Ilya Gringolts

Having recently collaborated with orchestras such as the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra, the Hungarian National Orchestra, the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, and the Orchestra Filarmonica della Scala, highlights of the 2024/25 season include appearances with the BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Sakari Oramo, the São Paulo Symphony Orchestra with Heinz Holliger, the Lahti Symphony Orchestra conducted by Hannu Lintu, and a play-lead program with the Rotterdam Philharmonic. Ilya Gringolts will also be a guest artist at the Tongyeong International Music Festival in 2025, where he will perform Sibelius’ violin concerto with the KBS Symphony Orchestra conducted by Ilan Volkov, as well as solo and chamber music recitals.

Ilya Gringolts has performed with prestigious orchestras such as the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the NHK Symphony Orchestra, the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, the Singapore Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, and the Mahler Chamber Orchestra. Recent projects include collaborations with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra, the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra, the Budapest Festival Orchestra, the Orquesta de Valencia, the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, and the National Symphony Orchestra of Taiwan. He regularly conducts projects from his violin with ensembles such as the Australian Chamber Orchestra, the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana, the Camerata Bern, and the Ensemble Resonanz.

For his award-winning recording Il labirinto armonico by Locatelli (2021), which received a Diapason d’Or and a Gramophone Editor’s Choice Award, Ilya Gringolts also conducted the Finnish Baroque Orchestra from his instrument. That same year, he released a solo album, Ciaccona, featuring works by Bach, Pauset, Gerhard, and Holliger, which also received the Gramophone Editor’s Choice Award. His critically acclaimed discography includes recordings for Deutsche Grammophon, BIS, and Hyperion, notably Paganini’s 24 Caprices for solo violin and Stravinsky’s complete works for violin (2018), recorded with the Orquesta Sinfónica de Galicia under the direction of Dima Slobodeniouk, an album that also received a Diapason d’Or award.

As first violinist of the Gringolts Quartet, he has enjoyed great success at the Salzburg Festival, the Lucerne Festival, the Edinburgh Festival, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Philharmonie Luxembourg, the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg, and the Teatro La Fenice in Venice. A highly regarded chamber musician, Ilya Gringolts regularly collaborates with artists such as Nicolas Altstaedt, Alexander Lonquich, Peter Laul, Aleksandar Madzar, Christian Poltéra, Lawrence Power, and Jörg Widmann.

After studying violin and composition with Tatiana Liberova and Zhanneta Metallidi in Saint Petersburg, he enrolled at the Juilliard School of Music, where he studied with Itzhak Perlman. Winner of the Premio Paganini International Violin Competition in 1998, he remains the youngest winner in the history of the competition. He was also named a BBC New Generation Artist at the beginning of his career. In addition to his position as professor at the Zurich University of the Arts, Ilya Gringolts was appointed to the Accademia Chigiana in Siena in 2021. He is also artistic advisor to the Mizmorim Festival in Switzerland. Ilya Gringolts plays a Stradivarius violin (1718 “ex-Prové”).