Alexander Ivashkin (Cello)
Born in Blagoveschensk, Russia, on 17.08.1948 Died in London, Great
Britain, on 31.01.2014
Alexander Ivashkin: Cellist and musicologist who courted danger in the Soviet
Union with his bent for contemporary pieces. Martin Anderson, The Independent,
13/02/2014 Professor Alexander Ivashkin 1948-2014. By Gavin
Gixon Farewell, Sasha. By Martin Anderson Sad news: Death of an
international cellist. By Norman Lebrecht
Alexander Ivashkin began his music education at the Gnessins Special School
of Music for gifted students at the age of five, playing both piano and cello.
It was the legendary Mstislav Rostropovich who suggested he choose a career of a
solo cellist. Ivashkin established an international reputation both as an
interpreter of the standard repertoire and as a proponent of contemporary music.
His highly acclaimed recitals, radio and TV recordings, and appearances with
orchestras have included performances in more than 40 countries.
As a soloist he has played with the conductors such as Mstislav Rostropovich,
Valery Gergiev, Vladimir Jurowski, Riccardo Muti, Krzysztof
Penderecki, Seiji Ozawa, Gennady Rozhdestvensky, Yuri
Temirkanov, Rudolf Barshai, Alexander Lazarev, Janos Furst, Vladimir
Verbitsky, Nikolai Alexeev, Nicholas Braithwaite, Theodore Kuchar, David
Stern, Dmitri Liss, Arvo Volmer, Martin Panteleev, and Andrey Boreyko. As
a chamber musician he has performed with Gidon Kremer, Mikhail Kopelman, Shlomo
Mintz, Dong-Suk Kang, James Buswell, Isabelle van Keulen, Lara StJohn, Oleh
Krysa, Tatyana Grindenko, Dmitri Sitkovetsky, Jan Tawroszewicz, Patricia
Kopatchinskaia, Rainer Moog, Boris Berman, Malcolm Bilson, Dmitri Alexeev,
Arturo Pizzaro, Alexei Lubimov, Mikhail Rudy, Victoria Postnikova, Daniel Adni,
Piers Lane, Irina Schnittke, Hamish Milne, Michael Houstoun, Diedre
Irons, Tamas Vesmas, Ivan Sokolov, and others.
Alexander Ivashkin has been a regular guest at many important music festivals
in Europe, Britain, the United States, Japan, Australia and New Zealand. He
appears regularly as soloist with some of the world's leading orchestras,
including the Russian State SO, The Mariinsky Orchestra, Ukranian State
SO, St. Petersburg Philharmonic, The Bolshoi Orchestra, Netherlands Philharmonic
Orchestra, Netherlands Radio Philharmonic, RAI Torino, Australian ABC
Orchestras, Slovak Philharmonic, New Zealand SO, Berlin SO, Hamburg SO,
Sudwestfalische Philharmonie (Germany), Boulder Philharmonic, Rutgers SO (USA),
Winnipeg Symphony, Montreal Soloists (Canada), Cape Philharmonic, Free State SO
(South Africa), Sofia Festival Orchestra (Bulgaria), Geneva Chamber Orchestra
(Switzerland), BBC SO, London Philharmonic Orchestra, London Chamber Orchestra
(UK), Reno Chamber Orchestra (USA), Netherlands Chamber Orchestra, New Zealand
Chamber Orchestra, Kremlin Chamber Orchestra and Studio for New Music (Moscow,
Russia), among others.
Since 1995 Ivashkin has been Artistic Director of the Adam International
Cello Competition and Festival. He is also artistic director of annual festivals
in London, including the Rostropovich Memorial festival in Wigmore Hall
and the VTB Capital International Cello Competition in London.
Alexander Ivashkin is the first performer and dedicatee of many works by
great contemporary composers. Along with Mstislav Rostropovich and Natalia
Gutman, he is one of the cellists for whom Alfred Schnittke composed. He has
actively collaborated with composers such as John Cage, George Crumb, Mauricio
Kagel, Krzysztof Penderecki, Peter Sculthorpe, Brett Dean, Sofia
Gubaidulina, Giya Kancheli, Arvo P?rt, Rodion Shchedrin, Nikolai Korndorf,
Alexander Raskatov, Vladimir Tarnopolski, Augusta Reid Thomas, James MacMillan,
Lyell Cresswell and Gillian Whitehead.
A recording artist for the Chandos, BMG and Naxos labels, Ivashkin has award
winning recordings of the complete cello music by Rakhmaninov, Prokofiev,
Shostakovich, Roslavets, Tcherepnine, Schnittke and Kancheli to his credit.
He has taught at schools of music in Russia, the US, Europe, Australia and
New Zealand, and currently is Professor of Music and the
Director of Classical Music Performance at the
University of London.
As soloist Ivashkin has performed in London's Royal Festival Hall, Queen
Elizabeth Hall, the Barbican Centre and Wigmore Hall, Birmingham's Symphony
Hall, the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam, Queens Hall, Edinburgh, Vredenburg, Utrecht,
Philharmonic Hall, Berlin, Musikhalle, Hamburg, Philharmonic Hall, Cologne,
Dvorak Hall, Prague, Moscow Conservatory Great Hall and the St Petersburg Great
Philharmonic Hall. He has played the Dvorak Concerto in Prague, Myaskovsky's
Cello Concerto in Birmingham (Symphony Hall), and has toured the United Kingdom
and Ireland with Shostakovich's First Cello Concerto and Tchaikovsky's Rococo
Variations. He presented a world premiere of the Brahms Cello Concerto in
Hamburg (followed by performances in Moscow, with Russian State SO, in St
Petersburg, with St Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra, and in Auckland, with
Auckland Philharmonia) and performed Beethoven's Triple Concerto at the
Amsterdam Concertgebouw with the Berlin Symphony Orchestra, Derek Han (piano)
and Massimo Quarta (violin). Highlights of Ivashkin's recent tours included
performances of two Shostakovich's Cello Concertos in the USA, three of
Gubaidulina's Cello Concertos at the BBC SO Festival in the Barbican Centre in
London, in Holland and in Italy (all — in presence of the
composer), the Schumann Concerto in Utrecht and St Petersburg, a Canadian tour
(as a cellist and a conductor), world premiere of new version of Penderecki's
Largo (Cello Concerto), under the baton of the composer; the performance
of Schnittke's Second Cello Concerto with London Philharmonic Orchestra
under Vladimir Jurowski in Royal Festival Hall, and concerts, recordings
and masterclasses in France, Germany, Greece, New Zealand,
Singapore, South Africa, Russia, and UK. In June 2012 Ivashkin performed
two new cello concertos with Valery Gergiev and the Mariinsky
Orchestra. The first performance of Gabriel Prokofiev's new Concerto for
cello and orchestra, along with new version of his grandfather, Sergei
Prokofiev's Cello Concertino (1952), was presented in Great Hall of St
Petersburg Philharmonia in May 2013.
Alexander Ivashkin is also well known as a conductor. He conducts orchestras
and choruses in Great Britain, Russia, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Armenia,
and Azerbaijan.
He plays a Giuseppe (Joseph) Guarneri cello of 1710, courtesy of The
Bridgewater Trust. He also plays electric cello, viola de gamba, sitar and
piano.
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