557757 bk Bloch US 20/8/07 8:50 pm Page 5 Royal Scottish National Orchestra the Sydney Opera, has been shown over fifty times on U.S. television, and has been released on DVD. Serebrier regularly champions contemporary music, having commissioned the String Quartet No. 4 by Elliot Carter (for his Formed in 1891 as the Scottish Orchestra, and subsequently known as the Scottish National Orchestra before being Festival Miami), and conducted world première performances of music by Rorem, Schuman, Ives, Knudsen, Biser, granted the title Royal at its centenary celebrations in 1991, the Royal Scottish National Orchestra is one of Europe’s and many others. As a composer, Serebrier has won most important awards in the United States, including two leading ensembles. Distinguished conductors who have contributed to the success of the orchestra include Sir John Guggenheims (as the youngest in that Foundation’s history, at the age of nineteen), Rockefeller Foundation grants, Barbirolli, Karl Rankl, Hans Swarowsky, Walter Susskind, Sir Alexander Gibson, Bryden Thomson, Neeme Järvi, commissions from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Harvard Musical Association, the B.M.I. Award, now Conductor Laureate, and Walter Weller who is now Conductor Emeritus. Alexander Lazarev, who served as Koussevitzky Foundation Award, among others. Born in Uruguay of Russian and Polish parents, Serebrier has Ernest Principal Conductor from 1997 to 2005, was recently appointed Conductor Emeritus. Stéphane Denève was composed more than a hundred works. His First Symphony had its première under Leopold Stokowski (who gave appointed Music Director in 2005 and his first recording with the RSNO of Albert Roussel’s Symphony No. 3 and the the first performances of several of his works) when Serebrier was seventeen. His music has been recorded by complete ballet suite Bacchus et Ariane (Naxos 8.570245) was released in May 2007. The orchestra made an conductors such as John Eliot Gardiner. His new Third Symphony, ‘Symphonie Mystique’ (Naxos 8.559183), important contribution to the authoritative Naxos series of Bruckner Symphonies under the late Georg Tintner, and received a Grammy nomination for Best New Composition of 2004. His Carmen Symphony CD, with the Barcelona BLOCH recorded a complete cycle of the orchestral works of Samuel Barber under former Principal Guest Conductor Marin Symphony Orchestra, won the Latin Grammy for Best Classical Album of 2004. The French music critic Michel Alsop. The orchestra performs a busy schedule of concerts across Scotland with annual appearances at the Edinburgh Fauré has written a new book about José Serebrier, published in 2001 in France by L’Harmattan. Serebrier’s first International Festival and regular performances in the BBC Promenade Concerts in London. recording with the New York Philharmonic was released in 2005. For further information visit www.joseserebrier.com José Serebrier Violin Concerto Grammy-winner conductor and composer José Serebrier is one of most recorded classical artists today. He has received 32 Grammy nominations in recent years. When he was 21 years old, Leopold Stokowski hailed him as “the greatest master of Baal Shem orchestral balance”. After five years as Stokowski’s Associate Conductor at New York’s Carnegie Hall, Serebrier accepted an invitation from George Szell to become Composer-in-Residence of the Cleveland Orchestra. Szell discovered Serebrier when Suite Hébraïque he won the Ford Foundation American Conductors Competition (together with James Levine). Serebrier was music director of America’s oldest music festival, in Worcester, With greatest appreciation to the Center for Jewish Culture and Creativity. Massachusetts, until he organized Festival Miami, and served as its artistic director for many years. In that capacity, he commissioned many composers, including Elliot Special thanks to Rose Schiff, Eileen Wingard, Chaim Boruch, Jascha Heifetz, Carter’s String Quartet No. 4, and conducted many American and world premières. He has made international tours with the Juilliard Orchestra, Pittsburgh Symphony, Joyce McLean, Ji-Young Lee, Ron Eisenberg, Avlana, and Cherina. Philharmonia Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Scottish Chamber Orchestra and the Orchestre de Chambre National de Toulouse. His first recording, Charles Ives’s Fourth Symphony with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, won a Grammy nomination. His recording of the Mendelssohn symphonies won the UK Music Retailers Association Award for Best Orchestral Recording, and his series of Shostakovich’s Film Suites won the Zina Schiff, Violin Deutsche Schallplatten Award for Best Orchestral Recording. Soundstage magazine selected Serebrier’s recording of Scheherazade with the LPO as the Best Audiophile Recording. He has recorded with the London Symphony Orchestra, London Philharmonic, Royal Philharmonic, Philharmonia, Bournemouth Symphony, Royal Liverpool Royal Scottish Philharmonic, Staatskapelle Weimar, Bayerischer Rundfunk Symphony Orchestra, SWR Symphony Baden- Baden/Freiburg, Oslo Philharmonic, Bamberg Symphony, Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Scottish Chamber National Orchestra Orchestra, English Chamber Orchestra, Barcelona Symphony, Czech State Philharmonic Brno, Sydney and Melbourne Symphonies and many others. “Serebrier Conducts Prokofiev, Beethoven and Tchaikowsky”, filmed at José Serebrier 8.557757 5 6 8.557757 557757 bk Bloch US 20/8/07 8:50 pm Page 2 Ernest Bloch (1880-1959) King David, himself, plucking the harp in the tender thanksgiving holiday period. Amidst dancing and song, Zina Schiff Violin Concerto • Baal Shem • Suite Hébraïque moments after the cadenza, before the tumultuous race the Torah scrolls are carried in joyous procession to the end of the first movement. The second movement, around the synagogue. The last verses of Deuteronomy The award-winning American violinist Zina Schiff is a Heifetz protégée. She has It is not surprising that Ernest Bloch probed the unique University of California at Berkeley. In 1927 Temple with segments requiring a muted solo violin, creates an are recited, immediately followed by the opening verses made acclaimed appearances throughout North America, Eastern and Western Europe, expressive capability and tonal palette of the violin. Emanu-El of San Francisco commissioned his Sacred enchanted, mystical spell, while the third expands and of Genesis, signaling the beginning of a new, unending Israel, Australia, and New Zealand. In the United States she has appeared as a soloist Born on 24th July, 1880, in Switzerland, the son of a Service. This resulted in increased patronage, which, by reworks the concerto’s opening theme with a cycle of Torah study. with such orchestras as Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, Rochester, Brooklyn, clock merchant in Geneva, Bloch exhibited a precocious 1931, permitted Bloch to give up teaching and pyrotechnical display that persists until the final The final letter of Deuteronomy, linked together San Antonio, Nashville, San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Seattle. Her first violin talent. By the time he was seventeen, he left home completely devote his attention to composition. He passionate statement. When Szigeti performed the with the first letter of Genesis, forms the Hebrew word recording was the score for the MGM movie, The Fixer, composed for solo violin by to study with the illustrious Belgian violinist and moved to Agate Beach, Oregon, where he lived until his première in Cleveland on 15th December, 1938, with lev, meaning heart, most appropriate since the Torah is a Academy-Award winner Maurice Jarre. Her CD début, two recordings as soloist with composer, Eugène Ysaÿe. Although impressed by death on 15th July, 1959. Dimitri Mitropoulos conducting, Arthur Berger, of the symbol of love of both God and humanity. Bloch’s the Israel Philharmonic, were Bach/Vivaldi and The Lark Ascending. Solo discs on the Bloch’s instrumental virtuosity, Ysaÿe recognised his Bloch’s exquisite Violin Concerto and Suites New York Herald Tribune, exclaimed, “…There is “Jewish Valentine” to his mother incorporates a famous 4Tay label are King David’s Lyre, a celebration of Jerusalem 3000, and Here’s One, pupil’s extraordinary creative potential and persuaded portray, in the composer’s own words, “…the complex, scarcely a work in the whole category of art music in Chasidic wedding dance, the mezinka. This tune is also an American collection which was featured in fifty countries on the radio show Art of him to pursue composition. Bloch continued his studies glowing, agitated soul that I feel vibrating through the which Jewish associations are stronger.” found in Dmitri Shostakovich’s first violin concerto the States. Both of these CDs were selected as Critics Choices for 1997 by the in Germany, but with no obvious prospects for a musical Bible…the freshness and naiveté of the Patriarchs, the Inscribed To the memory of my mother, Bloch’s (1958), composed for his Jewish friend, David Oistrakh. American Record Guide. Cecil Burleigh: Music for Violin and Piano on the Naxos career he reluctantly returned to Switzerland, becoming violence of the prophetic Books; the Jew’s savage love Baal Shem was written in 1923, while he was Director Bloch celebrated his seventieth birthday belatedly in American Classics series (8.559061) received the same honour from the American a book-keeper and clerk in his family’s shop. His of justice; the despair of Ecclesiastes; the sorrow and the of the Cleveland Institute. He wrote it for his Swiss December 1950 with a week-long