“MOSCOW SOLOISTS” CHAMBER ENSEMBLE

Yuri Bashmet founded the “Moscow Soloists” chamber ensemble in 1986. In 1992, Bashmet gathered the orchestra anew and changed its lineup, inviting students, graduates, and postgraduates of the Moscow Conservatory. The Russian debut of the new “Moscow Soloists” took place on May 19, 1992, on the stage of the Grand Hall of the Moscow Conservatory; two days later, on May 21, the ensemble performed in the Salle Pleyel in Paris.

The “Moscow Soloists” is a collective of fellow-thinkers who maintain a sense of ensemble while preserving their individualities. The mutual understanding between the conductor and the musicians creates a chemistry that makes each performance of the ensemble a special event.

The “Moscow Soloists” repertoire includes over 350 pieces of Russian and world classics from Bach and Mozart to Schnittke and Denisov. The ensemble regularly performs works by Giya Kancheli, Sofia Gubaidulina, Alexander Tchaikovsky, and other contemporary composers.

Over three decades, the “Moscow Soloists” have given over two thousand concerts in more than fifty countries. The “Moscow Soloists” have performed on the world’s most famous stages, including Carnegie Hall in New York, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Suntory Hall in Tokyo, the Barbican Hall in London, Tivoli in Copenhagen, the Musikverein in Vienna, the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, the Berliner Philharmonie, the Sydney Opera House, and the Grand Hall of the Moscow Conservatory. The ensemble participates in the BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall in London and is a welcome guest of such festivals as “Elba Music Island of Europe” (Italy), “December Evenings” (Moscow, Russia), the Mstislav Rostropovich Festival in Évian (France), festivals in Ravenna (Italy), Montreux (Switzerland), Bath (England), Sydney (Australia), Gabala (Azerbaijan), Omsk (Russia), and others.

In 2008, the ensemble received a Grammy Award for the Best Small Ensemble Performance for its recording of music by Igor Stravinsky and Sergei Prokofiev. The “Moscow Soloists” have been nominated for a Grammy in the Best Small Ensemble Performance category three more times: in 1994 for the recording of works by Dmitry Shostakovich and Johannes Brahms, in 2006 for the recording of Dmitry Shostakovich, Georgy Sviridov, and Mieczyslaw Weinberg chamber symphonies, and in 2009 for the recording of works by Tan Dun, Hikaru Hayashi and Toru Takemitsu.

The ensemble’s concerts have been repeatedly broadcast and recorded by the world’s leading radio stations, including the BBC, Bavarian Radio, Radio France, and NHK. The orchestra performed with renowned soloists, including Svyatoslav Richter, Mstislav Rostropovich, Natalia Gutman, Viktor Tretyakov, Gidon Kremer, Yefim Bronfman, Oleg Meisenberg, Maxim Vengerov, Vadim Repin, Dmitry Sitkovetsky, Sergey Krylov, Sarah Chang, Kristóf Baráti, Shlomo Mintz, Barbara Hendricks, James Galway, Lynn Harrell, Mario Brunello, Boris Andrianov, Alexander Buzlov, Thomas Quasthoff, Anna Netrebko, Olga Borodina, Jessye Norman, Igor Butman, and Friedrich Lips. One of the highlights in the ensemble’s history was the world premiere recording of Alfred Schnittke’s Concerto for Three with Mstislav Rostropovich and Gidon Kremer.

In 2008, the ensemble received a Grammy Award for the Best Small Ensemble Performance for its recording of music by Igor Stravinsky and Sergei Prokofiev. The “Moscow Soloists” have been nominated for a Grammy in the Best Small Ensemble Performance category three more times: in 1994 for the recording of works by Dmitry Shostakovich and Johannes Brahms, in 2006 for the recording of Dmitry Shostakovich, Georgy Sviridov, and Mieczyslaw Weinberg chamber symphonies, and in 2009 for the recording of works by Tan Dun, Hikaru Hayashi and Toru Takemitsu.

In 2007, in honor of their fifteenth anniversary, the “Moscow Soloists” made a large tour of Russia, giving 42 concerts in 39 cities. One of the concerts took place in Severomorsk on the “Pyotr Velikiy” battlecruiser. During the tour, the musicians gave their thousandth concert, which took place in Ufa. On its twentieth anniversary, the ensemble made a world tour in the winter of 2011–2012 and performed in London, Berlin, Milan, Helsinki, Washington, Toronto, Singapore, Tokyo, Beijing, Shanghai, and other cities, giving in total 80 concerts in 30 countries on five continents. In 2009, the ensemble toured Russian cities with Antonio Stradivari instruments from the State Collection of Unique Bow Musical Instruments, which was an honor that no other Russian ensemble had ever been given. In 2013–2014, the “Moscow Soloists” made a similar tour of European and Asian capitals.

In 2016–2017, the “Moscow Soloists” had a grand tour dedicated to the ensemble’s twenty-fifth anniversary. The concerts took place in more than fifty Russian cities, from the Far East to Kaliningrad and from Archangel to Stavropol and Krasnodar. The final concerts of the tour took place in St. Petersburg and Moscow.