BENJAMIN BEILMAN, violinist - Young Concert Artistsyca.org/media/electronicpresskits/beilman_benjamin_EPK.pdf · — INDIANAPOLIS STAR “This is a huge, up-and-coming talent

“Beilman stunned the house with brilliant artistry, instantly joining [Music@Menlo] festival favorites ... His violin entered almost imperceptibly, with quiet, intimate singing of such beauty that can make listeners cry.”

— SAN FRANCISCO CLASSICAL VOICE

“Mr. Beilman’s handsome technique, burnished sound and quiet confidence showed why he has come so far so fast.”

— THE NEW YORK TIMES

“Beilman left no doubt that for all the polish and self-possession of his playing, he can tear off a chunk of virtuosity and hold it proudly aloft.”

— INDIANAPOLIS STAR

“This is a huge, up-and-coming talent. He is amazing—talk about a rising star.”

— JENNIFER HIGDON (Pulitzer Prize-winning Composer)

“It was a performance brimming with imaginative touches and exquisite control. The slow movement was pure poetry.”

— STRAD MAGAZINE

“Mr. Beilman played with prodigious technique, unusual colors, delicate whimsy and flashes of sensuality.”

— THE NEW YORK TIMES

“20-year old Benjamin Beilman made a striking impression. Beilman’s sound was characterful and he played with both eloquence and flair.”

— MUSICALAMERICA.COM

“From his first statement in the quarter finals, Beilman displayed the spark, passion and such assurance that distinguishes great artists.”

— LE DEVOIR (Montreal, QC)

“His concert at the Louvre will remain etched in our memory. This young American is nothing less than a great artist, who combines a talent of rare perfection with a deep, intense and moving sensibility.”

— LE MONDE

Photo: Benjamin Ealovega

YOUNG CONCERT ARTISTS, INC. 250 West 57 Street, Suite 1222 New York, NY 10107

T: (212) 307-6655 F: (212) 581-8894 [email protected] www.yca.org

2012 Avery Fisher Career Grant • 2012 London Music Masters Award

First Prize Winner, 2010 Young Concert Artists International Auditions

Buffalo Chamber Music Society Prize • Candlelight Concert Society Prize • Friends of Music Concerts Prize

2010 Philadelphia Musical Fund Society Career Advancement Award • Summis Auspiciis Prize

First Prize, 2010 Montréal International Musical Competition

Bronze Medalist, 2010 International Violin Competition of Indianapolis

First Prize, 2009 Schmidbauer and Corpus Christi International Competitions in Texas

BENJAMIN BEILMAN, violinist

BENJAMIN BEILMAN, violinist

Violinist Benjamin Beilman’s “handsome technique, burnished sound and quiet confidence showed why he has come so far so fast” (The New York Times). He is the recipient of the prestigious 2014 Borletti-Buitoni Trust Fellowship, a 2012 Avery Fisher Career Grant, and a 2012 London Music Masters Award. This season, he makes his Alice Tully Hall debut, performing the Sibelius Concerto with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s and Gerard Schwarz. He performs the Mendelssohn Concerto with the San Francisco Symphony, the Tchaikovsky Concerto with the Mobile Symphony, the Sibelius Concerto with the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Higdon Concerto with the Philadelphia Orchestra. He performs at South Mountain Concerts with David Finckel, Wu Han, and Paul Neubauer, and in duo recitals with pianist Andrew Tyson at Bay Chamber Concerts, the Tennessee Arts Academy, and Caramoor. Mr. Beilman appears with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center throughout the season in New York and on tour as a member of CMS Two. Abroad, Mr. Beilman has appeared as soloist with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Stanislaw Skrowaczewski, with the Tonhalle Orchester Zürich and Sir Neville Marriner, with l’Orchestre Métropolitain de Montréal and Yannick Nézet-Séguin, and with the Malaysian Philharmonic and Hans Graf. He has also appeared in recital internationally at the Louvre, Tonhalle Zürich, Wigmore Hall, Spannungen, and Festpiele Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. In the U.S., Mr. Beilman has performed in Carnegie Hall’s Stern Auditorium with the New York Youth Symphony, as well as with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, the Fort Worth Symphony, the Buffalo Philharmonic, the Indianapolis Chamber Orchestra, the Chicago Philharmonic, the Greenville Symphony, and the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. He made his Weill Recital Hall debut last season in a program that included the premiere of a new work by David Ludwig, commissioned for him by Carnegie Hall. Past recital appearances include University of Florida Performing Arts, the Washington Center for the Performing Arts, Ravinia’s Rising Stars Series, Philadelphia Chamber Music Society as recipient of Philadelphia’s 2010 Musical Career Award, the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, MusicFest Vancouver, and the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts.

An avid chamber musician, Mr. Beilman is a frequent guest artist at chamber music festivals including at Music@Menlo, Music from Angel Fire, and Chamber Music Northwest as well as at the Bridgehampton, Marlboro, Santa Fe, Seattle, and Sedona Chamber Music Festivals. Mr. Beilman collaborates abroad at the Kronberg Academy in Frankfurt, Spectrum Concerts Berlin, the Verbier Festival in Switzerland, and at the Young Concert Artists Festivals in Tokyo and Beijing.

In 2010, he won First Prize in the Young Concert Artists International Auditions and YCA’s Helen Armstrong Violin Fellowship. He performed acclaimed debut recitals in the Young Concert Artists Series in New York, sponsored by the Summis Auspiciis Prize, and in Washington, D.C. at the Kennedy Center.

As First Prize Winner of the 2010 Montréal International Musical Competition and winner of the People’s Choice Award, Mr. Beilman recorded Prokofiev’s complete sonatas for violin on the Analekta label in 2011. He won the Bronze Medal at the 2010 International Violin Competition of Indianapolis as well as prizes for the best Bach performance and Mozart sonata performance; First Prize in the 2009 Schmidbauer and Corpus Christi International Competitions in Texas, where he was also awarded the special Bach prize; and the Gold Medal at the Stulberg International String Competition. Mr. Beilman was a winner of Astral Artists’ 2009 National Auditions and the Milka/Astral Violin Prize. He was a 2007 Presidential Scholar in the Arts and recipient of a Gold Award in Music from the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts. He has been heard on NPR’s Performance Today and From the Top, WQXR’s McGraw-Hill Financial Young Artists Showcase, and WFMT’s Impromptu.

Mr. Beilman studied with Almita and Roland Vamos at the Music Institute of Chicago, Ida Kavafian and Pamela Frank at the Curtis Institute of Music, and Christian Tetzlaff at the Kronberg Academy.

[surname is pronounced: Bile-min] ______________________________________ NOTE: Please do not delete references to Young Concert Artists.

12/2014

BENJAMIN BEILMAN, violin

REPERTOIRE WITH ORCHESTRA BARBER Concerto for Violin, Op. 14 BARTÓK Concerto for Violin No. 2 BEETHOVEN Concerto for Violin in D major, Op. 61 Romance for Violin and Orchestra No. 1 in G major, Op. 40

Romance for Violin and Orchestra No. 2 in F major, Op. 50 BRAHMS Concerto for Violin in D major, Op. 77 BRUCH Concerto for Violin No. 1 in G minor, Op. 26 DVORAK Romance for Violin and Orchestra in F minor, Op. 11/B. 39 ELGAR Concerto for Violin in B minor, Op. 61 HAYDN Concerto for Violin No. 1 in C major, Hob. VIIa: 1 HIGDON Concerto for Violin and Orchestra LALO Symphonie Espagnole, Op. 21 LUTOSŁAWSKI Chain II Dialogue for Violin and Orchestra MENDELSSOHN Concerto for Violin, Piano and String Orchestra in D minor Concerto for Violin in E minor, Op. 64 MOZART Concerto for Violin No. 3 in G major, K. 216 Concerto for Violin No. 4 in D major, K. 218

Concerto for Violin No. 5 in A major, K. 219 "Turkish" Sinfonia Concertante for Violin and Viola

in E flat major, K. 364 (320d) PROKOFIEV Concerto for Violin No. 1 in D major, Op. 19

Concerto for Violin No. 2 in G minor, Op. 63 RAVEL Tzigane for Violin and Orchestra SAINT-SAËNS Introduction and Rondo capriccioso in A minor, Op. 28

Violin Concerto No. 3 in B minor, Op. 61 SARASATE Zigeunerweisen, Op. 20 SIBELIUS Concerto for Violin in D minor, Op. 47 TCHAIKOVSKY Valse-Scherzo, Op. 34 TCHAIKOVSKY Concerto for Violin in D major, Op. 35 VIVALDI Concerto for 2 Violins in A minor, Op. 3 No. 8, RV 522

Four Seasons

Benjamin Beilman, violinist

Young, but Willing to Take On a Challenge Anthony Tommasini | The New York Times | May 27, 2014

The gifted, hard-working and game musicians of the New York Youth Symphony have played some formidable scores over the years, even Mahler’s mighty Sixth Symphony. In some ways, though, Copland’s Symphony No. 3 is harder to pull off in performance than many pieces that may sound a lot more difficult.

Moment to moment, this 42-minute score is captivating. But in striving for symphonic breadth, Copland faltered at something for which he usually had flawless instincts: musical structure.

The New York Youth Symphony earned my special respect on Sunday afternoon for its cogent, shapely performance of Copland’s Third Symphony at Carnegie Hall, conducted by the ensemble’s dynamic music director, Joshua Gersen, in a program that concluded this essential orchestra’s 51st season. Mr. Gersen, over all, drew incisive, cohesive and colorful playing from the dedicated musicians, who range in age from 12 to 22.

Copland was commissioned to write this piece by Serge Koussevitzky, who gave the premiere with the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 1946. The Copland of the ballet score “Appalachian Spring,” which had had its premiere in 1944, is very evident in the musical language of the Third Symphony. But in writing an ambitious symphony for a major orchestra, Copland fell under the spell of Mahler and Shostakovich. At times, the symphony seems uncertain, padded or pumped up. The slow third movement, for example, is tender and wistful, with wide-spaced harmonies, plaintive melodic writing and episodes of restless agitation. Whether the music comes across as searching or meandering depends upon the performance.

This one had that movement seeming ruminative, yes, but deliberately so. The first movement, with its bold, jagged theme played in string proclamations with woodwind chorales and bursts of brass, was excellent. The scherzo-like second movement had incisive attack and rhythmic vitality. To open the final movement, Copland borrowed his own “Fanfare for the Common Man.” The brass flourishes in this well-known music are exposed, and these players bobbled a few moments. It didn’t matter. The stirring grandeur came through, and the playing of the expansive, episodic movement was confident and full of character.

This all-American program opened with Harrison Hollingsworth, the orchestra’s assistant conductor, leading a lively account of Bernstein’s “Candide” Overture. With Mr. Gersen conducting, the brilliant young violinist Benjamin Beilman was the excellent soloist in Barber’s ravishing, Neo-Romantic 1939 Violin Concerto. He brought dark chocolate sound and lyricism to his rhapsodic playing and compellingly dispatched the breathless, perpetual-motion finale.

NEWS from Young Concert Artists, Inc.

YOUNG CONCERT ARTISTS, INC. 250 West 57 Street, Suite 1222 New York, NY 10107, www.yca.org Telephone: (212) 307-6655 Fax: (212) 581-8894 [email protected]

New York Youth Symphony Benjamin Beilman, was part of this ensemble’s program at Carnegie Hall. (James Estrin/The New York Times)


A Romantic Evening Benjamin Beilman and Yekwon Sunwoo at Carnegie Hall Vivien Schweitzer | The New York Times | November 18, 2013

When David Ludwig wrote his “Swan Song” for violin

and piano, he wanted to evoke the ghosts of 19th-

century composers. He was particularly inspired

by Schubert’s Fantasy for Violin and Piano, which

opens with an elegiac melody over bustling piano

figurations. The title of Mr. Ludwig’s contemporary

reimagining refers to Schubert’s “Swan Song” cycle,

written shortly before Schubert died at 31.

The young violinist Benjamin Beilman and the pianist

Yekwon Sunwoo, frequent collaborators, proved

temperamentally well suited to the work’s virtuoso gestures.

Mr. Beilman, a passionate performer with a deep, rich tone, played the opening melody beautifully as it

unfolded over the enigmatic piano motifs. Written primarily in a neo-Romantic language, the engaging

work features contemporary interjections, like plucked piano strings. In one section, Mr. Beilman

played gossamer scales that scampered fleetingly over Messiaen-like chords in the piano. A dramatic

violin cadenza and exuberant piano flourishes were woven into the final section.

Romanticism was the theme of the evening, beginning with Stravinsky’s “Divertimento.” Mr. Beilman’s

bold sound and Mr. Sunwoo’s characterful playing were heard to fine effect throughout the work, a

four-movement concert suite from Stravinsky’s ballet “The Fairy’s Kiss.”

Mr. Beilman sounded in his element during Tchaikovsky’s Valse-Scherzo (Op. 34), nimbly mastering the

double stops and other bravura challenges.

The mood turned stormier during Brahms’s Violin Sonata No. 3 in D minor, given a passionate and

expressive performance, with the turbulent outbursts balanced with introspective poise by this youthful,

but musically mature duo.

They offered two encores: Brahms’s Hungarian Dance No. 7 and a sweet-toned rendition of Kreisler’s

“Liebesleid,” an ever-popular bonbon that seemed a fitting conclusion to a lyrical evening.


Benjamin Beilman at Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall

YOUNG CONCERT ARTISTS, INC. 250 West 57 Street, Suite 1222 New York, NY 10107, www.yca.org

Telephone: (212) 307-6655 Fax: (212) 581-8894 [email protected]

(Richard Perry/The New York Times)


Telephone: (212) 307-6655 Fax: (212) 581-8894 [email protected] www.yca.org


Review: Benjamin Beilman plays Mozart and Lutoslawski with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra Laurie Niles Violinist.com September 23, 2013

Violinist Benjamin Beilman opened the Los Angeles Chamber Orches-tra's 2013-2014 season on Saturday at the Ambassador Auditorium in Pasadena, Calif., with performances of Mozart's Violin Concerto No. 5 in A major and Lutoslawski's "Chain 2." Beilman put his own, thoroughly convincing mark on the Mozart, add-ing a few of his own cadenzas to the traditional ones by Joseph Joachim and tweaking many of the bowings, articulations and technical habits we violinists have collectively formed in the 200+ years since this piece was written. This concerto has one of the most simple and effective openings in all the violin literature: After a long orchestral introduction, the violin en-ters on its most friendly note, an "A," slowly tracing "A" major chord as if to say, "I am the most beautiful instrument ever, am I not?" Ben, with his Antonio Gagliano violin (made in 1790, just 15 years after this piece was written) had me in complete agreement on this. Then came a little surprise, a cadenza of his own making, which brought us straight into the Allegro Aperto, which he played with bounce and vitality. Again, the first-movement cadenza was his own, and quite spellbinding. The second movement unfolded like one long, beautiful silken thread; Beilman was so fully present with his sound, 100 percent of the time. Not one note seemed inadvertent or glossed over. The music of Mozart, even in slow second movements, seldom takes the listener into realm of desperate sadness -- Mozart always rescues us short of the abyss. But Ben milked all the poignancy possible from those few moments when the music peers over the edge. He used Joachim's cadenza here, with its clever syncopated double-stops. A Mozart violin concerto requires a small orchestra, and that orchestra often is formed by reducing the ranks of a larger orchestra. In this case, LACO already is a chamber orchestra, accustomed to behaving with the quick reflexes and smaller numbers inherent in that kind of group. Add Jeffrey Kahane's sensitive and adept conducting, and this allowed for a keen performance, with the orchestra responding with agility to the performer. The final movement had great energy and spirit of dance, and the famous switches between the proper Minuet and the snappy Turkish march were well-dramatized.


Photo by Christian Steiner




Interview with Ben Beilman: Mozart, Germany and Lessons from Tetzlaff

Laurie Niles Violinist.com September 18, 2013

It's the perfect Gateway Concerto for getting your friends and acquaintances hooked on classical music: Mozart Violin Concerto No. 5 in A major, K. 219, (“Turkish”).

Played by the dynamic young violinist Benjamin Beilman -- even better! I was pleased to learn that he will perform this very concerto this weekend, right in my current home town of Pasadena, with the wonderful Los An-geles Chamber Orchestra. (Concert info if you are in LA: it's 8 p.m. Saturday at the Ambassador Auditorium; then they'll repeat the concert on Sunday at UCLA’s Royce Hall.)

So far I've invited all my students and a few family members. I'm encouraging another friend to bring her elderly mom, and I'm hoping a few people will think about bringing their friend from work who has never at-tended a classical concert but kind of liked "Amadeus."

As for Ben Beilman, since we spoke to him about a year ago, he's been busy concertizing and also spend-ing much of his time in Germany, taking in the music there and studying with Christian Tetzlaff.

Ben, who received a 2012 Avery Fisher Career Grant and recorded the Prokofiev Complete Violin Sonatas last year, just completed a European tour with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and will give a recital at Carnegie Hall in No-vember. Ben spoke to me over the phone last week from Ham-burg about life after Curtis Institute, about playing Mozart after living in Germany, and about his Gagliano violin.

Laurie: What have you been up to over the last year since I spoke to you?

Ben: I've been splitting time in between living in Philadelphia and also in Frankfurt, both for concerts, but also last year I was studying with Christian Tetzlaff in Frankfurt. Whenever I could, I would fly over here for lessons.


Interview with...

Page 1 of 5

Photo by Maia Cabeza





Laurie: What made you want to study with Christian, and what has it been like? That sounds like a wonderful opportunity.

Ben: It's been truly extraordinary. Entering my final year at Cur-tis, I was looking at different options for continuing my study; I felt like I wasn't fully-formed as the musician that I wanted to become, and I needed a little bit more guidance. I looked at all the major music schools, especially on the East Coast -- a lot of Curtis kids go to NEC or Juilliard. But I had been intrigued by Chris-tian's playing for a long time, and I always thought to myself, I'd love to spend some time in Germany. Working with Christian seemed to be a great fit.

first came into contact with studying with him through the Kronberg Academy; they sponsor violin master classes every two years, in the summer, for about a week or nine days. About 150 violinists apply and end up coming to Kronberg, which is a tiny, quaint suburb of Frankfurt -- imagine gingerbread houses, it's nice. So I applied for those master classes, and once I arrived, I auditioned to hopefully study with Christian. I was accepted, and I ended up having three lessons during that master class session. I worked on some Bach, and I worked on the Sibelius concerto. I already felt very comfortable with the Sibelius, but it was amazing because he took a piece that I felt like I knew very, very well and he completely turned it on its head for me. He opened up completely different avenues and ways of thinking. His biggest theme is about sound, and imagination with sound. That was fascinating.

Based on those lessons, I decided I wanted to study with Christian, once I was done with Curtis. So I went through the whole audition process in Kronberg, and I was accepted. We worked together over the last year; I worked with him every six or seven weeks. When I'm in town I'll see him maybe three or four times in a very short amount of time, then I go off and do my things, and obviously he is touring constantly.

Laurie: I definitely know of him as a performer, but I really never had heard of him in the context of a teacher or mentor.

Ben: He has just a handful of students at Kronberg; I think his class size is usually about three students. There's a violinist from Berlin who also studies with him; her name is Hyeyoon Park, and then Itamar Zorman, the top prize-winner at the Tchaikovsky Competition in 2011, also studied with him this last year. So he keeps his class very very small because he has to focus on his own things. But he likes teaching.


Interview with...

(Continued)

Page 2 of 5

Ben Beilman with Christian Tetzlaff. Photo by Andreas Malkmus.





Laurie: Do you speak German, then?

Ben: I'm picking it up, little by little! I can order the food and drinks and say very minimal things -- I'm working on it. But I wouldn't say that I speak German.

Laurie: Tell me a little bit about what an American classical musician can learn, just being in Germany? Has it changed your perspective at all?

Ben: Absolutely. For me what was really fun, besides fantastic lessons with Christian, was just getting to know a completely different set of young musicians. In the United States, you grow up with the same musicians throughout your childhood. We go to things like Aspen Music Festival, or, I was an ENCORE kid when it was still around, or Perlman Music Program. Then you go to conservatory with them, and there's something wonderful about being familiar with all your classmates. But coming to a completely different continent, where you don't know those people, is also really cool. I've gotten to play alongside a whole different set of musicians and gotten to know great players that I just had absolutely no idea even existed.

Laurie: Does it give you any different perspective on the history behind the music? I've often thought it would be nice to spend some extended time in Europe, just because that's where a lot of this music started.

Ben: Attending concerts here, I'd say generally it's sort of the same demographic of people who attend the concerts, but there's a different esteem about it. You see more awareness about it around all the cities. It makes sense; for Germans especially, the cornerstone of their musical identity are these great composers that we know and love -- Beethoven, Bach, Brahms. We have Elvis. And of course, we have Gershwin and Bernstein, and those are fantastic, those are our American idols. But it's different if you have Beethoven and Brahms.

Laurie: I'm looking forward to your concerts in Los Angeles; you're performing Mozart Concerto No. 5. Let's talk a little bit about Mozart. What do you enjoy most about playing Mozart?

Ben: Coming back to especially this concerto, there's so much that I hear now through an operatic lens. People talk about it all the time, that with Mozart, everything was about the voice and singing. Somehow this time, it really clicked for me. I've had the opportunity to see a lot of operas in Germany, and I hear a lot of these gestures that he wrote in his violin concertos and his string quartets -- gestures which are absolutely for the voice. And so I guess it's been about diction and syntax for me this time around, in the concerto.

Laurie: Do you have a favorite Mozart Concerto, of his five violin concertos?

Ben: I see his five concertos as a sort of progression. There's so much merit in each one, and it's just impossible to say that one is better than the next. But to me, it feels like the fifth concerto is maybe the most concise in his ideas, and what he wants to say. It's almost more varied than some of the other ones, and that's what I enjoy about it.


Interview with...

(Continued)

Page 3 of 5





Laurie: It seems like you're getting into a routine of traveling and soloing -- do you have any more perspective about it, as far as what this lifestyle is like? People study to be a soloist, but sometimes I wonder if they know what they're signing up for! Any advise for your younger colleagues?

Ben: I have noticed, especially in this last year since graduating from Curtis and being on the road more, that you need to know so much about your own personal limits. You have to make sure that you have a very, very good balance of certain cornerstone ideas: places of refuge and resilience that are completely separate from music. You have to make more of an effort to stay in touch with your family and friends, obviously, when you're traveling a lot.

Also, for a long time, I was getting really stressed about things and I didn't understand what was going on -- then I realized that I needed to go running a lot. So running is another source of refuge and stress reduction for me. Once you're traveling a lot, it's almost less about the actual performances and onstage time as it is about under-standing how to feel sated and fulfilled outside of that.

Laurie: Keeping a balance.

Ben: Absolutely. Even something as simple as a time change; a lot of it is knowing exactly how quickly your body can adjust, or what things you can do to help move that along. You need to know which flight to take, what time you're going to get in, how much sleep you can get on the plane, how much sleep you allow yourself the first night, the second night. It sounds boring and tedious, but it makes a huge difference, if you know how to plan that.

Laurie: Have you ever had a situation where you felt like, "Oh, man, I shouldn't have taken the red-eye…"

Ben: (he laughs) No -- I will say, though, the first time I went to Asia… I had a concert in Kuala Lumpur with the Malaysian Philharmonic, and during that trip, I was there for a grand total of maybe four and a half or five days. In terms of travel time, you're close to that anyway; you're at three days, just getting there and getting back. That was one time when I realized that I needed to learn how to get into a system very quickly. I couldn't sleep, and then I slept too much -- it was tough.

Some great advice that I've gotten from of my mentors in the past year is: You need to plan, months and years ahead of time, a complete break from the instrument. Christian says he takes a total of four or five weeks off a year. He'll usually space it out -- two during the holidays, maybe two in the summer and a week somewhere else. His whole mantra is that you have to know how to plan that for yourself, and you need to take the time and resist the temptation to accept a concert offer if it comes in during your vacation time. If they truly want you to come and play with them, or to play in recital, they can wait a year or two.


Interview with...

(Continued)

Page 4 of 5





Laurie: What violin are you playing these days?

Ben: I'm playing an Antonio Gagliano from 1790. I've played it for almost six years, and fortunately, it's mine. I'm paying it off, essentially, but it's mine, nobody can take it away. I'm very, very happy with it.

Laurie: That's a big achievement, if you actually have your own instrument. How did you find it?

Ben: I bought it from Robertson and Sons in Albuquerque. I looked in all the major shops on the East Coast, in Chicago and various places. Ida Kavafian was the one who knew the Robertson's shop; she said, "Hey, since you haven't found anything, let me call my friend Aaron and see if he has anything." So they actually shipped me two instruments: one was a Vuillaume, and the other was this instrument. When you opened up the box, it looked like it was bomb-proofed, I mean they had packaged it so tightly and so perfectly! It's weird to think about an instrument of that value going through FedEx, but they made it work.

And so I played the Vuillaume, and I thought, "Oh man, this is the one, this is great!" I almost didn't even want to try the Gagliano, but after a couple days I said, "Okay, just to confirm that the Vuillaume is the one, I'll try the Gagliano." And I tried the Gagliano and -- Okay, hands down, the Gagliano was the one!

Laurie: Before that, had you had experience playing on fine instruments?

Ben: Yes, fortunately, I'd had the use of a Carlos Tononi for about a year and a half before that; I played a Storioni, I tried a couple Strads and del Gesus in shops but never for an extended period. But I did have some long-term use of a nice instrument.

Laurie: I'm glad you have your own instrument; so many people get it taken out from under them and it's just awful to hear about.

Ben: Besides the idea of having something that you're so close to taken away from you, you also have to then spend however many weeks or months trying to readjust to a new one. So you're completely losing time, every time you borrow a new instrument.

Laurie: Does your instrument adjust okay when you travel?

Ben: Yes, I used to be so finicky with adjustments, and if something sounded a little different the next day, I would freak out and I'd think I needed to take it into the shop. But an attitude that I try to take these days comes from the violistPaul Neubauer, who famously says, "Oh, I don't believe in that stuff; that's just nonsense. An instrument sounds the way that it sounds." I think it's good to sort of trick yourself and think that there's nothing to worry about!


Interview with...

(Continued)

Page 5 of 5




Musica Viva Festival (Beilman, Bezaly, Pacifica Quartet) Clive Paget Limelight Magazine (Australia) April 6, 2013

Benjamin Beilman dazzles in Brahms and Sharon Bezaly sparkles in Prokofiev while the

Pacifica Quartet shine their light on Shostakovich.

This year’s (all too brief) Musica Viva Festival sports quite a line-up. A combination of fine

Australian talent with some outstanding international chamber players, several of whom are

making their Australian debuts. And if this evening’s concert was a fair representation of what’s in

store, there are some highly recommendable gigs coming up over the next few days.

The first half featured the 3 Bs – that’s right, Beethoven, Brahms and…er, Butterworth – and if it

proved to be only modified rapture, it built to a suitable climax. The first half definitely came to a

head with a remarkable Australian debut from 23-year-old violinist Benjamin Beilman in Brahms’

most reflective sonata, No 3 in D Minor. Masterfully accompanied by Ian Munro, Beilman gave a

passionate, romantic account using a tonal palette of which many an older player would be

envious. His highly effective use of a low vibrato piano in the first movement was haunting and the

slow movement with its almost (Richard) Straussian whiff of Viennese nostalgia was rapturous.

After a suitably spectral third movement he pulled out all the stops to give us a blazing, demonic

reading of the finale.

Beilman plays more Brahms later in the festival. If you are thinking of going, my advice would be

not to hesitate.


Benjamin Beilman: Catch him while you can




Saying Hello With Youthful Exuberance Benjamin Beilman and Yekwon Sunwoo at Merkin Concert Hall Steve Smith The New York Times March 13, 2012

For two young musicians out to make a lasting first impression, it would be hard to pick a more appro-priate selection of pieces than those chosen by the violinist Benjamin Beilman and the pianist Yekwon Sunwoo on Monday evening at Merkin Concert Hall.

The event, presented by Young Concert Artists, included three works by young men striving for effect beyond their years, as well as two pieces by composers in their twilight, recalling youthful pleasures.

The concert nominally belonged to Mr. Beilman, who at 21 has accumulated an impressive tally of awards: in 2010 alone, a bronze medal at the International Violin Competition of Indianapolis; first prize at the Montreal International Musical Competition; and three individual performance prizes as a winner of the Young Concert Artists International Auditions.

Mr. Beilman’s handsome technique, burnished sound and quiet confidence in Mozart’s Sonata in E flat (K. 302) showed why he has come so far so fast. But Mr. Sunwoo, who initially connected with Mr. Beil-man at the Curtis Institute in Philadelphia, was no mere supporting player. His playing was crisp and effervescent, with crystalline trills; in a work that demanded parity, he was an ideal foil.

Richard Strauss’s comparably youthful Sonata in E flat (Op. 18)suggests in its heated first movement the furrowed brow (and moist palms) of a novice striving to make a big splash: a quality aptly conveyed by Mr. Beilman’s sweeping bravura and Mr. Sunwoo’s grand responses. A chaste, muted middle move-ment gives way to a boisterous finale, in which the Strauss of the symphonic poems bounds forth in he-raldic dotted rhythms.

Chris Rogerson, at 23 a composer in residence with Young Concert Artists, based his “Once” on the pro-logue to “The Long Goodbye,” Meghan O’Rourke’s memoir recounting her grief over the death of her mother. Airy, soft-spoken ruminations are limned with ominous clouds, wrong-note pangs and themes abruptly cut short; in the finale Mr. Rogerson deftly evokes flickering fireflies and children scampering to catch them. Heard in its New York premiere, the work was sympathetically played and warmly re-ceived.

Unaccompanied, and playing from memory with vigor and unfussy precision, Mr. Beilman brought out rusticity and nostalgia in Prokofiev’s imaginative late Sonata for Solo Violin. Rejoined by Mr. Sunwoo, he closed the concert with another autumnal work, Kreisler’s sumptuous “Viennese Rhapsodic Fanta-sietta,” providing an affectionate account of Kreisler’s “Liebeslied” as an encore after a robust, pro-longed ovation.


Review of Merkin Hall Debut in the Young Concert Artists Series

Ruby Washington, The New York Times




Review: Violin-Piano Duo’s Rapport Shines Through Jay Harvey Indy Star February 21, 2012

When he was just 20, Benjamin Beilman earned his place among the laureates in the International Violin Competition of Indianapolis with some unhackneyed repertoire choices and fresh interpretive ideas, elegantly presented.

Since September 2010, when he was the highest-placing American -- winning the bronze medal -- Beil-man has continued to add distinction to his burgeoning career. Tuesday night, the IVCI presented him, with pianist Yekwon Sunwoo, in its Laureate Series at the Glick Indiana History Center.

The violinist, now 22, has matured, his playing having gained in technical luster and expressive variety. His one unaccompanied turn at this recital -- Prokofiev's Sonata for Solo Violin in D major, op. 115 -- though not a profound piece, displayed an engaging personality. His unfailing zestfulness avoided su-perficiality: In the theme-and-variations second movement, for instance, the sudden depth of the minor variation was dispatched with a sly wink.

He was well partnered in the rest of the program by Sunwoo, a fellow student at Philadelphia's Curtis Institute. Richard Strauss' remarkably prescient Sonata in E-flat major, op. 18, found the duo exulting in their superb rapport. Sunwoo's subtle pedaling in the second movement matched Beilman's muted playing. His playing was vivid and extroverted in the outer movements, with a rhythmic acuity that gave extra bounce to the violinist's lively phrasing.

Sunwoo and Beilman never settled for offering smooth accounts of the music. They made a miniature drama out of Mozart's Sonata in E minor, K. 304, with the pianist's initial phrases having a stage-setting quality before the duo launched the first movement's narrative arc. The second movement, marked "Tempo di menuetto," was reflective and somewhat shadowy -- at some remove from its dance origins, but still quite convincing.

Clara Schumann's Three Romances for Violin and Piano, op. 22, offered a rare chance to appreciate the compositional gifts of Robert Schumann's wife. Modest in their expressive scope, the pieces carry an indelible charm that Beilman and Sunwoo outlined expertly.

For the conventional bravura finish, the pair offered Jeno Hubay's "Fantasie Brillante" on themes from Bizet's "Carmen." Those irresistible tunes were treated to a wealth of sumptuous display, emphasizing the violin. Beilman left no doubt that for all the polish and self-possession of his playing, he can tear off a chunk of virtuosity and hold it proudly aloft.


Review of International Violin Competition of Indianapolis Laureate Series




Young Musicians Shine at Terrace Theater Recital Joe Banno The Washington Post February 17, 2012

It seems like every third review you read these days is remarking on yet another pro-digiously talented violinist who’s appeared on the classical music scene. Thursday’s Young Concert Artists Series recital at the Terrace Theatre introduced a local audience to the latest in this spawn of violin phenoms, the 21-year-old Benjamin Beilman, whose sweet, warm, slightly throaty tone gave considerable pleasure in sonatas by Mozart and Richard Strauss. The illusion of tossed-off ease Beilman created in Prokofiev’s daunting Op 115 Sonata for Violin Solo was mightily impressive — why isn’t this en-thralling work programmed more often? — and he found just the right balance of vir-tuosity, elegance and schmaltz in a pair of Fritz Kreisler bonbons.

But Beilman wasn’t the only young artist to shine Thursday. The superlative, 22-year-old pianist, Yekwon Sunwoo, made just as strong an impression as his string-playing partner. Indeed, such was the wisdom in his animated, light-filled playing of the key-board parts in the Mozart and Strauss sonatas that it was hard to draw one’s attention away from the piano.

And, at the ripe old age of 23, composer Chris Rogerson premiered his piece, “once”, inspired by Meghan O’Rourke’s memoir,“The Long Goodbye.” Evincing the open-chorded, prairie serenity of Copland, and spiced with angular intrusions of rapid-fire, upper-harmonic figures in the violin writing, the work — in a reading of tremendous heart and technical control from Beilman and Sunwoo — revealed a confident, fully-grown composing talent.


Review of Kennedy Center Debut in the Young Concert Artists Series




Review: Packed ABT Crowd Roars Approval for Vivaldi and Soloist Benjamin Beilman Jaci Webb The Billings Gazette November 12, 2011

It would have been enough if violinist Benjamin Beilman finished Saturday night with the audience sighing over the final strains of Antonio Vivaldi's "Four Seasons" at the Alberta Bair Theater.

But he didn't.

The standing ovation at the close of his performance, punctuated with whistling and shouting from the packed ABT crowd, may have encouraged him, but Beilman probably would have played an encore anyway.

With flushed cheeks and a steady hand on the bow, Beilman sailed into a Bach solo piece for an encore, dipping and weaving as if he were dancing with his violin.

At 21, Beilman is fun to watch and hear as he moves from the most delicate of touches to the boldest rake across the same strings a millisecond later.

The BSO has never performed all four movements of Vivaldi's "Four Seasons," nor has it devoted an entire concert to the strings, according to conductor and music director Anne Harrigan. The stripped-down orchestra accomplished both Saturday night, and the crowd roared back with its approval.

The concert started off with Gerald Finzi's subtle "Eclogue," another first for the BSO.

At first glimpse at the sparse group of instrumentalists on the stage, somewhere around 20, it felt like the concert would lack the depth of the full orchestra, which usually comes in at 80 musicians. One bass player and three cellists joined the violin and viola sections on stage.

But the players proved their worth long before the two-hour concert concluded.

The four movements of Ernest Bloch's "Concerto Grosso No. 1" added some jazz flavor to the evening. As the second piece on the program, the Bloch work was lovely and sentimental one minute and moody and heavy the next.

BSO keyboardist Lee Hancock honored both the Bloch and Finzi works with a fine touch at the piano.


Review of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons with the Billings Symphony




A Performance for from Rote Joseph Dalton Times Union (Albany, NY) October 3, 2011

"Great Music, Right Here" is the apt motto of the Glens Falls Symphony. Since the orchestra and its mu-sic director Charles Peltz regularly venture into contemporary music, "Right Now" might be an appro-priate tag.

Sunday afternoon's program featured something far better than a risky premiere. Instead, it was Jennifer Higdon's Violin Concerto, which was written in 2009 and received the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Music. That award doesn't always mean enduring quality but Higdon's concerto has got the stuff.

One of today's most widely performed composers, Higdon writes in the current style that might be dubbed post-ugly. The concerto, like most of her music, is lively, fluent and engaging, but also extraor-dinarily demanding on the players, both soloist and orchestra alike.

It was written for and recorded by star virtuoso Hilary Hahn, a former student of Higdon's at the Curtis Institute. Sunday's soloist was another Curtis student, 21-year old Benjamin Beilman. He's the first per-former to take up the work after Hahn and this was his debut in the piece. He delivered with distinction and flair.

The first movement's cadenza is a genuine tour de force, with a pilling up of themes and showy devices. Higdon, who spoke before the piece, said she wondered if it was actually playable but Beilman tackled it with ease and confidence.

After a stretch of romantic relaxation in the central movement, based on the form of the chaconne, comes the finale, which Higdon likened to a violin in a race at the Olympics. The hurdles on the track were the colorful explosions from the orchestra. The Glens Falls players shined in the numerous brief solos.

Beilman's encore, from Prokofiev's Sonata, revealed one of his gifts that was largely missing from the hyperactive concerto, a warm radiant tone.


Review of the Jennifer Higdon Violin Concerto

with the Glens Falls Symphony




Christopher Huss Le Devoir June 3, 2011


Review: CD of Prokofiev Sonatas released by Analekta (2011)

By recording this album of last year’s winner of Mont-real International Musical Compeition, Analekta now has 2 of the greatest Prokofiev recordings. Be-fore Beilman, in 1999 Carl Talbot had recorded James Ehnes at Domaine Forget. As per usual now, he places the microphones even closer to Beilman … The 18-year-old violinist miraculously stands out in this recording, with class. Accurate without any mis-takes, impeccable charac-terization, sharper accents than Ehnes: he demon-strates more than ever that he is walking in the foot-steps of the great masters.




Violinist.com Interview with Benjamin Beilman Laura Niles Violinist.com August 23, 2012

Here's a performer who brings a sense of assurance and enjoyment to his audience, not to mention mas-terful playing -- that was what I thought when I first heard Benjamin Beilman perform live during the 2010 International Violin Competition of Indianapolis.

Just three months before that performance, Benjamin Beilman had won first prize at the Montreal Inter-national Music Competition, and he won the Bronze Medal at Indianapolis. Two years later, Beilman, 22, has graduated from Curtis Institute and also received a 2012 Avery Fisher Career Grant and a 2012 London Music Masters Award.

This fall, Benjamin has a busy season with performance engagements all over the world: a recital Sep-

tember 7 in Cold Spring Harbor, NY; a performance of the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto Sept. 14 in

Switzerland with conductor Sir Neville Marriner and the Zurich Tonhalle Orchestra; a performance at

New York’s Alice Tully Hall on Sept. 24, playing Kodály's Serenade for 2 Violins and Viola, Op. 12, with

violinist Ani Kavafian and violist Paul Neubauer; and on Oct. 20, his Wigmore Hall debut, a recital with

pianist Yekwon Sunwoo, as part of his London Music Masters Award.

Benjamin spoke to me over the phone from Philadelphia last month about how he juggled long-distance

violin studies with the Vamoses at the Music Institute of Chicago during high school, about his time at

Curtis Institute, about coping with the rigors of the competition circuit, and about being one of the first

violinists after Hilary Hahn to play the Pulitzer Prize-winning 2008 Violin Concerto by composer Jenni-

fer Higdon.

Laurie: How did you get your start, playing the violin?

Ben: I first started playing violin in Houston, with a Suzuki teacher. My sister, who is two years older

than me, had started violin when she was five, so by the time I was five I wanted to play as well.

Shortly after I started taking lessons, we moved to Atlanta, and I studied with a former Atlanta Sym-

phony player. We lived there for five years, then when I was ten, we moved to Chicago. A lot of moves!

Three years later we moved up to Ann Arbor (Michigan), where I went to high school.


Page 1 of 5

Interview with...




Violinist.com Interview with Benjamin Beilman

While living in Ann Arbor, I was actually studying with Almita and Roland Vamos in Chicago. My dad

and I would leave after school on Friday -- it takes about four and a half hours to get from Ann Arbor to

Chicago. We'd get there in time for the performance class Friday evening. The performances classes are

kind of legendary for running until two or three in the morning. Then I'd have lessons all day on Satur-

day; I'd play in the little string orchestra that the Vamoses had assembled, and then Saturday night my

dad and I would drive back to Ann Arbor and spend the rest of the weekend there.

Laurie: That's dedication! So, you studied with the "Vami" -- I understand that they often work together

with a student.

Ben: Usually, yes. They like teaching in tandem, especially in their pre-college unofficial program. Typi-

cally, Mr. Vamos really focuses on technical aspects: etudes, Sevcik, Paganini Caprices, Locatelli, Dont --

all those kind of things. Mrs. Vamos usually hears the standard repertoire pieces.

Laurie: What a nice combination.

Ben: It's amazing. The foundation that Mr. Vamos gave us is pretty incredible; I still rely on that so

much. He would supplement a lot of those etude books with his own practices, and he'd take it to the

next level. Both of them had such an appreciation that was infectious, for playing from the heart. Mrs.

Vamos could always talk about scores and what's going on in the orchestra, but a lot of times it was: 'It

just doesn't sound genuine, I need you to play more honestly, without trying to do something, just make

it happen.'

I graduated high school a year early because I was so eager to start at Curtis. I had originally wanted to

audition at Curtis a year earlier, after my sophomore year of high school. But my mom wisely, wisely

put her foot down and said, 'No. You should have as much time being a normal kid as possible, and

then when you go to Curtis you can use all that time to focus on music.' You don't want to have a couple

years of high school (requirements) lingering, because then it's just going to complicate things. So I went

to Curtis when I was 17, and I studied primarily with Ida Kavafian for the first four years.

Curtis allows, and almost encourages, students to stay a fifth year during the Bachelor's program. There

are so many opportunities at Curtis to take advantage of that it's hard to do that in four years. So in my

fifth year at Curtis, I added Pam Frank as a teacher. Curtis also encourages that kind of sharing of stu-

dents.


Page 2 of 5

Interview with...





Even before I officially started studying privately with Pam, I worked a lot with her in chamber music,

on sonatas -- So I had worked with both of them for a long time.

Laurie: You have done a lot of competitions, and I was curious about what you've learned from that

process -- about preparation, about performance, about yourself. They seem very grueling!

Ben: They can be -- especially the bigger ones that I most recently have competed in, the Montreal and

Indianapolis Competitions. Those are the only ones of that magnitude that I've done, on the interna-

tional circuit.

Before that, I was doing a lot of national competitions. Those are still very high pressure, but not as gru-

eling as a two-week-long competition. In general, you learn to accept that it may not be your day, at all

times. You have to focus on what you're getting out of the competition, regardless of the winners. My

teachers really emphasized the idea that a competition is for you to get a lot out of just practicing for it.

You have that deadline, you have that big date marked off on your calendar. You know that by that

date, you need to have a huge list of repertoire -- the Brahms Concerto, Bach's B minor Partita, Ravel

Sonata, whatever it is -- ready to go.

In my early years, the main thing I got out of competitions was just having to balance a lot of pieces at once like that. But in the bigger competitions, Indianapolis in particular, I remember thinking, even before the final round came: How am I going to do this? I am just so tired, I feel like I've given it my all. Even though you only play three or four rounds, it feels like every day you are competing. You are always in the competition mindset. You have very limited time with the pianist so you al-ways have to be on for that, you have to be ready for the meetings with the conductors or with the orchestra -- you're constantly going at 120 percent. And that's going for 17 days, in some cases.

Laurie: That's a long time to sustain that.

Ben: Exactly.

Laurie: You must feel like a completely wrung-out towel by then. But I suppose it prepares you for the life of a soloist.


Page 3 of 5

Interview with...





Ben: Absolutely. Looking back, everything else after that will seem that much easier. When you have to

go play Bruch Concerto and then play Sibelius and Brahms in a two weeks' span of time, you think,

okay, I've done this before, this isn't my first time.

Laurie: I think it's really neat you have this musical relationship with your Curtis colleague Chriso

Rogerson, and I wondered if you could tell me how that started and how you've worked together with

this composer.

Ben: We first met at a workshop sponsored by the National Foundation for Advancement of the Arts,

called Young Arts. They hold this weeklong seminar for artists of all disciplines who are seniors in high

school. They have writers, they have dancers, they have singers both classical and popular, instrumen-

talists, jazz….they have all arts included. It's sort of a competition, but more than anything, it's sup-

posed to introduce you to all these different disciplines. Chris and I met there, obviously he was a com-

poser and I was a violinist there. Then when I came to Curtis, he had been a student there for two years

before me. So we started hanging out a lot and became friends.

The first time I played his music was about three years ago. Curtis has this program called Curtis on Tour. They send students alongside faculty members around the United States or sometimes around Europe, just to get that valuable experience of doing the whole touring process. For that tour, they commissioned two student composers, and I was selected to play Chris's piece, a violin and piano piece called 'Lullaby, No Bad Dreams.' I very quickly took to his musical language and general approach, and it was something I really en-joyed working on and playing for eight or nine performances. Then, serendipitously, both of us joined the Young Concert Artists roster -- he joined about a year before me. I talked with my manag-ers there and asked if they'd be willing to help me commission Chris for a violin sonata to play for all of these very important debuts that I had coming up last year, at the Kennedy Center, in New York and just around the country. They went for it, and so he and I got to work together again. He's a close friend. He's a Michigan football fan, so we'd watch football games together outside of music, we'd hang out, we'd go to parties together. So it was kind of the best of all worlds. One of the best things for me about commissioning a piece is how much influence you can have on it. Obviously, you're not dictating everything, but you can give the composer ideas. For example, let's say you have a Schumann sonata or something on the program that's very dark: you can suggest writing a piece that would contrast that, or maybe a series of little vignette pieces that are lighter in character. Or, you can say, 'I want you to listen to the way Debussy treats violin and piano in the Debussy Sonata, because I like that idea.' It's cool, helping to frame these new pieces.


Page 4 of 5

Interview with...





Laurie: I understand that you recently performed the violin concerto by Jennifer Higdon with the South

Dakota and Glens Falls symphonies. That concerto is a pretty new baby isn't it? Isn't that the concerto

that Hilary Hahn commissioned?

Ben: Exactly. That was a really cool process. Hilary commissioned Jennifer, with the help of the Balti-

more, Indianapolis and Toronto symphony orchestras. The piece was written for Hilary, and Jennifer

had Hilary' playing style and technique in mind. The piece was originally workshopped with the Curtis

Orchestra, so that both Hilary and Jennifer could hear what it sounded like, how things fit, how things

were balanced. At the time, I was sitting in the first violin section of the Curtis Orchestra, experiencing

all this. I had no idea that I would eventually be playing the piece as well! It was fascinating to see the

logic and the whole process of a soloist going about the question of: How do I make a piece perfect, for

myself? For example, I got to see, in the second movement, how Hilary didn't like how some of the

trombones were balanced, and so some of those things were edited out. Some things were added in, as

well. I also was in the orchestra when Hilary performed it with the Curtis Orchestra at Carnegie.

After that, I started working on it with Jennifer, so I got to see up close, how Hilary maneuvered around

these things. Just as a little side note: Jennifer would send Hilary drafts of the movements and I guess it

was three or four times, Hilary sent it back saying, 'No, this needs to be harder. Make it harder, make it

harder.' So you could imagine, if someone like Hilary is asking for something to be more technically

challenging, it's going to be impossible to play!

Laurie: And so was it?

Ben: Sometimes, yes! Again, Hilary was so nice. She gave me her personal fingerings and recordings, so

I had kind of a leg up on tackling the piece.

Laurie: Did you meet with her in person or anything?

Ben: I did, I asked her about a couple of fingerings and sections, and she also gave me really great advice about how to prepare it with the orchestra: certain things to focus on at each rehearsal. You have three full rehearsals with the orchestra, and the first time you meet with them, you don't do any rubato obviously, you just get it so they can feel the rhythms out, feel the pacing, and just kind of how to work with the orchestra, which obviously she is so skilled at. So it was great. I couldn't have gotten it from any better source. I had private sessions with Jennifer as well, so I had all I could possibly get.


Page 5 of 5

Interview with...

Documents

BENJAMIN BEILMAN, violinist - Young Concert Artistsyca.org/media/electronicpresskits/beilman_benjamin_EPK.pdf · — INDIANAPOLIS STAR “This is a huge, up-and-coming talent