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The Russian violinist and composer, Ilya Gringolts (Russian: Илья́ Алекса́ндрович Гринго́льц Il′já Aleksándrovič Gringól′c), studied violin (with Tatiana Liberova and Jeanna Metallidi) and composition in St. Petersburg. He then attended the Juilliard School of Music in New York, where he studied violin with Itzhak Perlman for 3 years. His Awards and prizes include: 2nd Prize at All-Russian Junior Competition (1992); 1st Prize at International Youth Competition in St. Petersburg (1994); 6th Prize at Yehudi Menuhin International Competition for Young Violinists, Junior Division (1995); Laureate at Henryk Wieniawski Violin Competition, Junior Division (1997). He won the International Violin Competition Premio Paganini Genoa, Italy (1998) and is still the youngest winner in the competition’s history. From 2001 to 2003, he was a member of the BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artists programme.
Ilya Gringolts wins over audiences with his incredibly skillful playing and sensitive interpretations and is always seeking out new musical challenges. As a sought-after soloist, he devotes himself to the great orchestral repertoire as well as to contemporary and rare works; he is also interested in historical performance practices. His concert programmes include virtuosic early repertoire by Tartini, Leclair, and Locatelli and premieres by Augusta Read Thomas, Michael Jarrell, Christophe Bertrand, and Albert Schnelzer.
Ilya Gringolts has performed with leading orchestras around the world such as the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra, NHK Symphony Orchestra, Singapore Symphony Orchestra, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Bamberger Symphoniker, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, and both orchestras of the SWR (Southwest German Radio): SWR Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart & SWR Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden & Freiburg. Recent highlights include projects with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, Helsinki Philharmonic, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Orquesta Sinfónica de Galicia, Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, and Radio Filharmonisch Orkest.
As first violinist of the Gringolts Quartet, founded in 2008, Ilya Gringolts has enjoyed great success at the Salzburg Festival, Lucerne Festival, Edinburgh Festival, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Philharmonie Luxembourg, Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Konzerthaus Dortmund, and Teatro La Fenice in Venice. A highly esteemed chamber musician, he regularly collaborates with artists such as James Boyd, Itamar Golan, Peter Laul, Aleksandar Madzar, Nicolas Altstaedt, Christian Poltera, David Kadouch, Antoine Tamestit, and Jörg Widmann.
Ilya Gringolts kicked off the 2020-2021 season with several concerts with the Münchener Kammerorchester; he has also been invited to solo with the National Symphony Orchestra Taiwan, Bayerischer Rundfunk Symphonieorchester, Orchestre National des Pays de la Loire, Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestra della Toscana, Deutsche Radio Philharmonie Saarbrücken Kaiserslautern, and Musikkollegium Winterthur. From the instrument he conducts projects with the Ferenc Liszt Chamber Orchestra and the Arctic Philharmonic Orchestra. The 2020-2021 season includes premieres of works by Bernhard Lang, Beat Furrer, André Tchaikowsky and Nicolaus Richter de Vroe.
Ilya Gringolts has made numerous critically hailed recordings on Deutsche Grammophon, BIS, Hyperion and Onyx. In 2006, he received Gramophone Award for Chamber Music, recording of chamber music of the Sergei Taneyev Piano Quintet with Vadim Repin, Nobuko Imai, Lynn Harrell, and Mikhail Pletnev. He received outstanding reviews for his 2013 recording of Paganini’s 24 Caprices for solo violin. A recording of Mieczysław Weinberg's violin concerto with the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra was followed by further CD's with violin concertos: Dvořák with the Prague Philharmonia and Korngold and Adams with the Copenhagen Philharmonic Orchestra under Santtu-Matias Rouvali. In 2018 the second part of his recording of the complete violin works of Igor Stravinsky was released, recorded with the Orquesta Sinfónica de Galicia under Dima Slobodeniouk and awarded the Diapason d'Or. In January 2021 he presented his recording of Locatelli concertos, for which he conducts the Finnish Baroque Orchestra from the instrument: “Ilya Gringolts’ recording does justice to the virtuoso as well as to the elaborate ornamentation. The performance is consistently fresh, inventive, detailed and clearly phrased.” (Pizzicato, Remy Franck)
In summer 2020 Ilya Gringolts and Ilan Volkov founded the I&I Foundation for the promotion of contemporary music to grant new commissions to young composers. An initial series of short solo works is already a part of the current season (2020-2021).
In addition to the modern violin, Ilya Gringolts has a continued commitment to period-instrument performance. Among the violins he has played are the Kiesewetter Stradivarius (1723), the Provigny Stradivarius (1716), and a Guarneri Del Gesu dated 1742. Currently he plays the "ex-Prové" Stradivarius violin (1718).
Ilya Gringolts is currently Professor on the music faculty of the Zürcher Hochschule der Künste. In addition, he was appointed to the renowned Accademia Chigiana in Siena in 2021. He is married to the Armenian violinist Anahit Kurtikyan. The couple have two daughters. His sister Olga is married to violinist Maxim Vengerov. |
