Robert deMaine

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Robert deMaine
Born December 6, 1969
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, U.S.
Genres Classical
Instruments Cello
Website [1]

Robert deMaine (born December 6, 1969 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma) is an American virtuoso cellist. He is known as a soloist, chamber musician, orchestral principal, recording artist, composer, artistic director, and teacher.

File:Robert deMaine, cellist.jpg
Robert deMaine, cellist (Craig T. Mathew/Mathew Imaging)

Biography

Robert deMaine was born into a musical family of French and Polish ancestry (the original form of his family name being "DuMaine" in Québec and Normandy).[1] A former child prodigy, and fourth-generation string player, his cello teachers have included his mother, Anna Rzeppa, and sister, Mary, and cellists Jane Smith, Kari Padgett Caldwell, Leonard Rose, Steven Doane, Richard Kapuscinski, Paul Katz, Stephen Kates, Luis Garcia-Renart, János Starker, Bernard Greenhouse, and Aldo Parisot.

He made his orchestral début at age 12 with the Oklahoma Symphony Orchestra[2] (now the Oklahoma City Philharmonic), playing Tchaikovsky's Variations on a Rococo Theme, Op. 33.

Education

Robert DeMaine is a fellowship alumnus of Yale University and the Eastman School of Music (where he also served as the youngest teaching assistant in the school's history at age 19), and has also studied at Bard College, the Gregor Piatigorsky Seminar and Festival at the University of Southern California, the Meadowmount School of Music,[3]Aspen Music Festival, Music Academy of the West, Marlboro Music School and Festival, Kronberg Academy, and the Juilliard School. He was also invited by the great French cellist, Pierre Fournier, for private study in Geneva, in 1983.

Following additional early childhood studies in keyboard, solfège, composition, conducting, voice, and music theory/harmony with Rose Rahal, the music director and organist at St. Eugene Catholic Church in his hometown of Oklahoma City, notably at the age of thirteen, Robert DeMaine was accepted for study at both the Paris Conservatory (class of André Navarra) and Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia (studio of David Soyer); however, he did not enroll at either school.

Competitions

The recipient of many significant national and international honors and awards, Robert deMaine was named the winner of the fifth Irving M. Klein International Competition for Strings in San Francisco,[4] and was the first cellist in the competition's history to win the Grand Prize, in 1990.

Current activities

In 2012, Robert deMaine was named Principal Cellist of the Los Angeles Philharmonic by Music Director Gustavo Dudamel. DeMaine was Principal Cellist of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra from 2002-2012,[5] having been appointed by the ensemble's then-Music Director, Neeme Järvi. Previously, he was Core Principal Cellist of the Hartford Symphony Orchestra and Connecticut Opera Orchestra (from 1993-2002), and as a teenager during his studies at Eastman, performed in the cello section of the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra. DeMaine has also served as a guest Principal Cellist in the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, and the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra in Norway.

DeMaine is the cellist of the Ehnes Quartet, formed at the Seattle Chamber Music Society in 2010, and the Dicterow-DeMaine-Biegel Trio, formed in New York in 2013. He often performs in recital with the Romanian-American pianist, Peter Takács. Currently based in Los Angeles, Robert deMaine maintains a schedule of international solo, chamber music, festival, and recital appearances around his duties at the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

A much sought-after teacher and coach, deMaine has presented masterclasses at many important music schools throughout the world, including London's Guildhall School, the Grieg Academy in Norway, the Conservatoire de musique du Québec à Montréal, the Colburn School, the University of Southern California Thornton School of Music, New England Conservatory, Music Academy of the West, the Eastman School of Music, the University of Michigan, the Conservatorio Nacional Superior de Música (Argentina) in Buenos Aires, Corrientes Conservatorio in Argentina, Oberlin Conservatory of Music, Yale University, Manhattan School of Music, Stanford University, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, the Hartt School of Music, the Meadowmount School of Music, McDuffie Center for Strings, China's Shanghai, Sichuan, and Chengdu Conservatories, Houston's American Festival for the Arts, the New World Symphony in Miami Beach, and the National Orchestral Institute at the University of Maryland. The Artistic Director of Classical Brunch (a series in Metropolitan Detroit), and Music at Millford (Millford Plantation, South Carolina), Robert deMaine is Artist-Faculty of the Montecito Music Festival, and the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, both in California. He has also taught at the Hartford Conservatory, Wayne State University Department of Music, the University of Michigan School of Music, and the Colburn School.

Robert deMaine can be heard on the Naxos, Chandos, and Onyx record labels, and is a Thomastik-Infeld artist. He has performed on cellos made by Antonio Gragnani (Livorno, 1795), Raffaele and Antonio Gagliano (Naples, 1798), Jean Baptiste Vuillaume (Paris, 1841, "Le Conquérant"), and currently plays instruments by Domenico Busan (Venice, 1748), and Antonio Stradivari (Cremona, 1684, the 'General Kyd, ex-Leo Stern,' in the collection of the Los Angeles Philharmonic). He plays on bows made by Dominique Peccatte, and Nikolaus Kittel.

Compositions

DeMaine has written music for the cello which he regularly performs, including 2 concerti, and 12 Études-Caprices.[6] He has also written several song cycles for voice and piano, and numerous cadenzas for cello concertos by Joseph Haydn and Luigi Boccherini, also improvising these during performances.

Personal Life

Robert DeMaine is married to musician Elizabeth DeMaine, and with their two children, Paul and Annette, they live in Los Angeles.

References

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External links

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