Kristin Lee Performs WEST SIDE STORY Suite With The Amarillo Symphony

On Friday, February 22, 2019 and Saturday, February 23, 2019, violinist Kristin Lee makes her debut as soloist with the Amarillo Symphony at Globe-News Center for the Performing Arts (500 S Buchanan Street). Led by music director Jacomo Bairos, Lee performs Leonard Bernstein's West Side Story Suite with the orchestra. This arrangement was created by illustrious film composer David Newman, son of Hollywood composing legend Alfred Newman and cousin of Randy Newman, for violinist Sarah Chang in 2011. Based both on the stage musical and the movie, it is full of exciting, energetic passages balanced with lyrical songs. according to Chang notes, "What I love about David's writing is that David himself is a violinist. He knows the instrument very well and he comes from a huge Hollywood composing family. He's been immersed in Bernstein, and he's the approved composer-conductor by the Bernstein estate."

This all-American program also features Richard Danielpour's Toward the Splendid City and Aaron Copland's Symphony No. 3.

A recipient of the 2015 Avery Fisher Career Grant, as well as a top prizewinner of the 2012 Walter W. Naumburg Competition and the Astral Artists' 2010 National Auditions, Kristin Lee is a violinist of remarkable versatility and impeccable technique who enjoys a vibrant career as a soloist, recitalist, chamber musician, and educator. "Her technique is flawless, and she has a sense of melodic shaping that reflects an artistic maturity," writes the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and The Strad reports, "She seems entirely comfortable with stylistic diversity, which is one criterion that separates the run-of-the-mill instrumentalists from true artists."

Kristin Lee has appeared as soloist with leading orchestras including The Philadelphia Orchestra, St. Louis Symphony, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, New Jersey Symphony, Rochester Philharmonic, Milwaukee Symphony,

Tacoma Symphony, Hong Kong Philharmonic, Nordic Chamber Orchestra of Sweden, Ural Philharmonic of Russia, Korean Broadcasting Symphony, Guiyang Symphony Orchestra of China, Orquesta Sinfonica Nacional of Dominican Republic, and many others. She has performed on the world's finest concert stages, including Carnegie Hall, Avery Fisher Hall, the Kennedy Center, Philadelphia's Kimmel Center, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Steinway Hall's Salon de Virtuosi, Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, the Ravinia Festival, Philadelphia's World Cafe Live, Le Poisson Rouge in New York, the Louvre Museum in Paris, Washington, D.C.'s Phillips Collection, and Korea's Kumho Art Gallery. An accomplished chamber musician, Kristin Lee is a member of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, performing at Lincoln Center in New York and on tour with CMS throughout each season.

Highlights of Lee's 2018-19 season include performances presented by the San Francisco Symphony with Itzhak Perlman, Town Hall Seattle, Chamber Music Sedona, Parlance Chamber Concerts, Lyra Music Festival, Olympic Music Festival, North Carolina New Music Initiative,

and a return to the Moab Music Festival.

Reflecting on both her personal journey and her professional journey, Kristin Lee has developed a new project, Americana, which showcases a spectrum of illustrious composers and the American musical styles which influenced them, as well as their own musical styles which influenced generations of composers to come. As a foreign-born citizen of America, Lee was compelled to select this unique collection of works to express her pride of the country she now calls her own, and offers recital programs that have a distinct and recognizable sound of American music and its rich history.

Lee's many honors include awards from the 2015 Trondheim Chamber Music Competition, 2011 Trio di Trieste Premio International Competition, the SYLFF Fellowship, Dorothy DeLay Scholarship, the Aspen Music Festival's Violin Competition, the New Jersey Young Artists' Competition, and the Salon de Virtuosi Scholarship Foundation. She is also the unprecedented First Prize winner of three concerto competitions at The Juilliard School - in the Pre-- College Division in 1997 and 1999, and in the College Division in 2007.

Born in Seoul, Lee began studying the violin at the age of five, and within one year won First Prize at the prestigious Korea Times Violin Competition. In 1995, she moved to the United States and continued her musical studies under Sonja Foster. Two years later, she became a student of Catherine Cho and Dorothy DeLay in The Juilliard School's Pre-College Division. In January 2000, she was chosen to study with Itzhak Perlman. Lee holds a Master's degree from The Juilliard School. She is a member of the faculty of the Aaron Copland School of Music at Queens College and the co-founder and artistic director of Emerald City Music in Seattle.

For more information, visit www.violinistkristinlee.com.

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