Shulamit Ran, Soliloquy
THE NOVARTE TRIO
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The Novarte Trio was founded by Hannah Shields, Luis Esnaola and Sébastien Gingras in 2004. They were a resident trio at the Great Lakes Chamber Music Festival in 2005, and an honors ensemble at the New England Conservatory. They gave a recital in Jordan Hall in 2006. |
Luis Esnaola
Violinist Luis Esnaola debuted as a soloist with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra conducted by Lopez Cobos at age ten. As a guest soloist, he has also performed with Canada’s National Arts Centre Orchestra in the Aronoff Center for the Arts. In Europe, he has performed with the Pablo Sarasate Orchestra, the Philharmonic Orchestra of Gran Canaria, conducted by Adrian Leaper, and with the Spanish Radio Television Orchestra, which was broadcast on Spanish national television.
Mr. Esnaola was the youngest prize winner in the history of the Sarasate International Violin Competition, as well as recipient of the audience prize. He has also been awarded several other prizes: He won first prize in both the solo as well as the chamber music division of the German National Competition “Jugend Musiziert”, and was invited to perform at the Gewandhaus in Leipzig at a concert broadcast by Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk. He was also a finialist at the New York Philharmonic Young Artist Solo Competition at Avery Fisher Hall and recipient of the Special Prizes of the German Savings Banks, Deutsche Stiftung Musikleben of Hamburg and Imbusch Stiftung of Schleswig-Holstein.
He was invited to perform during the 2002 National Arts Awards Gala in New York City, and for the 2003 Canada Day Gala in Ottawa’s Southam Hall. He has also performed in recitals at Weill Recital Hall, Yale University and at the Kursaal in San Sebastian. A devoted chamber musician, Mr. Esnaola performs as a member of the Novarte Piano Trio and has collaborated with musicians of the Cleveland String Quartet, the Takacs Quartet, the American String Quartet, and the Peabody Trio.
Luis Esnaola’s primary music studies took place in Germany and continued in Madrid with Joaquin Torre, until he moved to the United States in the year 2000. Currently, he is a student of Donald Weilerstein at the New England Conservatory. Earlier he studied with Pinchas Zukerman and Patinka Kopec at the Manhattan School of Music. Since 2001, he has been a member of the Itzhak Perlman Music Program, traveling to China and performing at the Kennedy Center in Washington. Mr. Esnaola has participated in master classes with Yfrah Neaman, Dorothy DeLay, Ruggiero Ricci, Pinchas Zukerman and Itzhak Perlman, and has taken part in music festivals such as the Sarasota, Yellow Barn, Great Lakes, and Aspen.
Sébastien Gingras
Canadian cellist Sébastien Gingras grew up in Chicoutimi, Québec, and went to school at the Conservatoire de Musique. He graduated in 2003 from the class of David Ellis, the cellist of the Alcan String Quartet, and moved to the United States to study with Laurence Lesser at the New England Conservatory, where he was the recipient of the Gregor Piatigorsky Scholarship. He received the Master of Music degree in 2005.
From 2001 to 2003 Mr. Gingras was a
member of the Saguenay-Lac-St-Jean Symphony
Orchestra in Québec. In 2002 he served as principal
cellist of the National Youth Orchesta of Canada on
a tour of Japan and Hong Kong, and in performances
throughout Canada.
Mr. Gingras has won top prizes in many solo competitions, including the Montreal Symphony Orchestra Competition, the Festival de musique du Royaume, and the Canadian Music Competition. In 2005, he performed the Brahms Double Concerto with the NEC Orchestra in Jordan Hall. On several occasions Mr. Gingras performed in recitals broadcast by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, and he has joined the Alcan String Quartet in performances of Schubert’s String Quintet and Tchaikovsky’s Souvenir de Florence.
Mr. Gingras is a co-founder of the Novarte Trio. He has participated in such festivals as the Domaine Forget festival, the Yellow Barn Chamber Music Festival, the New York String Orchestra Seminar, and the Great Lakes Chamber Music Festival. Mr. Gingras has worked with Donald and Vivian Weilerstein, Will Fedkenheuer, Laurence Lesser, Soovin Kim, Paul Katz and Jeremy Denk. He has taken master classes with such artists as Jaime Laredo, Pamela Frank, Joseph Silverstein, Andrés Diaz, Anthony Marwood and Isidore Cohen.