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M E L I N D A L E E M A S U R | P I A N I S TLauded for her “lustrous performances [and] extraordinary musicianship” [Incident Light] and “impeccable technique and artistic interpretation” [The Columbian], pianist Melinda Lee Masur has performed on all three stages of Carnegie Hall, at London's Wigmore Hall and Purcell Room, the Berliner Philharmonie, the Ravinia Festival, the Festival Les Muséiques Basel and in cities throughout the United States, Europe and Asia. She has been featured on nationally broadcast radio, including Chicago’s Dame Myra Hess and Texas Public Radio, as well as on Hong Kong’s classical radio/television station, RTHK4, and has appeared as soloist with orchestras such as the Vancouver Symphony, Shanghai Philharmonic and Harvard-Radcliffe Bach Society.
An avid chamber musician, Melinda Lee Masur has performed with such artists as Augustin Hadelich, Alban Gerhardt, Fanny Clamagirand and Adrian Brendel. Since founding The Lee Trio in 2002 with her sisters, violinist Lisa Lee and cellist Angela Lee, critics have raved about the Trio’s “gripping immediacy and freshness” and "rich palette of tone colours" [The Strad]. The Lee Trio regularly performs on both sides of the Atlantic and in Asia and is devoted to working with and performing the music of living composers. Piano trios by composers including Nathaniel Stookey, Philip Lasser, Uljas Pulkkis, Laurence Rosenthal, Julian Yu and Sylvie Bodorova have been given their world, American and European premieres by The Lee Trio. The Trio's recording of Jane Antonia Cornish's Duende was released on the Delos label in 2014 to critical acclaim. Melinda Lee Masur's musical mentors include the pianists Erna Gulabyan, Maria Curcio, Claude Frank, Sergei Edelmann, Anna Kim, Jeffrey Swann and Michael Friedmann, and violist Susan Bates for chamber music. She graduated with honors from Harvard University, studying piano and chamber music with composer Leon Kirchner and pianist Robert Levin. In fulfillment of her Konzertexamen Diploma at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hannover in Germany, she studied with pianist Einar Steen-Nøkleberg, and in Berlin, studied Art Song with baritone Thomas Quasthoff and Lied-pianist Wolfram Rieger. Melinda Lee Masur is a member of the music faculty at Boston University as well as Director of Piano Chamber Music for the BU Tanglewood Institute. Together with her husband, Ken-David Masur, she serves as Artistic Director of the Chelsea Music Festival, an annual summer music festival in New York City lauded as a "gem of a series" by The New York Times. Melinda Lee Masur is a Steinway Artist. |