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JOSHUA BELL: THE RESOUNDING CAREER OF A VIOLIN VIRTUOSO!
With a U.S. recital tour underway, look for his February 8 release of
"Romance of the Violin Dual Disc", which follows Billboard's
#1 Classical Album of the Year, "Romance of the Violin"
Barbara Bales
 World-renowned, Grammy-winning violinist Joshua Bell seems to possess Midas' Touch. Unlike some prodigies, who burst onto the scene...then disappear, Joshua's career continues to flourish. The gifted, 37-year-old (whom People magazine once named one of the "50 Most Beautiful in the World") tours globally, to the tune of 100-plus concerts per year. He is also an outstanding athlete, a video game champ (admitting, "My video game playing has taken a back seat lately.") and a veritable pinball wizard. (Okay, so he's got perfect pitch and great hand-eye and small-and-large-motor coordination!) Moreover, the Indiana-born violinist is the first classical artist to have appeared in a VH-1 video and his life story has been made into a BBC documentary. On Classical Countdown, radio station WQXR-FM's annual program, listeners voted his recording of the Beethoven Violin Concerto as Number 12 on their list of favorite works of classical music for 2004.
 In Billboard magazine's year-end issue, he was named the #1 2004 Classical Artist of the Year, with "Romance of the Violin" clocking in as the #1 Classical Album of the Year, topping the Billboard Classical Chart for three months. "Romance of the Violin" contains magnificent melodies (by Bach, Mozart, Puccini, Borodin and Chopin, among others) that match Joshua's magnificent playing...and on its heels is the highly-anticipated "Romance of the Violin Dual Disc", due out on This month, the Sony Classical artist begins his U.S. recital tour, making stops in the Metro area along the way. He will grace Long Island with a February 4th recital at Tilles Center For the Performing Arts (at Long Island University / C.W. Post) in Greenvale and on February 9th, he will perform at Avery Fisher Hall, Lincoln Center in Manhattan. For both recitals - as well as for a number of others -the repertoire will be the same and Joshua will be accompanied by pianist Jeremy Denk, with whom, he is "very excited to team up. I found about Jeremy Denk through friends of mine. My mother heard him play and she told me he was fantastic." The gentlemen will perform Brahms: Sonata No. 1 for Violin & Piano in G major, Op. 78, SAINT-SAËNS: Sonata No. 1 for Violin & Piano in D minor, Op. 75, and JANÁCEK: Sonata for Violin and Piano.
Also in 2005, Joshua joins the prestigious Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra as an Artistic Partner, where he will enjoy dual roles of soloist and conductor. "Three weeks a year, I will be conducting from the violin and leading them mostly from the violin. I am doing the same thing with St. Martin in the Fields, in Europe, where I'm leading from the instrument."
 The U.S. is poised to distribute the film, "Ladies in Lavender", which stars Dames Judy Dench and Maggie Smith and features Joshua on the soundtrack; perhaps it, too, will receive an Oscar Award. (More on that later....) Boasting an ever-growing catalog of recordings (over two dozen to date), Joshua has been a guest at the Kennedy Center Opera House...on Sesame Street...and most everywhere in between. He enjoys meeting with fans after each recital and loves to see young people in attendance. "A lot of young people don't know where to go to see a classical concert or they don't know what music to buy. Hopefully, by going on Sesame Street and by going into schools, where I talk to kids and play for them, it will encourage them to take up an instrument," he enthuses.
...Speaking of children and music, the proud owner of a 1713 Antonius Stradivarius instrument (his third Stradivarius) has had the opportunity to work on a computer-enhanced "hyperviolin" at the MIT Media Lab (visit: www.media.mit.edu/hyperins), an experience he describes as "very exciting....They combined technology with music in interesting ways that are promising for young kids....They had a music program that allowed kids to compose - without having to understand the rather complicated notation system we have - and to use a computer to free-associate, the way a young person might scribble when making art work at home....MIT would put on concerts and perform orchestral works of kids that put these things together."
 At age five, Joshua first played for the late violinist Josef Gingold, who ultimately became his teacher and mentor. Thus far, Professor Gingold's prize pupil has received a cascade of awards. Let's begin with Lincoln Center's Avery Fisher Artist Program Career Grant, which Joshua received in 1986. Then there's the Distinguished Alumni Service Award he received in 1991 by his alma mater, Indiana University. In 2000, the Indiana Living Legend Award was given to Joshua by the Indiana Historical Society. In 2001, he was handed the Echo Klassik Award for his recording of the Sibelius / Goldmark Violin Concertos. In 2002, "Joshua Bell: West Side Story Suite from Central Park" got an Emmy Nomination for Best Classical Music-Dance Program. His debut recording for Sony Classical, "Gershwin Fantasy", was nominated for Best Classical Crossover Album for the 41st Grammy Awards. For the 42nd Grammy Awards, Joshua, along with his friend, bassist / composer Edgar Meyer (whom Joshua has commissioned to write a piece for him) and bluegrass musicians Sam Bush and Mike Marshall, created "Short Trip Home", which got a Grammy nomination for Best Classical Crossover Album. At the 43rd Grammy Awards, Joshua's recording of Nicholas Maw's Violin Concerto picked up a Grammy for Best Instrumental Soloist Performance with Orchestra. On to the 44th Grammy Awards: his "West Side Story Suite" recording was nominated for Best Classical Crossover Album; it won a Grammy for Best Engineered Album, Classical. His collaborations with other Sony Classical artists have captured Grammys, as well: Best Spoken Word Album for Children (Wynton Marsalis' "Listen to the Storyteller"), Best Classical Crossover Album (Bela Fleck's "Perpetual Motion") and Best Instrumental Arrangement (Claude Debussy's "Doctor Gradus ad Parnassum" from "Children's Corner" on Bela Fleck's "Perpetual Motion").
The creme de la creme of classical music awards is the Gramophone Award and, yes, its Concerto Award was bestowed upon Joshua in 1998 for his recording of the Barber and Walton Violin Concertos and Bloch's "Baal Shem". Across the puddle, the British have their honors, too. The Mercury Music Prize is given out for the best in British music. Indeed, Joshua's recording of British composer Nicholas Maw's Violin Concerto won Classical Album of the Year in 2000.
And now, we present the Oscars: his performance on the soundtrack to the movie, "The Red Violin", helped garner an Oscar (in 2000) for the composer John Corigliano, who won for Best Original Score. "Joshua plays like a god," announced Mr. Corigliano of Mr. Bell.
 It is no surprise that Joshua will do a recital in which he combines works by composers separated by hundreds of years. "Sure. Sometimes it works really well, to mix things up like that. When I decide on a recital program I like to have variety...like a tasting menu. One could do an all-Brahms concert, or connect the music by very specific themes....I like to have contrasting pieces, yet pieces that seem to work together. That could mean a Baroque piece followed by a 20th-Century piece. For instance, on this program, I'm doing the Brahms G-Major Sonata - my single favorite sonata written for the violin - followed by the Saint-Saens D-Minor Sonata, which on paper, if you just see the two composers, one wouldn't think they'd work too well...but Saint-Saens is very classical in a way, incredibly varied and intense and Brahms is pastoral and beautiful." Likewise, when deciding on a recital program, he takes key relationships into account, as well. "G-Major followed by D-Minor, things that audiences might not be aware of." Joshua's love of the classics is shared by his passion for new music. "I want to play music that really moves me and that I connect with. I love being involved with new projects and working with composers and making recordings of new music, where fifty versions don't exist in the record store! Or working on new arrangements, like I did with Gershwin....or 'West Side Story'." He writes his own cadenzas, like he had for Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto in E Minor, Op. 64, one of the world's most beloved violin pieces. "I want to keep the concert hall from being a museum for old music. The public should feel like something new is happening," he maintains, noting that he will re-visit works, as well. "I recorded the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto when I was twenty and I will be re-recording it. It's like discovering something again." He refers to his live recording of the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto, with the Berlin Philharmonic, conducted by Michael Tilson Thomas, set for a June release.
Would the versatile virtuoso - who routinely pairs up with musicians outside the classical sphere (like Bobby McFerrin, James Taylor, Chick Corea and Edgar Meyer, to name a few) - consider working with a hard rock / heavy metal rock musician? "Yes, but it would have to be the right project. I want to keep the integrity of the music." Guitarist extraordinaire Eddie Van Halen (who also plays violin and piano, having won piano competitions as a kid) is among the rock musicians he admires. "I think he is fantastic." (Imagine what a sensation that would create, a collaboration between those two brilliant musicians?!)
As if he weren't busy enough, Joshua Bell aspires to "do more conducting and more composing." What kind of bow does a Stradivarius-wielding player use, anyway? "I use a Tourte bow, which is the best. A good bow is extremely important, almost as important as the violin itself." And what is the hardest part of mastering the violin? "It's all hard. Practice and you'll just get better." Visit: www.joshuabell.com
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