Pamela Frank

The American violinist Pamela Frank has established an outstanding international reputation across an unusually varied range of performing activity. In addition to her extensive schedule of engagements with prestigious orchestras throughout the world and her recitals on the leading concert stages, she is regularly sought after as a chamber music partner by today’s most distinguished soloists and ensembles. The breadth of this accomplishment and her consistently high level of musicianship were recognized in 1999 with the Avery Fisher Prize, one of the highest honours given to American instrumentalists. She has appeared with leading American and European orchestras and has performed under many esteemed conductors. She appears often at numerous international festivals in Europe and the United States. In chamber music she works with her father, pianist Claude Frank, and appears regularly with the pianist Peter Serkin. Her other frequent collaborators, drawn from a large group of chamber music colleagues, include Yo-Yo Ma, Tabea Zimmermann and her husband, the violinist Alexander Simionescu. For many years she took part in the Marlboro Festival in Vermont as well as the subsequent Music from Marlboro tours. She also participated in several of the Isaac Stern chamber music seminars at Carnegie Hall and the Jerusalem Music Centre. Pamela Frank has a distinguished list of recordings to her credit, and a repertoire that demonstrates her affinity with contemporary music. Born in New York City, she is the daughter of noted pianists Claude Frank and Lilian Kallir. She began her violin studies at the age of five and after eleven years as a pupil of Shirley Givens continued her musical education with Szymon Goldberg and Jaime Laredo. In 1985 she formally launched her career with the first of her four appearances with Alexander Schneider and the New York String Orchestra at Carnegie Hall. A recipient of the Avery Fisher Career Grant in 1988, she graduated the following year from the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia.