Public Radio, and on numerous occasions, 98.7 WFMT Chicago (Chamber Music from Ravinia and Live from the Mayne Stage).  With the success of her first recording, her next project on Outhere Record Label will feature works by Britten, Beethoven, and Schubert.

Born in the United States to Korean parents, Ms. Pae began the cello at age four, creating an instrument from a Cheerios cereal box wound with strings and an imaginary bow.  After her first lessons, she quickly graduated to a sixteenth sized cello and three years later became the youngest cellist accepted into the Juilliard Pre-College Division.  She is a graduate of the Juilliard School and New England Conservatory, and former Artist-in-Residence at the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapelle in Belgium.  Her most prominent mentors include Gary Hoffman, Laurence Lesser, and Joel Krosnick, and violinists Miriam Fried and Sylvia Rosenberg and violist Kim Kashkashian.

Ms. Pae plays a Vincenzo Postiglione cello (c. 1885) generously on loan from the Arts and Letters Foundation. 

 

DEBORAH PAE

 


 

 

Russian born pianist Misha Namirovsky has been called a “Master of his Art” (The Norderstedter Zeitung – Hamburg), and a “Lyrical Poet” (Die Rheinpfalz – Frankfurt). His playing was characterized as “incredibly musical and sensitive, yet at the same time transparent and precise.” (Klassik.TV) Prof. Namirovsky is a winner of several international competitions including the prestigious German Piano Award in Frankfurt and Chopin Koscuiszco Foundation Competition in New York. Further prizes include the Promusicis award in Paris, the Gran Prix at the Cantu competition in Italy and first prize at the Louisiana International Piano Competition among others. His vivid and sensitive performances are appreciated by critics and audiences alike. Following a performance of the Chopin Concerto No. 1 with the Springfield Orchestra in Massachusetts, Mark Baszak wrote in the Union - News: “Misha Namirovsky astounded the audience with his flawless technique and mesmerizing yet non - theatrical performance.” After a recent recital in Paris, the French pianist and musicologist Eric Heidsieck described Namirovsky’s playing as follows: “His Debussy was full of colors and clarity, and the Rachmaninoff’s Etudes-Tableaux showed extreme virtuosity and controlled passion.”

Namirovsky has performed as soloist in some of the world's most renowned concert halls including Carnegie Hall in New York, Jordan Hall in Boston, Salle Cortot in Paris, Great Conservatory Hall in Moscow, the Alte Oper in Frankfurt, the Shanghai Symphony Hall in Shanghai, and the Minato Mirai Hall in Yokohama. He collaborated, among others, with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, The Conservatory Orchestra of Havana Cuba, Sendai Philharmonic Orchestra in Japan, Novaya Rossiya Symphony, Nizhnii Novgorod Philharmonic and the Capella Symphony Orchestra in Russia, the Niederbayernphilharmonie in Germany, and New Britain and Atlantic Symphony Orchestras in Boston. Upcoming performances include recitals in Nanjing, Suzhou and Beijing in China, a solo debut concerts at the prestigious Miami piano festival in the USA and the Steinway series in Germany, as well as recitals in Brussels and Santander.

A passionate chamber musician, Namirovsky participated in the celebrated Marlboro Festival in Vermont, and the Eastern Music Festival in North Carolina. Namirovsky’s piano trio with violinist Tessa Lark and cellist Deborah Pae won the silver prize at the preeminent Fischoff Chamber Music Competition in Indiana and is scheduled to perform at the Perlman Music Series and Chamber Music Live concerts in New York as well as for the Music for Food Foundation in Boston. This season Namirovsky will be recording together with the cellist Deborah Pae for the Outhere Label, and for Musiq3 Radio in Belgium. With the cellist Alexander Suleiman, Misha will be on tour of Asia with a very special series of performances and workshops titled Music, Magic and Maths. Other collaborations include prominent musicians Peter Wiley, Arnold Steinhardt, Michael Tree, Sarah Beaty, Amir Eldan, and Hye-Jin Kim.

A devoted teacher, Misha Namirovsky has received a deep and versatile musical training steeped in the illustrious Russian tradition of piano playing. Prof. Hung-Kuan Chen (professor in the Julliard school and former piano chair at the Shanghai Conservatory) called Mr. Namirovsky “a serious musician and excellent pianist: in addition he is a wonderful teacher with marvelous energy and awareness.” Former teachers Solomon Mikowsky, Sofia Poliak and Eliso Verssaladze (herself a student of Yakov Zak and Heinrich Neuhaus), and Hung-Kuan Chen have all played a crucial part in the pianist’s development. Other influences include Mitsuko Uchida, Alfred Brendel and Peter Weiley. Namirovsky regularly gives masterclasses in USA (Oberlin College, Northwestern University of Louisiana, Queens College, NY) Spain (Santander Conservatory,) and China. With a special collaboration with Steinway Pianos, Namirovsky will hold special masterclasses throughout China in the 2015-16 season. Namirovsky’s students have been accepted to Universities in the USA and participated in summer festivals in Europe (Gijon Piano Festival). Namirovsky holds degrees from the Manhattan School of Music and the Yale University and the Munich Musikhochschule. He completed his D.M.A at the New England Conservatory in Boston with a dissertation concentrating on the piano works of the British composer Frank Bridge. Namirovsky will present several lectures on the composer in the upcoming season.

 

This event is sponsored by Columbia University's Music Performance Program and is free and open to the public.