From March 12-18, 2024, Asheville Symphony will present the first-ever Artist Residency celebrating the impact and the legacy of the violin and featuring world-renowned violinists (and husband and wife) Noah Bendix-Balgley and Shanshan Yao.
An Asheville native, Bendix-Balgley is First Concertmaster of the Berlin Philharmonic, widely regarded as one of the greatest orchestras in the world. He tours both as a soloist and as a chamber musician. A laureate of the 2009 Queen Elizabeth Competition, he also won top prizes at the Long-Thibaud Competition in France and the Postacchini Competition in Italy.
Bendix-Balgley will be joined on several events during the Artist Residency by Shanshan Yao, who joined the roster of the New York Philharmonic in 2013. She has won numerous competitions including the Calgary Concerto Competition and the Morningside Music Bridge Concerto Competition.
Asheville Symphony’s Artist Residency is a biennial initiative that honors and explores one musical instrument in collaboration with a preeminent musical artist. Through an exploration of genre, instrumentation, solo performance, and more, this week-long residency offers programs for a wide range of audiences with an emphasis on education. At each residency, Asheville Symphony audiences will discover new ways to appreciate and understand a musical instrument and its role in an orchestra.
“The Artist Residency has a distinct focus on education,” says ASO Executive Director Daniel Crupi. “We wanted to create an opportunity to embed world-class artists in our community in a variety of different contexts to give audience members the chance to learn about and appreciate one specific instrument, which this inaugural year is the violin. We are thrilled that Noah Bendix-Balgley, who leads one of the best orchestras in the world, is returning to his hometown for the inaugural Artist Residency alongside his wife, Shanshan Yao, who is…
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