Tutunov & Friends features: Kinga Augustyn, violin & Alexander Tutunov, piano

The Tutunov Piano Series is pleased to welcome violinist Kinga Augustyn on Friday, November 3, 2023. She will perform in a combined concert with Dr. Alexander, piano at the SOU Music Recital Hall at 7:30pm. A livestream is available for this performance.

Kinga Augustyn Polish-American Kinga Augustyn is a versatile New York City-based virtuoso concert violinist and recording artist. “Stylish and vibrant” (The Strad Magazine), and “beyond amazing, one hell of a violinist!” (The Fanfare Magazine), Augustyn has performed as a soloist with orchestras in the United States, Europe and Asia, and they include the Roanoke Symphony Orchestra, Queens Symphony Orchestra, Catskill Symphony Orchestra, Deutsches Kammerorchester Berlin, Magdeburg Philharmonic Orchestra, the Chamber Orchestra Leopoldinum, and the Wroclaw Philharmonic Orchestra. She has toured China and performed at China’s most prestigious venues such as Beijing Poly Theater and Shanghai Oriental Art Center. As a recitalist and chamber musician Kinga has appeared at the Stern Auditorium and the Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Aspen Music Festival, the Chicago Cultural Center, Teatro Ristori and Gran Teatro La Fenice. In addition to concerti with orchestras and recitals with piano, Ms. Augustyn frequently performs unaccompanied solo violin recitals and is also a member of the Baroque Virtuosity trio with lutist Christopher Morrongiello and harpsichordist Rebecca Pechefsky. Augustyn is often praised for her musical interpretations, profundity, deft phrasing, beautiful tone, mastery of the bow, perfect intonation, and for unique programming ideas. “With completely secure technical control, she couples a tapestry of tone color to her innate musicality” (The Fanfare Magazine). Music Web International describes her recording of the Bruch Violin Concerto with Janacek Philharmonic as “extremely moving and expressive,” characterized by “beauty, richness and smoothness of her tone,” and as “music she responds to on a deeply personal and emotional level.” Augustyn’s repertoire includes music both standard and lesser–known, stylistically varied and ranging from early baroque to contemporary. Kinga is an advocate of new music and has performed and recorded multiple world premieres of works written especially for her. She also researches and brings awareness to lesser-known composers, including those of her native Poland. Up to date, Augustyn has recorded three albums of Polish music. Grazyna Bacewicz: A Portrait was released in 2022 on Centaur Records. The other two albums, released on Naxos, are world premieres by the contemporary Polish composer Romuald Twardowski (b. 1930), recorded with the Torun Symphony Orchestra and Mariusz Smolij, and the Polish Violin Music, a highly praised, “fascinating” (The Strad) album of lesser-known Polish works. In 2021 Augustyn released on Centaur Records Turning in Time, a critically acclaimed album featuring 20th and 21st Century unaccompanied solo violin works by Krzysztof Penderecki (world premiere of Capriccio), Debra Kaye (world premiere of Turning in Time), as well as other works, significant in the violin repertoire, by Elliott Carter, Luciano Berio, Isang Yun and Grazyna Bacewicz. Gramophone calls the album “remarkable” and praises Augustyn for “vibrant intensity, caressing the phrases and bringing bold focus to the electric unfolding of creativity”.

Augustyn’s expanding discography also includes the Paganini Caprices, which music critics consider as convincing as Perlman’s or Midori’s, and an “an enduring benchmark” (Classical Net); La Pasión, featuring 6 Tango-Etudes for Solo Violin by Astor Piazzolla; Telemann 12 Fantasias for Solo Violin (Centaur Records), in which “her interpretations are convincing in every piece here, and the Baroque spirit of the violin and Telemann’s mastery abiding throughout” (Music Web International); and Glen Roven’s Runaway Bunny Concerto performed with Catherine Zeta-Jones as a narrator and featuring Kinga Augustyn’s Solo Violin Cadenza (GPR Records). Augustyn has won international awards, including First Prizes at the Alexander & Buono International String Competition (USA), Artist International Presentations (USA), and the J. S. Bach String Competition (Poland), as well as other top honors that include prizes at the Johannes Brahms International Competition (Austria), the Kloster Schoental International Young Artist Competition (Germany), Michael Hill International Violin Competition (New Zealand), and the Kosciuszko Foundation Wieniawski Violin Competition (USA). Augustyn studied at The Juilliard School with Dorothy DeLay, Cho-Liang Lin, and Naoko Tanaka, and earned there both the Bachelor and the Master degrees as a full tuition scholarship recipient. She holds a doctorate from the Stony Brook University, where she was also awarded a full-tuition scholarship and assistantship and worked with Phil Setzer and Pamela Frank. On a regular basis Augustyn plays a violin made by Joseph Gagliano in 1774, generously on loan to her from a private collector. When playing early music in a historically informed style, she plays Lukas Wronski’s uniquely designed violin inspired by the famed statue Venus de Milo. Augustyn currently serves as Violin Faculty at Queens College Aaron Copland School of Music. Dr. Alexander Tutunov Alexander Tutunov is widely recognized as one of the most outstanding virtuosos of the former Soviet Union. First Prize winner of the Belarusian National Piano Competition and winner of the Russian National Piano Competition, Tutunov's playing was described by Soviet Culture, Moscow, as "exhilarating and inspired, and which demonstrated a unique talent". Tutunov maintains a busy performing schedule in Europe, China, Mexico, and the United States as a recitalist, soloist with orchestra, and on radio and television. Dr. Tutunov is also in demand as an adjudicator for piano competitions. Tutunov's recording of the Abeliovich Piano Concerto was featured as part of the Emmy award winning soundtrack for the History Channel documentary, Russia: Land of Tsars, and his CD of the Tchaikovsky Concert Fantasy with the Russian Philharmonic Orchestra was produced in January 2008. Other recordings include: Concerto for Piano & Orchestra by Peter Sacco with the Czech National Symphony Orchestra (Albany Records) and the solo piano works of Lev Abeliovich Sonatas & Frescoes, Trio, Songs (Altarus Records). Tutunov graduated magna cum laude from the Central Music School of the Moscow Conservatory (studies with Anna Artobolevskaya and Lev Naumov) and University of North Texas (piano studies with Joseph Banowetz). Awarded his doctoral diploma with honors in concert performance from the Belarusian State Conservatory, Dr. Tutunov has taught at the Minsk College of Music, the University of North Texas, and Illinois Wesleyan University. Tutunov now lives in Ashland, where he is Professor of Piano and Artist in Residence at Southern Oregon University. A successful piano pedagogue, he continues to prepare award-winning students. Tutunov is Artist in Residence at the University of Alaska Southeast, Artistic director of the SOU International Piano Institute, Director of the Tutunov Piano Series at Southern Oregon University, and was recently named the Director of the Chinese-American International Piano Institute in Chengdu, China.