Hiromi Kikuchi

violin

Hiromi Kikuchi began learning the violin at the age of three and won the National Competition of Japan at the age of ten. She studied with Saschko Gawriloff, Henryk Szeryng, Nathan Milstein, and members of the Amadeus Quartet. After she won various international competitions, she first appeared as a soloist in Europe, the United States, and Japan. She has made guest appearances at many international festivals, including in Salzburg, Paris, Vienna, Berlin, Edinburgh, Aldeburgh, Lucerne, Budapest, and Milan. György Kurtág, with whom she worked for many years, wrote various pieces for her, including …concertante… for violin, viola and orchestra, and the violin partita Hipartita—the title is made up of the first syllable of her name, Hi, and the word Partita, which designates a sequence of several pieces in the same key. 

Ms. Kikuchi performed …concertante… with the La Scala Orchestra in Milan and received the Italian National Association of Music Critics’ Franco Abbiati Prize prize for it. She has also performed the work with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam, the Radio Symphony Orchestra Vienna, the Konzerthaus Orchestra Berlin, the BBC Symphony Orchestra London, and the Asko Schönberg Ensemble at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. Since the premiere of Hipartita at the Berliner Festspiele, she has performed the work as a soloist in Carnegie Hall in New York, as well as in Vienna, Paris, Madrid, Budapest, Milan, and London. 

Ms. Kikuchi won the German Critics’ Prize and the Dutch Edison Prize. Her recording of Kurtág’s Signs, Games and Messages with her husband was voted one of the best new Classical releases of 2003 by The New York Times.

Ms. Kikuchi will perform with The Orchestra Now on April 29, 2023.

Bio: April 2023