Born in Riga, Ilya Grubert began his studies at the E. Darzin Music School. Considered a student of exceptional talent, at the age of fourteen he continued his training with the famous Russian teachers Yuri Yankelevich and Zinaida Gilel, and then under Leonid Kogan at the Moscow Conservatory. Ilya Grubert earned his first international success at the Helsinki Sibelius Prize in 1975. Subsequently, he won the first prize in two prestigious international competitions, the Genova Paganini and Moscow Tchaikovsky Competitions in 1978. He then embarked on a highly successful career, which has brought performances as a soloist with important orchestras, including the Moscow Philharmonic, St Petersburg Philharmonic, the Russian State Orchestra, the Dresden Staatskapelle Orchestra, the Rotterdam and the Helsinki Philharmonic, working with conductors such as Gennady Rozhdestvensky, Maxim Shostakovich, Yoel Levi, Voldemar Nelson, and Mariss Jansons. His concerts have included tours in the United States, Canada, Australia and throughout Europe.
Ilya Grubert has recorded for major record companies, with a repertoire that includes the Sibelius, Tchaikovsky and Bruch concertos and all Prokofiev’s violin compositions. In January 1996, he won the Golden Tuning Fork for his performance in the Sibelius and Bruch concertos. Ilya Grubert received much acclaim for his Naxos CD with violin concerto in D minor by Myaskovsky and G minor by Weinberg (8.557194). Other recordings include two Paganini concertos, the concerto by Arutunian and the Violin Concerto No. 1 of Prokofiev. He now lives in Holland, where he teaches at the Amsterdam Conservatory. He plays a 1740 violin by Pietro Guarnieri of Venice, formerly the property of Wieniawski.
