In 1979 he succeeded his master André Navarra as cello teacher at the Conservatoire de Paris. His more than three decades teaching at the Conservatoire allowed him to train an impressive number of young cellists. Many of them, such as Xavier Phillips and Gautier Capuçon, for example, now have remarkable individual careers.
Philippe Muller has been invited to give master classes in prestigious institutions around the world, particularly in Kyoto, Japan, where for twenty-two years he has been involved in an academy of french music. Many international festivals invite him regularly. He performs mostly in Europe, but also in Canada, the United States, Latin America, Japan, and Korea.
Mr. Muller’s extensive discography reflects his personality, presenting a range of works from Vivaldi, Beethoven, and Brahms to Fauré, Ravel, Martinu, Malec, and Merlet, not to mention the complete suites of J. S. Bach.
He plays a 1756 Gennaro Gagliano.
Fred Sherry
A pioneer and a visionary in the music world, cellist Fred Sherry has introduced audiences worldwide to the music of our time through his close association with today’s composers. Elliott Carter, Mario Davidovsky, Steven Mackey, David Rakowski, Somei Satoh, Charles Wuorinen, and John Zorn have written concertos for Sherry, and he has premiered solo and chamber works dedicated to him by Milton Babbitt, Derek Bermel, Lukas Foss, Oliver Knussen, Peter Lieberson, and Toru Takemitsu, among others.
Mr. Sherry was a founding member of Tashi and Speculum Musicae; a member of the Group for Contemporary Music, Berio’s Juilliard Ensemble, and the Galimir String Quartet; and a close collaborator with jazz pianist and composer Chick Corea. He has been an active performer with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center since the 1970s and was the artistic director from 1988 to 1992.
Fred Sherry created the series “Bach Cantata Sundays” at St. Ann’s Church and conceived and directed the acclaimed “Arnold Schoenberg: Conservative Radical” series at Merkin Concert Hall. He was the creator and director of “A Great Day in New York,” the groundbreaking festival featuring 52 living composers presented by the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and Merkin Concert Hall.
In his recording career, Fred Sherry has been a soloist and sideman on hundreds of commercial and esoteric recordings on RCA, Columbia, Vanguard, CRI, Albany, Bridge, ECM, New World, Arabesque, Delos, Vox, Koch, and Naxos. The Fred Sherry String Quartet recordings of the Schoenberg String Quartet Concerto and the String Quartets Nos. 3 and 4 were both nominated for a Grammy.
Mr. Sherry’s duet book, The Bach Method (Boosey & Hawkes, 2011) will be followed by a long-awaited treatise on contemporary string techniques.
Alan Stepansky
Alan Stepansky is recognized as one of the most gifted cellists of his generation. Whether performing as soloist, recitalist, or chamber musician, “he plays with great inward concentration and intensity, utter authority, and a beautiful, warm tone” (Strings Magazine). Mr. Stepansky recently completed a distinguished nine-year tenure as the New York Philharmonic’s associate principal cellist and made his solo debut with the Philharmonic under Kurt Masur during the 1992–93 season. Earlier, he was featured as a soloist with John Williams and the Pops Esplanade Orchestra and became principal cellist of the Boston Pops at age 24.
Mr. Stepansky has concertized in major cities such as New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Pittsburgh, and Montreal, with recitals broadcast by National Public Radio and the CBC. He has been a guest artist of the Mostly Mozart Festival and has appeared in many of the nation’s most prestigious chamber music series, including the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Washington National Gallery, the Frick Museum in Pittsburgh, Bargemusic (Brooklyn, New York), New York Philomusica, and the New York Philharmonic Ensembles. His multidisc recording project for the EMI label got off to an auspicious start in July 1995, when his CD of the Korngold Trio with violinist Glenn Dicterow and pianist Israela Margalit was featured as Editor’s Choice by Gramophonemagazine and then honored as Chamber Music Record of the Year by the British Music Industry Association. BBC Magazine awarded four stars to his performance of the Barber Cello Sonata, later featured as a Critic’s Choice by the New York Times. He has also recorded for the Cala and Elysium labels.
Mr. Stepansky’s teachers have included Orlando Cole, Laurence Lesser, and Harvey Shapiro. After studies at the Curtis Institute of Music and the University of Pennsylvania, he graduated from Harvard University with the Horblit Prize, conferred for his outstanding musical accomplishments and subsequently taught at Harvard and MIT. Increasingly in demand as a teacher as well as a performer, he is currently professor of cello at the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University and at Manhattan School of Music. At Manhattan School, he is a founding faculty member of the groundbreaking Orchestral Performance Program, a highly successful degree program for instrumental majors that focuses on the art of high-level orchestral playing and audition taking. In 1999, he founded and directed the Peabody Strings, a student chamber orchestra at Peabody Conservatory. A frequent guest lecturer at The Juilliard School, he recently conducted master classes at the Toho School in Tokyo, the Hong Kong Academy, and the Faculdades de Artes Alcantara Machado in São Paulo. He was a guest speaker and featured artist at the Sixth American Cello Congress. In the summer of 2002, he presented master classes at the National Orchestral Institute and at the Domain Forget in Quebec.
Manhattan School of Music faculty since 1991.
Frederick Zlotkin
Frederick Zlotkin, winner of the International Music Competition at Geneva, is recognized as one of today’s outstanding cellists. Among the highlights of his wide-ranging musical career are solo engagements with l’Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, the Minnesota Orchestra, the National Symphony Orchestra, and the St. Louis Symphony; chamber music appearances as a member of the Lyric Piano Quartet; guest artist with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, the Aspen Music Festival, Chicago’s Ravinia Festival, and the Minnesota Sommerfest; and his post, for over forty years, as Solo Cellist for the New York City Ballet at Lincoln Center. He also performs regularly as a substitute with the New York Philharmonic.
Zlotkin, who earned his bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees from the Juilliard School, studied with Gregor Piatigorsky, Leonard Rose, and Channing Robbins. He is the only present-day cellist who performs Bach’s Six Suites for Solo Cello with full ornamentation; his recording of that work has been hailed as “one of the most gratifying Bach performances on records.” A member of the faculties of Manhattan School of Music, Queens College, and the Brooklyn College of Music, he has also served as adjunct professor at SUNY Purchase and as music director of the Montauk Chamber Music Festival. He has been on the Manhattan School of Music faculty since 1983.
