Superstar Violinist Joshua Bell Does Bruch With Jacksonville Symphony Jan. 7

A limited number of tickets are still available at JaxSymphony.org and the Jacksonville Symphony Orchestra Box Office (904) 354-5547 for violinist Joshua Bell’s Jan. 7 concert with the Jacksonville Symphony. Bell will be performing Bruch’s Violin Concerto in G minor during the second half of the evening, following the Jacksonville Symphony’s performance of Dvorak’s Carnival Overture and Beethoven’s 8th Symphony, under the direction of Fabio Mechetti.

The pricier tickets–in the $120 and $75 seats–are sold out, but seats remain in the $50, $40 and $35 seats. Click here for the seating chart and ticketing.

Enchanting audiences worldwide with his breathtaking virtuosity and tone of rare beauty, Joshua Bell has earned the title “classical music superstar.” An Avery Fisher Prize and Musical America’s 2010 Instrumentalist of the Year, Bell is the newly named music director of the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields. Bell came to national attention at age 14 in his debut with Riccardo Muti and the Philadelphia Orchestra. Today he is equally at home as a soloist, chamber musician, orchestra leader and composer who performs his own cadenzas to several of the major concerto repertoire.

Bell was recently appointed Music Director, for the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields, the first American to hold this post since Sir Neville Mariner formed the orchestra in 1958. On January 10, Sony will release two new CDs: French Impressions, Bell’s first recital CD with Jeremy Denk, featuring works by Ravel, Saint Saëns and Franck AND the soundtrack to the new Chinese film production Flowers of War, starring Christian Bale.

Since his first LP recording at 18, Bell has recorded more than 36 CDs garnering Mercury, Grammy, Gramophone and Echo Klassik Awards. Recent releases include At Home With Friends, the Defiance soundtrack, Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons and The Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto with the Berlin Philharmonic. He has recorded critically acclaimed performances of Sibelius and Goldmark and the Beethoven and Mendelssohn concertos both featuring his own cadenzas; and the Oscar winning soundtrack, The Red Violin.

This year’s performances include a United States tour with the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields and recitals across the country. He tours Europe with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Vladimir Jurowski and in recital with Jeremy Denk.

Having received his first violin at age four, Bell became serious about the instrument by age 12, thanks to violinist and pedagogue Josef Gingold. He performs on the 1713 Gibson ex Huberman Stradivarius.