Lin/Castro-Balbi Duo

Saturday, January 31, 8:00 PM
Venue: Jonsson Performance Hall
Ticket: $15
Season: 2014-15

Pianist Gloria Lin and cellist Jesús Castro-Balbi have received critical acclaim for their performances around the world. Both are faculty members at Texas Christian University. They are founders of the music project Caminos del Inka, dedicated to promoting music of the Americas.

GLORIA LIN BIOGRAPHY

Piano, Chamber Music, Musicology

Taiwanese-born pianist Gloria Lin was educated at The Juilliard School, the Interlochen Arts Academy, the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor, the Manhattan School of Music, and earned her Doctor of Music degree at Indiana University-Bloomington. Her teachers include Rostislav Dubinsky, Joseph Kalischtein, Nina Lelchuk, Solomon Mikowsky, Aldo Parisot, and Gyorgy Sebok.

Dr. Lin is the winner of the Dora Zaslavsky Koch Piano Competition, the Chopin Council of Greater New York Competition, and was awarded the Grand Prize at the Young Keyboard Artist Association International Competition as well as the First Prize at the Taiwan National Youth Piano Competition. She received the Outstanding Achievement Award at the University of Michigan, and the United States Presidential Award at the Interlochen Arts Academy.

Dr. Lin has performed around the world from New York's Alice Tully Hall, Symphony Space, Kosciuszko Foundation, and the United Nations, to the Ford Center in Toronto, the Carlos Chavez Hall in Mexico City, and to France, Japan, Spain, and Venezuela. She is a regular guest artist at the International Music Festival in Morelia, Mexico; the Sociedad Filarmonica series in Lima, the University of Texas at Dallas, the Cliburn at the Modern, the Fort Worth Chamber Music Society, the TCU Faculty & Friends Chamber Music Series and the TCU Cellofest in Fort Worth. She has been featured on prominent national and international media, such as NPR's Performance Today, WNYC's Soundcheck, and Japan's public television NHK.

An active chamber musician, Dr. Lin is a founding member of the Lin / Castro-Balbi duo with cellist Jesús Castro-Balbi, and a member of the music project Caminos del Inka. She has collaborated with such noted artists as cellists Christopher Adkins, Andres Diaz, Marion Feldman, Patrick Jee, Brinton Smith, and violinists David Davidovici, Celeste Golden, Michael Shih, and Roland and Almita Vamos.

Dr. Lin serves on the piano faculty at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth and maintains an active private studio. During the summer, she teaches at Conservatory Music in the Mountains in Durango, Colorado.

JESÚS CASTRO-BALBI ?BIOGRAPHY

Hailed as "an exceptional cellist" (Dallas Morning News), "an artist of the first rank, who commanded a huge range of volume, timbre and emotions" (Fort Worth Star Telegram), and praised for his "rich and warm tone, with lots of variety of inflection and nuance" (New York Concert Review), cellist Jesús Castro-Balbi brings a dynamic presence to the international stage, as a much sought-after soloist, recitalist, chamber musician, mentor, adjudicator, and organizer. Recent highlight include features at the Lincoln Center Festival, Symphony Space and 11 appearances at Carnegie Hall in New York City, five visits to China, concerts at Leipzig's famed Gewandhaus, and at prestigious venues in Colombia, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Korea, Latvia, Mexico, and Peru. He performed as a soloist with the Aarhus, Aguascalientes, Cannes, Dallas, Fort Worth, Leipzig MDR, and Xalapa Symphony Orchestras, the Mexico City and the UNAM Philharmonic Orchestras, and the National Symphony in Lima. His favorite concert repertoire spans from the Bach Solo Suites, concertos by Haydn and Boccherini, the great romantics Dvorak and Elgar, to modern masters Dutilleux and Lutoslawski, while reserving a special place to chamber music and new music. To date he appears in 12 compact discs and has presented 46 premiere performances and premiere recordings including 12 works written for him by Esteban Benzecry, Martin Blessinger, Blaise Ferrandino, Robert Garwell, Luis-Jorge Gonzalez, Till Meyn, Andrés Posada, Robert Rodríguez, Edgar Valcárcel, and Samuel Zyman. In 2013-14, he champions a new concerto for cello and orchestra by Jimmy Lopez, The Lord of the Air.

?Jesús Castro-Balbi is the cellist of the Lin / Castro-Balbi Duo, of the Clavier Trio, and of the music project Caminos del Inka. Among other distinctions, Mr. Castro-Balbi is the winner of the Aldo Parisot Prize, the Salon de Virtuosi Award in New York, and of the First Prize at the Carlos Prieto International Cello Competition. Jesús Castro-Balbi is the first full-time cello professor at the Texas Christian University School of Music in Fort Worth, Texas, where he has developed a first rate studio of talented cellists from around the world. At TCU, he is also the founding artistic director of the TCU Cello Ensemble, the biennial TCU Cellofest, and of the Faculty & Friends Chamber Music Series. He received the 2008 Dean's Research and Creativity Award and the 2012 College of Fine Arts Award for Distinguished Achievement as a Creative Teacher and Scholar. In addition to his work at TCU, he leads the Carlos Prieto Mexican Cello Institute in Morelia, Mexico, conducts master-classes and lectures at Beijing's Central Conservatory, The Juilliard School, Paris Conservatoire, Leipzig's Hochschule, at the Yale School of Music, and teaches at Conservatory Music in the Mountains in Durango, Colorado, where he is also Associate Dean. He has adjudicated for the Sphinx Competition, the Carlos Prieto and the Lutoslawski International Cello Competitions.

Of Peruvian heritage, raised in France and now a US citizen, Jesús Castro-Balbi is a graduate of the Conservatoire National Supérieur at Lyon, Indiana University at Bloomington, Yale, and earned a Doctor of Musical Arts degree at The Juilliard School. He studied with Iseut Chuat, Marc Coppey, Jean Deplace, Aldo Parisot, Janos Starker, and members of the Amadeus, Borodine, Juilliard, Ravel and Tokyo String Quartets.

For more information contact:
Arts and Performance Office
utdarts@utdallas.edu
972-UTD-ARTS

Persons with disabilities may submit a request for accommodations to participate in this event at UT Dallas' ADA website. You may also call (972) 883-5331 for assistance or send an email to ADACoordinator@utdallas.edu. All requests should be received no later than 2 business days prior to the event.