Department of Music

• Tuesday, March 2, 2010
• Old Cabell Hall
• 8:00pm
• Free

• Wednesday, March 3, 2010
• Old Cabell Hall
• 11:30am
• Free

On March 2 at 8:00 pm in Old Cabell Hall Auditorium, violinist Charles Castleman, professor of violin at the University of Rochester’s Eastman School of Music, will be performing a violin recital. He will be accompanied by pianist Julie Nishimura (University of Deleware). The program will include Sonatina by Antonin Dvorak, Poème Elegiaque, Op. 12 by Eugene Ysaÿe, Sonata in A Major by César Franck, and Henri Wieniawski’s Polonaise in D Major  Op 4. In addition, on March 3 from 11-1 pm, Castleman will be offering a master class for string instruments in the Auditorium.

Castleman has been soloist with the orchestras of Philadelphia, Boston, Brisbane, Chicago, Hong Kong, Moscow, Mexico City, New York, San Francisco, Seoul and Shanghai. A medalist at the Tchaikovsky and Brussels competitions, his Jongen Concerto is included in a Cypres CD set of the 17 best prize-winning performances of the Brussels Concours’ 50-year history. He has performed at international festivals including Marlboro, Grant Park, Newport, Sarasota, AFCM (Australia), Akaroa (New Zealand), Budapest, Fuefukigawa, Montreux, Shanghai, Sheffield, and the Vienna Festwochen. He regularly participates in the Park City, Round Top and Sitka festivals in the U.S. Castleman’s long-term chamber music associations have included the New String Trio of NY and the Raphael Trio.

Castleman has recorded for Music and Arts, MusicMasters, Albany, BASF, Nonesuch, Sony Classical, Discover, Unicorn and ASV. He commissioned the David Amram Concerto, premiering it with Leonard Slatkin and the St. Louis Symphony and recording it for Newport Classic. His recitals have been broadcast on NPR, BBC, in Berlin and in Paris.

Castleman is founder-director of The Quartet Program, in its 40th season, an intensive workshop in solo and chamber performance. Yo-Yo Ma has praised it as “the best program of its kind ... a training ground in lifemanship.” He has conducted master classes in London, Vienna, Helsinki, Kiev, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Seoul, Tokyo, and throughout Australia, Canada and New Zealand.  His students have been winners at the Brussels, Munich, Naumburg and Szeryng competitions, are active in 30 chamber groups and are first desk players in 11 major orchestras.

His teachers were Emanuel Ondricek and Ivan Galamian; his most influential coaches David Oistrakh, Szeryng, and Gingold. He plays the “Marquis de Champeaux” Stradivarius from 1708.

Pianist Julie Nishimura celebrates 20 years as Faculty Accompanist for the Department of Music with more than 350 collaborative recitals and over 40 opera and scene study performances with the Opera Workshop and Opera Theatre. As secondary faculty, she teaches the Accompanying/Chamber Music and Sight-reading classes. A much sought-after collaborative artist, she has performed on the chamber music series of Carnegie's Weill Recital Hall, the Philadelphia Orchestra, Delaware Symphony and has been a guest artist at over 30 college campuses. Nishimura is a perennial favorite at the Delaware Chamber Music Festival, California Summer Music, and Strings International Music Festival, where she has given recitals with Hai-Ye Ni, Carrie Dennis, Harold Robinson and John Koen. As Co-Artistic Directors of the non-profit organization, Distant Voices Touring Theatre, she and her husband, writer-stage director Danny Peak, have produced over 100 shows for audiences nationally and internationally.

Upcoming projects include a recording of solo piano works for Albany Records, a performance of the Schumann Piano Quintet with the Copeland String Quartet, and guest artist with Camerata Philadelphia, and a special 20th Anniversary celebration at the University of Delaware.