Ilya Gringolts

One can hardly play the violin more expressively and uncompromisingly than Gringolts. (Süddeutsche Zeitung)

The Russian violinist Ilya Gringolts wins over audiences with his extremely virtuosic playing and sensitive interpretations, and is always looking for new musical challenges. As a sought-after soloist, he devotes himself to the great orchestral repertoire but also to contemporary and seldom-played works. He has premiered compositions by Peter Maxwell Davies, Augusta Read Thomas, Christophe Bertrand and Michael Jarrell. In addition, he is interested in historical performance practice and collaborates with ensembles such as the Finnish Baroque Orchestra or Arcangelo.

Ilya Gringolts has performed with leading orchestras around the world such as the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, St. Petersburg Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic, NHK Symphony, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, and both orchestras of the SWR (Southwest German Radio). Recent highlights included projects with the Bavarian Radio Symphony, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, Bamberg Symphony Orchestra as well as Taipei Symphony Orchestra and Singapore Symphony Orchestra.

After solo and duo appearances at the Verbier and MiTo Festivals, Ilya Gringolts starts the 2018/19 season far away from his adopted home of Switzerland: with the Hong Kong Sinfonietta he gives the Asian premiere of Michael Jarrell’s Violin Concerto and leads Locatelli’s Violin Concerto Il labirinto armonico from the soloist position, and then gives a play-conduct programme of works by Paganini, Vivaldi, Bach and Bartók with the Australian Chamber Orchestra on tour to the five largest Australian cities. This season he has also been invited to perform with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Hamburg Symphony Orchestra, Orquestra Sinfónica de Galicia and Berner Symphonieorchester as well as the Munich Chamber Orchestra and Uppsala Chamber Orchestra, performing works including world premieres by Albert Schnelzer and Nicolaus Richter de Vroe.

Ilya Gringolts is also first violinist of the Gringolts Quartet, which he founded in 2008 and which has enjoyed great success at the Salzburg Festival, Lucerne Festival, Menuhin Festival Gstaad, Edinburgh Festival and Teatro La Fenice in Venice among others. This season the quartet will make its debut at the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Philharmonie Luxembourg, Elbphilharmonie Hamburg and at the Dortmund Konzerthaus. An in-demand chamber musician, Ilya Gringolts collaborates with artists such as Yuri Bashmet, David Kadouch, Itamar Golan, Peter Laul, Aleksandar Madzar, Nicolas Altstaedt, Andreas Ottensamer, Antoine Tamestit and Jörg Widmann.

He has made numerous critically praised recordings on Deutsche Grammophon, BIS, Hyperion and Onyx, and received outstanding reviews for his recording of Paganini’s 24 Caprices for solo violin in 2013. In the orchestral realm, he has released recordings of Mieczysław Weinberg’s Violin Concerto with the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra in 2015 as well as Dvorak’s violin concerto with the Prague Philharmonia for Deutsche Grammophon, and concertos by Korngold and Adams with the Copenhagen Philharmonic under Santtu-Matias Rouvali. In 2018 he released the second CD in his recording project of Stravinsky’s complete violin works, recorded with the Orquestra Sinfónica de Galicia under Dima Slobodeniouk.

After studying violin and composition in St. Petersburg, he attended the Juilliard School of Music where he studied with Itzhak Perlman. In 1998 he won the International Violin Competition Premio Paganini, as the youngest first prize winner in the history of the competition. As well as his position as violin professor at the Zurich Academy of the Arts, he is also a Violin International Fellow at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama in Glasgow. Ilya Gringolts plays a Giuseppe Guarneri "del Gesù" violin, Cremona 1742-43.

2018/19 Season

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