Alexandru Tomescu
Violinist/Romania
STATE SOLOIST OF ROMANIA • iPalpiti alumnus
“Alexandru Tomescu is a great artist, an ambassador of Romanian culture. Together with his violin he went throughout Europe and America and changed people’s views of Romania”-Kansan Uutiset, Helsinki, Finland
Alexandru Tomescu returns to iPalpiti and Disney Hall after establishing himself as an international “violin superstar” (Berliner Morgenpost). A former student of Eduard Schmieder and Tibor Varga, Tomescu was an iPalpiti soloist early in his career, in iPalpiti’s first festival in 1998. Since then, he has gone on to perform in the world’s leading concert halls, including Carnegie Hall, the Concertgebouw, Tokyo’s Metropolitan Arts Center, collaborating with conductors such as Valery Gergiev, Kurt Masur, Maxim Vengerov and Christoph Eschenbach. The winner of no fewer than 27 international competitions, he was presented in 2007 with the Stradivarius Elder-Voicu violin, which makes its Los Angeles debut in this festival.
Since returning to his native Romania, he has made it his mission to demonstrate that classical music is a world open to everyone, and one that fosters harmony across national and cultural borders. As a kind of Romanian musical ambassador, he and the Stradivarius he performs on have visited many of the world’s capitals, uniting the sound of an extraordinary instrument to Tomescu’s deep musical sensibility.
Tomescu has brought both conventional and unconventional means to his mission, deftly combining innovation and tradition. He played in a subway station to demonstrate the continuing appeal of classical music, not just to the cognoscenti, but to all. He has performed to raise funds for the Romanian Association for the Blind, and to fund hearing aids for children.
His efforts are not limited to performing; he is also a sought-after musical commentator in the press and on radio and television, addressing what it means to be an artist in the 21st century, how musical inspiration is developed, and why classical music continues to be a critical cultural force.
His powerful musical style may be best summarized by a quote about a single exemplary concert: “Alexandru Tomescu makes uncommon music out of Paganini’s Caprices, playing up contrasts, letting each phrase live and breathe. I expected an evening of champagne bubbles. Tomescu serves up whiskey” (David Larsen-Metro Magazine, New Zealand).