“Gilman is a name to watch,” stated Classic FM Magazine in 2007. Today, Alexander Gilman is among the most renowned violinists and teachers of his generation. The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung describes him as “an artist who identifies profoundly with the work.” Since 2013, Alexander has been the artistic director of the LGT Young Soloists, and in 2019, he was appointed professor of violin at the Royal College of Music.
Alexander Gilman has worked with renowned conductors such as Neeme Järvi, David Zinman, Bernard Haitink, Dan Ettinger, Mario Venzago, Michael Sanderling, and Perry So. His chamber music partners include Maximilian Hornung, Nils Mönkemeyer, Juliane Banse, Matan Porat, Franzisco Araiza, and Erik Schumann. Alexander is a sought-after guest at international music festivals as both a soloist and a teacher. His concerts have been recorded and broadcast by numerous radio and television stations, including Bavarian Radio, WQXR New York, Rai Italia, and NHK Japan.
Alexander Gilman’s continuously expanding repertoire encompasses a wide spectrum across all major genres of music, as reflected in his award-winning recordings on OehmsClassics. These recordings have been met with enthusiastic reviews from major magazines like The Strad, FonoForum, and Ensemble. His album of violin concertos by Barber, Korngold, and others with the Cape Town Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Perry So, received outstanding critical acclaim. He also received the Diapason d’Or prize and many other awards for this album.
In recent years, the violinist has been particularly active in New Music, participating in numerous premieres of commissioned works by contemporary composers such as Benedikt Schiefer, Uwe Lohrmann, Matthijs van Dijk, and Konstantia Gourzi.
Alongside his activities as a soloist, Alexander has established himself as an internationally recognized teacher. He is passionate about fostering young talent and holistically preparing them for a life as professional musicians. The fact that his students regularly win competitions demonstrates the high quality of his teaching. Some of his notable students include award-winning violinists such as Esther Yoo, David Nebel, Jane Hyeonjin Cho, and many others.
Alexander Gilman currently teaches at the Royal College of Music in London and Kalaidos University in Switzerland. Previously, he taught at the Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK) and the Amadeus Music Academy in Vienna. Additionally, Alexander holds master classes at universities and festivals across the world, such as the Summit Music Festival in New York, Baptist University in Hong Kong, the Academy of Fine Arts in Singapore, the Dubrovnik Festival, the University of Cape Town, and many more. He is also in demand as a juror at a variety of international music competitions.
By founding the LGT Young Soloists, Alexander Gilman created a unique initiative to promote young talent, offering them a musical homeland and giving them the opportunity to grow as soloists, chamber musicians, and orchestral musicians. The string ensemble is made up of highly talented young soloists between the ages of 12 and 23.
Eleven years after their founding, Alexander has established the ensemble as the most active and widely touring youth orchestra in the world. In recent seasons, the LGT Young Soloists have performed at prestigious venues such as the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Konzerthaus Berlin, Philharmonie Luxembourg, Mozarteum Salzburg, and Victoria Hall Singapore. They premiered Philip Glass’s new symphony at the Musikverein Vienna and in London. The ensemble also opened the 2022 editions of the Heidelberg Spring Festival and the Merano Festival, and they made their U.S. debut with a sold-out concert at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. In the coming months, they will perform at the Tonhalle Zurich and embark on tours throughout Australia and Asia.
The LGT Young Soloists are the world’s first youth orchestra to record for Sony Music/RCA. Alexander Gilman curates their recordings around thematic programs, exposing the young musicians to a broad musical spectrum. The ensemble’s discography already includes seven albums: Italian Journey (2015), Russian Soul (2017), Nordic Dream (2018), Souvenir (2019), Beethoven Recomposed (2021), World Premiere of Philip Glass’s Symphony No. 14 (2022), and the latest album featuring works by Schubert and Ichmouratov. Their albums have been nominated for the Opus Klassik Award and have received acclaim from the media: “If you didn’t know that young teenagers are playing here, you would think you were in the midst of a top ensemble” (Das Orchester). Several former members of the ensemble are now successfully pursuing careers as professional musicians in leading ensembles, including the London Symphony Orchestra, Berlin Philharmonic, Munich Philharmonic, and many more.
Alexander Gilman was born in Bamberg and grew up in a family of musicians. At the age of seven, he made his debut at the Gasteig in Munich. From the age of sixteen, he worked with the famous violin teacher Dorothy DeLay in New York and attended master classes with Itzhak Perlman, Aaron Rosand, Ingolf Turban, Igor Ozim, Akiko Tatsumi, and Mikhail Kopelman. Alexander Gilman graduated with distinction from Zakhar Bron’s master class at the Hochschule für Musik in Cologne. He then moved to the Hochschule der Künste in Zurich for his master’s degree, from which he also graduated with distinction.
Gilman’s career has been marked by numerous prizes at international competitions in Europe and the USA, including the WestLB Music Competition in 2006. As part of this award, the Stradivari “Ex-Croall” from 1684, which had previously been loaned to Frank-Peter Zimmermann, was made available to him. Alexander Gilman was a recipient of a bursary from the Deutsche Stiftung Musikleben and a multiple winner of the Deutscher Musikinstrumentenfonds competition. Thomastik-Infeld, the maker of violin strings, chose Alexander to be a Thomastik-Infeld Artist. He currently plays a violin made by Giovanni Battista Guadagnini.