John Moran performs across the world with the Smithsonian Chamber Players and Orchestra, Folger Consort, Washington Bach Consort, New York Collegium, Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra, Les Musiciens du Louvre, The Consort of Musicke, and English Baroque Soloists. He is a member of REBEL,Violins of Lafayette, Capriole, Mensa Sonora, and Trio Riot, and he has recording credits include Dorian, Virgin Classics, Deutsche Grammophon, Erato, Deutsche Harmonia Mundi, and Musica Oscura. Dr. Moran contributed to the revised New Grove Dictionary of Music and authored a monograph on the history of cello playing for Yale University Press.
Dr. Moran earned a MusB from Oberlin Conservatory, a Soloist Diploma in Baroque Cello from the Schola Cantorum in Basel, Switzerland, and a PhD from King's College in London.
Amit Peled www.amitpeled.com
Cello
From the United States to Europe to the Middle East and Asia, Israeli cellist Amit Peled, a musician of profound artistry and charismatic stage presence, is acclaimed as one of the most exciting instrumentalists on the concert stage today. At 6'5" tall, Peled started life as a basketball player and was called "larger than life" when he enveloped his cello and "Jacqueline du Pré in a farmer's body." Peled often surprises audiences with the ways he breaks down barriers between performers and the public, making classical music more accessible to wider audiences. Tim Smith of the Baltimore Sun reflected on a recent performance: “Peled did a lot of joking in remarks to the audience. His amiable and inviting personality is exactly the type everyone says we’ll need more of if classical music is to survive. ”
During the 2014/15 season Mr. Peled will continue sharing with audiences around the world the sound of the historic cello of Pablo Casals. The instrument, a Goffriler ca. 1733, was personally handed to him by the Maestro’s widow, Mrs. Marta Casals Istomin. Some of the upcoming highlights with this historic cello include a 20 cities US recital tour entitled “Homage to Pablo Casals” culminating in a performance at the Kennedy Center in Washington, recording the Miaskovsky Cello Concerto for Naxos, and a return trip to Asia for recitals and performances with the National Symphony of Taiwan to name a few. As an advocate of modern music Mr. Peled will also premier a solo piece written especially for him by composer Lera Auerbach.
Mr. Peled has performed as a soloist with many orchestras and in the world’s major concert halls such as: Carnegie Hall and Alice Tully Hall, New York; Salle Gaveau, Paris; Wigmore Hall, London; Konzerthaus, Berlin; and Tel Aviv’s Mann Auditorium. Following his enthusiastically received Alice Tully Hall concerto debut playing the Hindemith cello concerto, the New York Times stated: “Glowing tone, a seductive timbre and an emotionally pointed approach to phrasing that made you want to hear him again.”
As a recording artist, Mr. Peled recently released his fourth Centaur Records CD, Collage, which follows three extremely successful installments, The Jewish Soul, Cellobration, and Reflections. As an active chamber musician, Peled is a founding member of the famed Tempest Trio with pianist Alon Goldstein and violinist Ilya Kaler. Their Dvorak CD on Naxos has been described as “ The best ‘Dumky’ on disc ever!”
Mr. Peled is also a frequent guest artist, performing and giving master classes at prestigious summer music festivals such as the Marlboro Music Festival, Newport Music Festival, Seattle Chamber Music Festival, Heifetz International Music Institute, Schleswig Holstein and Euro Arts Festivals in Germany, Gotland Festival in Sweden, Prussia Cove Festival in England, The Violoncello Forum in Spain, and the Mizra International Academy and Festival in Israel.
Amit Peled has been featured on television and radio stations throughout the world, including NPR’s “Performance Today,” WGBH Boston, WQXR New York, WFMT Chicago, Deutschland Radio Berlin, Radio France, Swedish National Radio & TV, and Israeli National Radio & TV.
One of the most sought after cello pedagogues, Mr. Peled is a Professor at the Peabody Conservatory of the Johns Hopkins University.
Alan Stepansky
Cello
Soloist, principal cellist, chamber musician, recording artist, and distinguished teacher, Alan Stepansky is known internationally as a musician whose multi-faceted career exemplifies the highest ideals of artistry, versatility, and devotion to teaching and mentoring the next generation of gifted young cellists. One of the most inspiring cellists of his generation, he has appeared as a guest artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, the Mostly Mozart Festival, the Washington National Gallery of Art, the Frick Museum, Camerata Pacifica, Brooklyn's Bargemusic, and Jazz at Lincoln Center, and has performed in concert with a diverse array of artists across many genres from Isaac Stern, Emanuel Ax, Renee Fleming, Frederika Von Stade, Ruth Laredo, Glenn Dicterow and the American and Takacs String Quartets, to such pop icons as Sting, Bruce Springsteen, and Natalie Merchant. After becoming Principal Cellist of the Boston Pops under John Williams and a frequent performer in the Boston Symphony Orchestra in his early twenties, he rose to prominence in the orchestral world a few years later, when he was chosen by music director Zubin Mehta to be the Associate Principal Cellist of the New York Philharmonic. After ten years of combining this position with many solo, chamber music, and teaching oportunities, he decided to devote more time to his involvement in teaching while simultaneously expanding into a wider range of performing and recording activities. He is currently Professor of Cello at both the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University and the Manhattan School of Music, and is cello faculty artist of one of the world's most prestigious summer festivals, the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, California.
He has recorded a series of chamber music and solo discs for EMI which were honored by Gramophone Magazine, BBC Magazine, The New York Times, and the British Music Industry Association, and has been engaged as the solo cellist for numerous major motion picture soundtracks, including such films as Adaptation, August Rush, Being John Malkovich, The Brave One, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, The Good Shepherd, Kinsey, The Last Holiday, Manchurian Candidate, Michael Collins, Moonrise Kingdom, Music Of The Heart, Primary Colors, The Rookie, A Serious Man, Titanic, True Grit, and many others. He has also appeared on the albums of numerous recording artists across many genres, including Bruce Springsteen, David Byrne, Natalie Merchant, Audra McDonald, Judy Kuhn, Joss Stone, Shawn Colvin, Lou Reed, and Sting, and is a featured artist on Sting’s latest CD, “The Last Ship”.
Dedicated to the idea that music should be used to help raise consciousness and funds for meaningful social causes, he serves on the Board of Directors of Music for Life International, and recently appeared as the Principal Cellist for five major fund-raising events held in Carnegie Hall - Beethoven's Ninth for South Asia, Requiem for Darfur, Mahler for the Children of AIDS, Beethoven for the Indus Valley, and Shostakovich for the Children of Syria - all featuring an international orchestra drawn from leading symphonic, chamber music, and solo artists from around the world. After studies at the Curtis Institute of Music and the University of Pennsylvania, Mr. Stepansky graduated from Harvard University with a degree in music theory and musicology and the Horblit Prize, conferred for his outstanding musical accomplishments. His teachers included Orlando Cole, Laurence Lesser, Leon Kirchner, and Harvey Shapiro. Among recent engagements, he returned to perform as soloist with the Boston Pops Orchestra in Symphony Hall, and has appeared as soloist with the New York Philharmonic and many other orchestras.
A guest at many summer festivals, he has appeared at the Texas Music Festival, Domaine Forget Festival in Quebec, the Heifetz Institute, the National Orchestral Institute, and as the international cello artist of the Beijing International Music Festival in Beijing and Shanghai. He has given master classes in conservatories and university music departments around the world, including the Hong Kong Academy, Tokyo's Toho School, and Faculdades De Artes Alcantara Machado in Sao Paulo, Brazil, as well as at Rutgers' Mason Gross School of the Arts, University of Delaware, and Harvard University; he also recently served as a visiting faculty artist at the New World Symphony in Miami, Florida. As a teacher, Mr. Stepansky works intensely and energetically with his students to help them reach their potential both as expressive artists and as instrumentalists seeking the mastery of technique and style necessary to meet the practical demands of a multi-faceted career as a cellist active in many genres. His students have won positions in numerous orchestras in the United States, Europe, and Asia, including the New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, Seattle Symphony, St. Louis Symphony, Montreal Symphony, Shanghai Symphony, Orchestre Symphonique de Quebec, and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and have successful careers as soloists, chamber musicians, and teachers.
