Anne Akiko Meyers, violinist

This season, violinist ANNE AKIKO MEYERS plays both new and "signature" repertoire in a series of great orchestral dates: the Barber Violin Concerto, which she has played to great acclaim throughout her career; the Bach Double Violin Concerto, which featured on her chart-topping 2012 release with the English Chamber Orchestra,  AIR: The Bach Album; and a new concerto, written specifically for her by the much-in-demand composer Mason Bates: 

~ Dec. 1, 2012, ORPHEUS Chamber Orchestra
at Carnegie Hall, Barber Cto.
~ Dec. 7 & 9, 2012, PITTSBURGH Symphony
 Mason Bates Concerto (world premiere)
~ Feb, 7, 9 & 10, 2013, PHOENIX Symphony
Bach Double Cto. and Barber Cto.
~ Feb. 28, March 1 & 2, 2013, NASHVILLE Symphony
Mason Bates Concerto
 

The Mason Bates project, which Meyers premiered with Leonard Slatkin and the Pittsburgh Symphony and revisits in February with Giancarlo Guerrero and the Nashville Symphony, was developed over several years with Meyers' strong input and advocacy.  As Bates wrote on his blog:  "This is one of the finest, fieriest fiddlers I’ve ever seen, and every note of the piece is written with her blazing musical personality in mind.  And she’s been the perfect collaborator, being painful[ly] respectful of my intentions — while thankfully pointing out the problematic passages."  
Learn a bit about the collaboration on Meyers' blog here.

Other highlights of the season include an acclaimed performance of the Mendelssohn Concerto in E Minor at Chautauqua with Andrew Litton; "a dazzling" chamber concert in Dallas; Mozart Cto. No. 3, K.216 (featuring the Wynton Marsalis cadenzas written for Meyers) with the Reno Philharmonic; performances with the New West Symphony, the Pasadena Symphony and elsewhere.

And, as you may have heard in delightful recent news, Meyers has been given the life-time use of the legendary 'Vieuxtemps' Guarneri Del Gesu.  Click on the image above to watch a video discussing the Ex-Vieuxtemps and to hear Meyers perform on the instrument.

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(January 2013)

After winning widespread critical and popular acclaim for her 2012 Bach album, Air, violinist ANNE AKIKO MEYERS is bringing a new work to audiences this season, playing the world premiere of composer/DJ Mason Bates' Violin Concerto in December 2012 with Leonard Slatkin and the Pittsburgh Symphony. 

We asked Meyers to share her thoughts about working on the Bates piece, and she explained:

"I am thrilled to premiere Mason Bates' first violin concerto-actually his first concerto for any instrument. I have been very interested in his work for some time and asked him to write some cadenzas for the Beethoven Violin Concerto, several years ago.

 

I love the overall process of collaborating with living composers, as we can discuss technical aspects to help achieve the storyline the composer has so deeply in mind. Understanding the soul of the piece is what's important and we have done a lot of work via Skype! 

The premiere feels much like giving birth to a child. I look forward to sharing this beautiful work with audiences soon."

She repeats the Bates' in the winter of 2013 with Giancarlo Guerrero and the Nashville Symphony. Other upcoming dates include the Barber Concerto (a special favorite of Meyers', which she performed last month with the New West Symphony for their season opener) with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra at Carnegie Hall, and with the Phoenix Symphony (where she also performs the Bach Double Violin Concerto with concertmaster Steven Moeckel.) Later, in the Spring of 2013, she joins the Reno Philharmonic to play the Mozart Violin Concerto No. 3, with cadenzas written for her by Wynton Marsalis.

(October 2012)

Violinist ANNE AKIKO MEYERS took some time to speak with Japan Cinema this month. Enjoy the candid interview here. This week she opens the New West Symphony's season with a signature work -- the Barber Violin Concerto -- and later this fall she revisits the Barber at Carnegie Hall with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra. (Watch archival video of Meyers playing the Barber here.)

(September 2012)

Violinist ANNE AKIKO MEYERS appeared on All Things Considered this week, in a story about her newest recording: AIR: The Bach Album.  The album, which will be released on Valentine's Day, has already shot up to No. 1 on Amazon's Classical list.  Click here for a preview!

 

If you saw the Nashville Symphony's 12/13 season announcement earlier this week, you may have caught another piece of wonderful news fromANNE AKIKO MEYERS: she joins the Giancarlo Guerrero and the Nashville Symphony on a program called "Tchaikovsky meets Techno" for a new violin concerto Meyers comissioned from DJ/composer Mason Bates. Learn more about the program here.

(February 2012)

On January 30, violinist ANNE AKIKO MEYERS appears in recital for New York City's Rubin Museum of Art's "Resonating Light" series.  She recently spoke with BBC MUSIC MAGAZINE about the program:

'Samsara' is the title of your recital programme. What does it mean?

The whole series at the Rubin Museum is titled 'Resonating Light'. Tim McHenry, curator of the museum and producer of this series, came up with the title 'Samsara' after I told him what music I'd chosen. 'Samsara' means 'continuous flow of life', and the programme goes from birth to death to afterlife.

How did you choose the music? 

The Rubin Museum was such an interesting situation as Tim asked me to come by and view all the collections, and then base my recital theme on that. That was really a first to be asked to programme like that. I chose a wide selection of diverse composers, but it starts and ends with Bach. It's meant to be symbolic of life itself, and the general mood and character I wanted to convey.

So how does the programme develop?

The Bach Air on the G string represents the first breath of air we take into our bodies. Piazzolla's Milonga del Angel is steamy, sexually desirous music; I wanted to show building passion, which leads to finding love in Kreisler's Liebesfreud. His Liebeslied represents the love that you lose. Lost love makes the love you find that much sweeter; we all experience that bittersweet feeling. Then Arvo Pärt's Spiegel im Spiegel is the mid-life crisis! You look into a mirror and take stock of where your life is, it's a time you need to be quiet and meditate to find yourself.

Can you tell us about the two contemporary pieces in the second half?

Somei Satoh's Birds in Warped Time II is so fascinating because he thinks the rests are more important than the notes. The rests symbolise death, and the notes life. So it's a very ethereal reflective work, and you hear the birds going off into the distance. Jakob Ciupinski's piece The Wreck of the Umbria for Solo Violin/Electronics is an eerie reminder of how life was on that boat. It was destroyed in World War II, and this piece represents faded life and the afterlife. Ciupinski is an adventurous young composer and a deep sea diver himself. Then the Bach-Gounod Ave Maria is the encore.

Click here to read the full interview.

And click here for more information on the January 30 Rubin Museum recital. (January 2011)

Violinist ANNE AKIKO MEYERS began the autumn with the release of her newest album, "Seasons...dreams," out September 28 on eOne Music. The disc release has been the occasion of a cascade of appearances, ranging from a performance at the exclusive Madison Avenue David Webb Jewelry boutique as part of Vogue's Fashion's Night Out, to interviews with San Francisco Classical Voice and WNYC's Soundcheck, to nightclub dates at New York City's (le) Poisson Rouge, Chicago's S.P.A.C.E, and presented by KDFC at Yoshi's in San Francisco.

Meyers then returned to the St. Louis Symphony for the Mozart G Major Concerto, led by Louis Langrée:

"It was a pleasure to hear, a performance notable for its clarity and idiomatic sense of style from all concerned, and appropriately understated. Meyers brought technical accomplishment, a warm persona and a cool interpretive slant to her playing. Her cadenzas were written for her by Wynton Marsalis, and they brought out her strengths as a performer nicely." - SARAH BRYAN MILLER The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, September 24, 2010

Upcoming dates include the Barber Concerto with James DePriest and the Pasadena Symphony, and for a return to the Düsseldorfer Symphoniker.

(September 2010)

Anne Akiko Meyers' new album Smile, on Koch Records, is on the charts, in the top 20 Classical discs. Anne played her CD launch at New York City's hot new venue, (Le) Poisson Rouge:

"She played with an unfailingly sweet tone, molding her phrases like a singer...If anyone needed reminding that Ms. Meyers is a performer of substance and skill, here was the proof." Steve Smith for THE NEW YORK TIMES, Feb. 5, 2009

Coming up, Anne plays the Barber Concerto for a return to the BBC Scottish Symphony and the Tchaikovsky Concerto with the Osaka Philharmonic in Japan. (March 2009)

Last month violinist ANNE AKIKO MEYERS gave a smashing performance of the Barber Violin Concerto with Andrew Litton and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra.

"For musical theatricality, it was Barber's Violin Concerto in the hands of soloist Anne Akiko Meyers that proved most memorable. Meyers plays the Royal Spanish Stradivarius violin, and her capacity to make this instrument speak was compelling. Such luxuriant richness of tone invested Barber with a rare profundity, while the moto perpetuo finale had a brilliance that convincingly carried its own dramatic logic." The Guardian, Nov. 17, 2008.

Next up Ms. Meyers looks forward to the release of her newest recording "Smile" for Koch Records, January 27. She celebrates the release with a date at Manhattan's "most enticing new-music venue", (Le) Poisson Rouge, Tuesday, Feb. 3, 2009. Learn more about the event here and see the exclusive video EPK here.

(December 2008)

Always eager to explore new forms and means of performance, violinist ANNE AKIKO MEYERS makes several West Coast appearances this month, notably reuniting with Paul Haas for "Rewind" with the New Century Chamber Orchestra in San Francisco . A seamless concert experience, "Rewind" presents five centuries of music, held together with new-music continuo. The work was premiered with Ms. Meyers at New York City's Angel Orensanz Center.

Next up, Ms. Meyers performs Mendelssohn Concerto in E Minor with Boris Brott and the New West Symphony, a work she revists in February with Carl St. Clair and the Pacific Symphony. Other upcoming highlights include the Barber Violin Concerto with the Warsaw Philharmonic and the Orchestra Sinfonica Siciliana in Palermo; performances of Prokofiev 1 with the Spokane Symphony; recitals in California and New York; and performances at the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo, Japan. (January 2008)