| Instrumentalist - Violin
Ida Kavafian enjoys an international reputation as one of the most versatile musicians performing today. With a repertoire as diverse as her talents, Ms. Kavafian has electrified recital stages throughout North America, the Far East and Europe. She has also appeared as soloist with leading orchestras both nationally and internationally. For twenty years, Ida Kavafian has been the artistic director of the highly successful festival, Music from Angel Fire in NM. She also founded and guided Bravo!Colorado, in Vail, as music director for ten years, building it into one of the leading festivals in the country. As an educator, she is on the faculty of the Curtis Institute, and has served on numerous competition juries and boards, including Chamber Music America.
Ms. Kavafian's commitment to contemporary music has led to many world premieres by composers as varied as Toru Takemitsu, who wrote a concerto for her, and jazz greats Chick Corea and Wynton Marsalis, with both of whom she has toured and recorded. In May 2003 Ms. Kavafian performed the world premiere of Michael Daugherty's concerto, Fire and Blood with the Detroit Symphony under the direction of Neeme Jarvi. Since then she has performed this work in Carnegie Hall with the American Composers' Orchestra and with the National Symphony of Mexico in Mexico City. Other recent season highlights include her three recital series at Lincoln Center (and on tour) featuring the complete violin and piano music of Stravinsky, along with sonatas of Bach, and contemporary premieres.
Ms. Kavafian's 2006-07 season finds her performing as violin soloist with the symphony orchestras of New Mexico, Midland (Michigan), Chattanooga and with Florida West Coast Symphony as violist in Mozart's Sinfonia Concertante with Ani Kavafian. She is also a guest artist in several performances with the Orion String Quartet of Mozart's String Quintet and makes numerous appearances through the season with Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.
In the 2005-06 season she performed Fire and Blood with the Interlochen Arts Academy Orchestra, where she spent much of her musical youth and recently received the coveted Alumni Award. She also toured the Daugherty work with the Interlochen Orchestra, performing in Chicago, Cleveland and Detroit. She appeared as soloist with the Puerto Rico Symphony in the opening concert of their 2005-06 season, and was featured in the World Premiere of a new work for solo violin, winds and percussion by Daugherty for Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center in the spring of 2006.
Ms. Kavafian is an extremely active chamber musician. Since her founding membership in the innovative group TASHI over thirty years ago, Ms. Kavafian's chamber music appearances have included many renowned festivals and series throughout the world. She has toured and recorded as violist with the Guarneri String Quartet and is an active participant with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, of which she is an Artist Member. She and her sister, Ani, continue to perform together regularly in recital and with major orchestras. Their television credits together include features on CBS Sunday Morning and NBC's Today Show, and they have recorded for Nonesuch. Ms. Kavafian has also appeared in a solo feature on CBS Sunday Morning.
Ms. Kavafian was the violinist of the legendary Beaux Arts Trio for six years. Some of their honors during her tenure included being named "Ensemble of the Year" by Musical America for 1997 and a 1998 Grammy nomination. She has formed a new exciting ensemble, called Opus One, along with pianist Anne-Marie McDermott, violist Steven Tenenbom and cellist Peter Wiley. Opus One premiered a new work by George Tsontakis in the 2005-06 season. She is a frequent guest artist with ensembles such as the Orion, American and Shanghai String Quartets.
Ms. Kavafian made her New York debut at the 92nd Street Y with pianist Peter Serkin as a winner of the Young Concert Artists International Auditions. She was a recipient of the coveted Avery Fisher Career Grant in 1988. Her violin is a J.B. Guadagnini, made in Milan in 1751, and her viola was made in 1987 by Peter and Wendela Moes.
Born in Istanbul, Turkey of Armenian descent, Ms. Kavafian's family immigrated to the United States when she was three, settling in Detroit. She began her studies at age six with Ara Zerounian, continuing with Mischa Mischakoff, and ultimately earned her Master of Music degree with honors from the Juilliard School, where she was a student of Oscar Shumsky.
Ms. Kavafian resides in Connecticut and Philadelphia where she and her husband, violist Steven Tenenbom can be found passionately pursuing their hobby of breeding, training and showing prize winning champion Hungarian Vizsla dogs under the kennel name, "Opus One Vizslas." Even in this field, Ms. Kavafian has enjoyed great success, having bred, trained and owned the Number One Vizsla All Systems in the U.S. for the year 2003.
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IDA KAVAFIAN
