 |
Renowned for her astonishing technique, highly expressive musical temperament and broad repertoire,
Reiko Watanabe pursues a career combining highly acclaimed recital tours and festival performances with equally lauded concerto performances with the world's leading orchestras and conductors.
Born in Tokyo, Ms. Watanabe's exceptional musicianship was recognized when, at fifteen, she became the youngest grand-prize winner in the history of the All Japan Music Competition. In 1985, one year after capturing top honors in the GB Viotti Competition, she won a scholarship to the Julliard School where her teachers included Joseph Fuchs, Felix Galimir, Samuel Rhodes and Jacob Lateiner. A top prize-winner in the Paganini, and Josef Gingold competitions, Miss Watanabe's success in the major Julliard competitions resulted in performances of concertos by Stravinsky and Paganini at the Avery Fischer Hall with the Julliard Orchestra before she graduated with a master's degree in 1992.
The prestigious list of conductors with whom she has collaborated includes
Leonard Slatkin, Charles Dutoit, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Andrew Davis, Mikhail
Pletnev, Neeme Järvi, Jesus Cobos Lopez, Mariss Jansons, Fabio Luisi
and the late Giuseppe Sinopoli and she has performed with orchestras such
as the Los Angeles Philharmonic, St. Louis Symphony, National Symphony
Orchestra, Hamburg Philharmonic, Philharmonia Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra,
Orquesta Sinfonica de Castilla y Leon, Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, NHK
Symphony Orchestra, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Berlin Radio
Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Göthenburg
Symphony Orchestra, Oslo Philharmonic, Vienna Tonkünstler Orchestra,
Russian National Orchestra, Bamberg Symphony Orchestra and the Dresden
Staatskapelle. Notable recent successes include the Barber concerto with
the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra, conducted by James DePriest and of the Strauss
Violin Concerto by Edo de Waart and the Yomiuri Nippon Symphony Orchestra.
As well as her concerto performances, Ms. Watanabe is much in demand as a chamber musician and recitalist. Her series of recitals in Tokyo, 2004, based around the music of Brahms, met with gret critical acclaim.
Ms. Watanabe released her first CD, the Berg Violin Concerto performed with the Dresden Staatskapelle and Sinopoli, recorded on the Teldec label, in 1997. In 2001 she released a recording of the Bach Partitas and her latest recording on Warner Music label, is the Shostakovich and Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto, performed with St.Petersburg Symphony Orchestra and Alexander Dmitriev.
In 2005, she was awarded the 35th Exxon Mobil Music Promotion Award honoring her contribution to the development of Japan's musical culture
Miss Watanabe currently resides in New York City.
|
