Joshua Bell to Perform at Symphony Hall

(Boston)  Celebrity Series of Boston will present Joshua Bell, on Sunday, November 17, 2013, at 3pm at Symphony Hall, 301 Massachusetts Avenue, Boston. Sponsored by Tufts Health Plan and The D.L. Saunders Real Estate Corporation. Media Partner is Classical New England WGBH.

Tickets for Joshua Bell start at $30, and are available online at www.celebrityseries.org, by calling CelebrityCharge at (617) 482-6661 Monday-Friday 10:00 a.m.- 4:00 p.m., or at the Symphony Hall box office, 301 Massachusetts Avenue, Boston.

This performance marks Joshua Bell’s eighth appearance with the Celebrity Series of Boston.

Joshua Bell performs on the 1713 Huberman Stradivarius violin and uses a late 18th century French bow by Francois Tourte. He received his first violin at age four after his parents noticed him plucking tunes with rubber bands he had stretched around the handles of his dresser drawers. By 12 he was serious about the instrument, thanks in large part to the inspiration of his teacher and mentor, Josef Gingold. Two years later, Bell came to national attention in his highly acclaimed debut with Riccardo Muti and the Philadelphia Orchestra. He then made his Carnegie Hall debut, received an Avery Fisher Career Grant, and a notable recording contract.

In 1989, Bell received an Artist Diploma in Violin Performance from Indiana University where he currently serves as a senior lecturer at the Jacobs School of Music. His alma mater honored him with a Distinguished Alumni Service Award. He has been named an “Indiana Living Legend” and is the recipient of the Indiana Governor’s Arts Award. In 2011, Bell received the Paul Newman Award from Arts Horizons and the Huberman Award from Moment Magazine. Bell was named “Instrumentalist of the Year, 2010” by Musical America and that same year received the Humanitarian Award from Seton Hall University. In 2009, he was honored by Education Through Music, and he received the Academy of Achievement Award in 2008 for exceptional accomplishment in the arts. In 2007, he was awarded the Avery Fisher Prize and recognized as a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum. He was inducted into the Hollywood Bowl Hall of Fame in 2005.

In 2013, Bell will tour the US with the Cleveland Orchestra and Europe with the New York Philharmonic as well as perform with the Tucson, Pittsburgh, San Diego and Nashville Symphony Orchestras. Joshua Bell currently records exclusively for Sony Classical. Bell serves on the artist committee of the Kennedy Center Honors and is on the Board of Directors of the New York Philharmonic. He has performed before President Obama at Ford’s Theatre and at the White House and recently returned to the Capital to perform for Vice President Biden and President of the People’s Republic of China, Xi Jinping. Bell's most recent challenge is his appointment as the new Music Director of the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields, the first person and first American to hold this post since Sir Neville Marriner formed the orchestra in 1958.

Joshua just released his new album on October 15, Musical Gifts, with special guests Gloria Estefan, Alison Krauss, Kristin Chenoweth, trumpeter Chris Botti, jazz greats Chick Corea and Branford Marsalis, opera stars Plácido Domingo and Renée Fleming, Michael Feinstein and a cappella group Straight No Chaser.

Program:

Tartini

Violin Sonata in G minor, Opus 1, no. 10, “Devil’s Trill Sonata”

Beethoven

Violin Sonata No. 10, Opus 96

Stravinsky

Divertimento for violin and piano (after “The Fairy’s Kiss”)

Tchaikovsky

Valse-Scherzo, Opus 34

The performance is approximately 90 minutes, including intermission, followed by a CD signing.