Bella Hristova, violin
Gloria Chien, piano
Acclaimed for her passionate, powerful performances, Bella Hristova is “a player of impressive power and control” (The Washington Post). She makes her Phillips debut with pianist Gloria Chien.
Artist Photo
Program
About the Artist
Acclaimed for her passionate, powerful performances, beautiful sound, and compelling command of her instrument, violinist Bella Hristova is a young musician with a growing international career as a soloist and recording artist. Her talent has been recently recognized with a prestigious 2013 Avery Fisher Career Grant, given to outstanding instrumentalists and based on excellence alone. The Strad has praised, “Every sound she draws is superb”, and The Washington Post’s The Classical Beat has stated she is “a player of impressive power and control.”
A sought after chamber musician, Hristova was selected as a member of CMS Two and has frequently performed chamber music at Lincoln Center, as well as at The Grand Teton Festival, Music@Menlo, Ravinia’s Steans Institute, Music from Angel Fire, the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, and Marlboro Music Festival. She has appeared multiple times on Garrison Keillor’s A Prairie Home Companion on National Public Radio.
Born in Pleven, Bulgaria, in 1985 to Russian and Bulgarian parents, Hristova began violin studies at the age of six. At 12, she participated in master classes with Ruggiero Ricci at the Mozarteum in Salzburg. In 2003, she entered The Curtis Institute of Music, where she worked with Ida Kavafian and studied chamber music with Steven Tenenbom. She received her Artist Diploma with Jaime Laredo at Indiana University in 2010. Hristova plays a 1655 Nicolò Amati violin, once owned by the violinist Louis Krasner.
Watch & Listen
In 2013, Bella Hristova won the Avery Fisher Career Grant. In this video, the violinist talks about the pieces she performed: John Corigliano’s “Red Violin Caprices” and an arrangement of George Gershwin’s “It Ain’t Necessarily So” from the opera Porgy and Bess.