ÍøÆغÚÁÏ

As a violinist with a wide range of musical interests, Rachel Barton Pine has her hands in several projects at any given time, and her skillful, communicative musicianship also gives her a broader audience appeal than many strictly classical-oriented musicians. Pine has a growing recording catalog, most notably on the Cedille Records label. Her repertoire spans music from the Baroque through the present day, including several on commission, and she has also ventured into the realm of rock & roll.

Born on October 11, 1974, in Chicago, Rachel Barton (Pine was added following her 2004 marriage) began playing the violin at age three and, at ahe seven, gave her first public concert. She made her debut with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra at age ten. She had an impressive roster of teachers, including Roland and Almita Vamos, Ruben Gonzalez, Elmira Darvarova, and Werner Scholz. In the early '90s, she won a few international prizes, and every performance and her first recording -- Homage to Sarasate (1994) -- pointed to a promising career. However, it was temporarily stalled in 1995 when Pine was in a train accident that resulted in the loss of one leg and severe injury to the other. Following her recovery and rehabilitation, she quickly resumed an active concert schedule, regularly appearing with major American orchestras and with many of the leading conductors: Zubin Mehta, Charles Dutoit, and Neeme Järvi, among others. Her first recording following her accident was Franz Liszt: Works for Violin and Piano, featuring pianist Thomas Labé, and issued on the Dorian label.

Since then, Pine has made many recordings, mainly on the Cedille Records and Avie labels, and often makes recital tours to support her albums. Her solo violin albums include Capricho Latino, Bach's Sonatas and Partitas, and Bel Canto Paganini. She also commissioned new solo dance suites from Bruce Molsky, Darol Anger, Billy Childs, and Daniel Bernard Roumain, which she premiered in the 2016-17 season. Violin Concertos by Black Composers of the 18th & 19th Centuries, Scottish Fantasies, and concertos by Glazunov and Montsalvatge are among her recordings. She partnered with pianist Matthew Hagle for an album of music by American violinist Maud Powell and for Violin Lullabies, both of which are complemented by her editions of the scores, published by Carl Fischer, which has also issued Pine's own compositions and concerto cadenzas.

Pine also performs and records with John Mark Rozendaal and David Schrader as Trio Settecento. That interest in Baroque and earlier music also leads Pine sometimes to play the viola d'amore or rebec. In these ventures, Pine has often collaborated with her daughter, Sylvia Pine, who is also a violinist. At the other end of the spectrum, Pine has been a fan of rock and heavy metal since she was a teenager. She has collaborated with Anthrax drummer Charlie Benante on projects, has been interviewed by rock radio stations, and created an orchestral program called "Shredding with the Symphony," that mixes music by the likes of Van Halen, AC/DC, and Black Sabbath, with Bruch, Vivaldi, and Sibelius, among others. In 2023, Pine was heard on a recording of Malek Jandali's Concertos, performing the composer's Violin Concerto, and she issued the album Dependent Arising, which featured Shostakovich's Violin Concerto No. 1, Op. 77, and Earl Maneein's concerto for violin and orchestra that provided the album's title. The latter marked Pine's 24th release on Cedille Records.

In addition, Pine also launched the Rachel Barton Pine Foundation in 2001 to assist young musicians through various programs and partnerships, which she was still operating as of the mid-2020s. She performs on a Joseph Guarnerius del Gesu (Cremona 1742) instrument, known as the "ex-Bazzini, ex-Soldat," on lifetime loan from her patron. She also uses a 1770 Nicolò Gagliano I violin for some Baroque and Classical period works. ~ TiVo Staff

In the decades since its founding, the Royal Scottish National Orchestra has earned a reputation as a distinguished ensemble with an extensive concert schedule, wide-ranging repertoire, and a significant representation on recordings. In 2021, the orchestra was heard on the album Xiaogang Ye: Winter, as well as a recording of Mozart Concertos, backing Francesca Dego.

The Royal Scottish National Orchestra is the direct descendant of the Scottish Orchestra, founded in Glasgow in 1891. Throughout its first 40 years, the Scottish Orchestra had a series of principal conductors, beginning with George Henschel from 1893 until 1895. In 1933, while the orchestra -- along with the rest of the world -- was facing financial difficulties, subscribers and patrons kept the ensemble afloat. That year, John Barbirolli assumed the post of principal conductor; since that time, the orchestra has been helmed by many well-known conductors, including George Szell, Walter Süsskind, and Alexander Gibson (the first Scot to lead the ensemble and the longest-tenured), among others. Under Süsskind's leadership, with the establishment of the Scottish National Orchestra Society with monies from several Scottish cities, the Scottish Orchestra became a permanent ensemble, changing its name to the Scottish National Orchestra in 1950.

During its early years, the orchestra played its Glasgow concerts in the acoustically wonderful St. Andrew's Hall. From the time the hall was destroyed by fire in 1962, the Scottish National Orchestra played in a series of venues of varying suitability. In 1977, during Gibson's tenure, Queen Elizabeth II granted the orchestra royal patronage; Gibson also earned his knighthood that year during the Queen's Silver Jubilee and Birthday Honours. The redesign of the Trinity Church on Claremont Street in 1979 gave the Scottish National Orchestra a new home: Henry Wood Hall. In 1991, the orchestra changed its name to the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, affirming its royal patronage. It was briefly named the Royal Scottish Orchestra but reverted to its present name in 1992.

While the orchestra boasts a wide-ranging repertoire, it has been singled out for its recordings of Bruckner, Barber, and 20th century British composers like Bax, MacMillan, and Holst. It has also earned a particular reputation for recorded performances of film scores, including a Gramophone Award in 1997 for its recording of Bernard Herrmann's score to Vertigo. In 2015, the orchestra moved to its current home, the RSNO Centre at the Glasgow Royal Concert Hall. Neeme Järvi (principal conductor from 1984 until 1988) is the orchestra's conductor laureate, and Alexander Lazarev (principal conductor from 1997 until 2005) is conductor emeritus. Following a six-year stint as principal guest conductor, the Royal Scottish National Orchestra appointed Thomas Søndergård its music director, effective in 2018. In 2021, the orchestra was heard on a collection of works by Xiaogang Ye on BIS and, under Roger Norrington, backed Francesca Dego on a Chandos recording of Mozart Concertos. ~ TiVo Staff

Composer, conductor, and instrumentalist (piano, clarinet, and organ) Teddy Abrams was named conductor of the Louisville Orchestra in 2014; he announced an aim to bring broad accessibility to the programming of an ensemble that historically had specialized in difficult contemporary works. At the time, he was the youngest conductor of a major American symphony orchestra.

A native of Berkeley, California, Edward Paul Maxwell Abrams was born on May 6, 1987. He showed talent on the piano starting at age three and also studied clarinet as a child. Then, at nine, he attended a performance by the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Michael Tilson Thomas and developed the ambition to become a conductor. He began studying conducting with Tilson Thomas at 12 and completely bypassed middle school and high school, supplementing his music studies with courses at local community colleges. Abrams graduated from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music with a bachelor's degree at 18 and went on for further conducting studies at the Curtis Institute in Philadelphia and at the Aspen Music Festival and School. Abrams quickly found high-profile posts, winning a three-year conducting fellowship with the New World Symphony in Miami Beach in 2011 and then graduating to posts at the MAV Symphony Orchestra in Hungary and the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. In the latter post, he was responsible for the orchestra's community programs, and he brought a strong orientation toward the wider musical community when he came to Louisville. He is also a composer, and the 2017 Louisville Orchestra release All In, on the major Decca label, also featured two Abrams compositions.

Abrams has led the Louisville Orchestra in more than ten premieres of his own works, including Muhammad Ali Portrait, inspired by the city's most famous native son in the sports world. Under his leadership, the orchestra has also collaborated with musicians in the locally vibrant fields of folk (vocalist Aoife O'Donovan) and bluegrass (banjoist Béla Fleck). Abrams himself is also noted as a performer; he has played chamber music with the Sixth Floor Trio and has also performed in klezmer bands. Abrams is the conductor of the Britt Music & Arts Festival Orchestra, which he led in 2016 performances at Crater Lake National Park, and he was featured as a pianist, playing two of his own compositions plus a partially improvised version of Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 30 in E major, Op. 109, in a Tiny Desk Concert on the U.S. National Public Radio network, becoming one of the few classical musicians to have appeared on the streaming video series. Abrams and the Louisville Orchestra returned on Decca in 2019 with the album The Order of Nature, and he also led the Royal Scottish National Orchestra on the Avie label that year, backing violinist Rachel Barton Pine in violin concertos by Dvořák and Khachaturian. In 2023, Abrams and the Louisville Orchestra joined Abrams' Curtis School classmate Yuja Wang on the Deutsche Grammophon label for The American Project, which included a recording of Abrams' jazz- and rock-influenced Piano Concerto. ~ James Manheim