Ilya Kaler Violin
Present
Ilya Kaler has won many awards including first prizes and Gold Medals at the Tchaikovsky (1986), Sibelius (1985) and Paganini (1981) competitions. Born into a family of musicians in Moscow, he studied at the Moscow Conservatory. Mr. Kaler has appeared as soloist with major orchestras throughout the world including the Leningrad, Moscow and Dresden Philharmonic Orchestras, the Montreal Symphony, the Danish and Berlin Radio Orchestras, the Detroit, Seattle and Baltimore Symphonies, and the Moscow and Zurich Chamber Orchestras. His solo recitals have taken him throughout the former Soviet Union, the United States, East Asia, Europe, Latin America, South Africa and Israel. Mr. Kaler’s recordings include the Paganini Caprices, sonatas by Schumann, Brahms and Bach, concertos by Paganini, Shostakovich, Tchaikovsky, Brahms, Schumann, Dvorák and Glazunov. An active chamber musician, he has appeared at many music festivals throughout the United States and Europe. His orchestral career includes guest concertmaster appearances with the San Francisco and Baltimore Symphonies, the Philadelphia Orchestra, and regular tours with the World Orchestra for Peace under the direction of Valery Gergiev. He was the concertmaster of the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra for 5 years. Mr. Kaler has been a Professor of Violin at the Indiana University School of Music in Bloomington, the Eastman School of Music in Rochester and is currently a Professor of Violin at the DePaul University School of Music in Chicago. He performs on a 1735 Guarnerius del Gesu violin on generous loan from the Stradivari Society of Chicago.