First Prize winner of Denmark’s 1996 Carl Nielsen International violin Competition, Adele Anthony, enjoys a rapidly expanding and acclaimed worldwide career. Among the highlights of her current season are important debuts with the Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra, Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra, The Richmond Symphony and the El Paso, Long beach and Roanoke Symphony Orchestras. At the age of 10, Adele Anthony played in a Royal Command Performance before HRH Prince Charles. Subsequent to her 1983 debut with the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, she has appeared as soloist, both in home halls and on tour, with all six symphony orchestras of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (Sydney, Melbourne, Queensland, West Australian, Tasmanian, Adelaide) as well as the Australian Youth Orchestra. She has also performed frequently with New Zealand’s Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra and toured that country with Singapore Symphony Orchestra, followed by her debut with the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra. In Europe, she has been heard with Orchestra Philharmonique de Radio France, the NDR Orchestra Hannover, Denmark’s Aalborg, Odense and Sonderjylands Symfoniorkesters, and Finland’s Kuopio Symphony Orchestra, and has appeared at the Davos International Music Festival in Switzerland. Miss Anthony has collaborated with several of today’s most distinguished conductors, among them: Lawrence Foster, Piero Gamba, Hiroyuki Iwaki, Marek Janowski, Jorge Mester, Thomas Sanerling, Herbert Soudant, Stanislaw Skrowaczewski.
Adele Anthony began playing the violin at the age of 2 1/2 in Tasmania. She studied with Beryl Kimber as an Elder Conservatorium Scholar at the University of Adelaide until 1987, and has attended the Aspen Music Festival several times as a Staling Fellow. At New York’s famed Juilliard School, Miss Anthony worked with three eminent teachers: Dorothy DeLay, Felix Falimir and Hyo Kang. She was also the recipient of the School’s Staring Foundation, Dorothy DeLay, Lincoln Center and Fritz Kreisler Scholarships.
At 13, Adele Anthony was the youngest winner of the ABC Instrumental and Vocal Competition, performing the Sibelius Violin Concerto with the Queensland Symphony Orchestra; the prize also included a live national telecast of the Tchaikovsky Concerto. In 1990, she was invited by the National Arts Club in New York City to perform at the presentation of its Medal of Honor to Zubin Mehta. Miss Anthony has been the recipient of awards from The Australia Council, the South Australian Government and The Queen’s Trust. She was the winner of the 1992 Aspen Music Festival Walton Competition, and subsequently performed the concerto at the Festival. She won Second Prize of the "Grand Prix Jacques Thibaud" at the 1993 Jacques Thibaud International Violin Competition in Paris and was a prize winner at the 1994 Hannover International Violin Competition.
Adele Anthony is also an active recording artist, whose artistry is represented on several important CDs. In the spring of 2000, Naxos released her recording of the Philip Glass Violin Concerto (8.554568) with Takuo Yuasa and the Ulster Orchestra, which followed that label’s earlier release of an all-Schubert album (8.554148). During the summer of 1999, her recording of Arvo Part’s Tabular Rasa with Gil Shaham, Neeme Jarvi and the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra was issued on Deutsche Grammophon, quickly followed by her Centaur recording of the Nielsen Violin Concerto with Dori Matson and the New York Scandia Symphony. She has also recorded Paganini’s Concerto no.1 for ABC Classics Polygram, and the Faure Sonata no.1 from the 1993 Long-Thibaud Competition was released on the REM label.
Adele Anthony performs on an outstanding violin the Guarneri del Gesu, Cremona, 1735, ex Mary Portman, which is on extended loan to her from Mr. Clement Arrison through The Stradivari Society, 410 South Michigan Avenue, Chicago, IL 60605. The Stradivari society is a unique organization that supports the highest level of string playing by seeking Patrons who will acquire and make available to artists of exceptional talent and ability the most precious antique Italian instruments. Adele Anthony is married to the renowned violinist Gil Shaham. They make their home in New York City.
Further Information
Violinist Adele Anthony used to follow her father around the house as he practised the violin, imitating him with a brush and comb.Today, however, she lists her preferred leisure activities as watching films and playing video games—although she also likes to read. She indulges herself by eating and sleeping. Her favourite authors are Dick Francis and Somerset Maugham. Cricket, that most English of sports, is her favourite, although it is the food of India that she likes the most. In cooking she considers her specialities to be both Indian and Chinese, and likes both wine and beer, especially those from Australia. She can speak a little French, although her main non-musical goal is to learn Mandarin Chinese—perhaps so that she can eat the food in its home country!
She lives in New York city with her husband, violinist Gil Shaham. Their friends are mostly musicians, and she feels that if she weren’t a musician she would be a doctor. Every day begins, after breakfast, with checking the computer.
She likes to holiday anywhere, although particularly dislikes packing and unpacking—one of the perils of the job, being a professional musician! She is stimulated by the visual as well as the aural, and the thing in the world that she would most like to see in the world is the Aurora Borealis, the so-called Northern Lights. She also greatly likes the work of the artist Miro. Her tastes in music are similarly eclectic, and not limited to classical music.
She enjoys performing, and prefers working on stage to a recording studio. If she had to choose a work to perform more often it would be the Walton concerto, although the composers she most admires are Bach, Beethoven and Brahms. If she could meet someone she had never met, it would be legendary violinist Fritz Kreisler.
