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A consistently exciting artist, renowned globally for her spectacular technique, sumptuous sound and deeply probing musicianship, violinist RACHEL LEE PRIDAY has appeared as soloist with major international orchestras, among them the Chicago, Houston, National, Pacific, St. Louis and Seattle symphony orchestras, Boston Pops Orchestra, Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra and Germany’s Staatskapelle Berlin. Her distinguished recital appearances have brought her to eminent venues, including Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts’ Mostly Mozart Festival, Chicago’s Ravinia Festival and Dame Myra Hess Memorial Series, Paris’ Musée du Louvre, Germany’s Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festival and Switzerland’s Verbier Festival. Ms. Priday has also toured the United Kingdom and South Africa.
Since making her orchestral debut at the 1997 Aspen Music Festival, Rachel Lee Priday has performed with numerous orchestras across the United States, including those of Alabama, Bangor, Colorado, Knoxville, Rockford and Springfield (MA), as well as the New York Youth Symphony. In Europe and Asia, she has appeared at Germany’s Moritzburg Festival and with orchestras in Graz, Austria, Hong Kong, Singapore and Korea, where she performed with the KBS Symphony Orchestra, Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra and Russian State Symphony Orchestra on tour.
Passionately committed to new music and creating enriching community and global connections, Rachel Lee Priday’s wide-ranging repertoire and multidisciplinary collaborations reflect a deep fascination with literary and cultural narratives. Recent seasons have seen a new Violin Sonata commissioned from Pulitzer Prize Finalist Christopher Cerrone and the world premiere of Matthew Aucoin’s The Orphic Moment in an innovative staging that mixed poetry, drama, visuals and music. She has collaborated often with Ballet San Jose, and was lead performer in “Tchaikovsky: None But the Lonely Heart”, theatrical concerts with the Ensemble for the Romantic Century at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Ms. Priday’s work as soloist with the Asia America New Music Instituted promoted new music relationships and cultural exchange between Asia and the Americas, combining music premieres and educational outreach in the United States, China, Korea and Vietnam.
Rachel Lee Priday began her violin studies at the age of four in Chicago. Shortly thereafter, she moved to New York City to study with the iconic pedagogue Dorothy DeLay; she continued her studies at The Juilliard School Pre-College Division with Itzhak Perlman. She holds a B.A. degree in English from Harvard University and an M.M. from the New England Conservatory, where she worked with Miriam Fried. In the fall of 2019, she joined the faculty of the University of Washington School of Music as Assistant Professor of Violin.
Rachel Lee Priday has been profiled in The New Yorker, The Strad, Los Angeles Times and Family Circle. Her performance have been broadcast on major media outlets in the United States, Germany, Korea, South Africa and Brazil, including a televised concert in Rio de Janeiro, numerous appearances on Chicago’s WFMT and American Public Media’s “Performance Today.” She has also been featured on the Disney Channel, “Fiddling for the Future” and “American Masters” on PBS, and the Grammy Awards.
Rachel Lee Priday performs on a Giuseppe Guarneri violin (“filius Andreae”).
BACH, J.S.
Concerto #1 in a, BWV 1041
Concerto #2 in E, BWV 1042
Concerto in g, BWV 1056R (Reconstruction)
Concerto in d for 2 Violins, BWV 1043
BARBER
Concerto, Op. 14
BARTÓK
Concerto #2 (1938)
Rhapsody #1
BEETHOVEN
Concerto in D, Op. 61
Concerto in C, Op. 56 (“Triple”)
Romance #2 in F, Op. 50
BERG
Concerto (1935)
BERNSTEIN
Serenade (1954)
BOTTESINI
Gran Duo Concertante for Violin, Double Bass & Strings
BOULOGNE, Joseph
Concerto #9 in G, Op. 8
Sinfonia concertante for 2 Violins, Op. 13
BRAHMS
Concerto in D, Op. 77
BRITTEN
Concerto in d, Op. 15
BRUCH
Concerto #1 in g, Op. 26
Scottish Fantasy, Op. 46
CHAUSSON
Poème, Op. 25
CONUS, Julius
Concerto in e
CORIGLIANO
The Red Violin: Chaconne for Violin & Orchestra
DVORÁK
Concerto in a, Op. 53
Romance in f, Op. 11
ELGAR
Concerto in b, Op. 61
FARÍAS, Miguel
Concerto
GLAZUNOV
Concerto in a, Op. 82
HARTMANN, Karl Amadeus
Concerto funèbre
HAYDN
Concerto #1 in C
Concerto #2 in D
JOFRE, JP
Double Concerto for Violin & Bandoneon #1
KHACHATURIAN
Concerto in d (1940)
KORNGOLD
Concerto in D, Op. 35
LALO
Symphonie espagnole, Op. 21
MASSENET
Méditation
MENDELSSOHN
Concerto in e, Op. 64
MOZART
Concerto #3 in G, K. 216
Concerto #4 in D, K. 218
Concerto #5 in A, K. 219
Sinfonia concertante in E-flat, K. 364
PAGANINI
Concerto #1 in D, Op. 6
PRICE, Florence
Concerto #2 (1952)
PROKOFIEV
Concerto #1 in D, Op. 19
Concerto #2 in g, Op. 63
RAVEL
Tzigane (1924)
SAINT-SAËNS
Concerto #3 in b, Op. 61
Havanaise, Op. 83
Introduction & Rondo capriccioso, Op. 28
SARASATE
Carmen Fantasy
Introduction & Tarantella, Op. 43
Zigeunerweisen, Op. 20
SCHUMANN
Concerto in d, WoO 23
SHOSTAKOVICH
Concerto #1 in a, Op. 99
SIBELIUS
Concerto in d, Op. 47
STRAVINSKY
Concerto in D (1931)
TCHAIKOVSKY
Concerto in D, Op. 35
Valse-Scherzo, Op. 34
VAUGHAN WILLIAMS
The Lark Ascending
VIEUXTEMPS
Concerto #5 in a, Op. 37
VIVALDI
L’estro Armonico, Op. 3
Concerto #5 in A for 2 Violins, RV 517
Concerto #6 in a, RV 356
Concerto #10 in b for 4 Violins, RV 580
The Four Seasons, Op. 8
WIENIAWSKI
Concerto #2 in d, Op. 22
Rachel Lee Priday is one of the finest soloists with whom I have ever worked. There aren't enough superlatives to describe her: She's technically flawless and so, so musical. Her performances with me received three standing ovations at each concert! The audience loved her (and they give me the credit for bringing her to them). Perhaps even more importantly, Rachel is a wonderful person, kind, friendly, and easy to work with. She approached her time with the orchestras in a collaborative and generous way, making my job easy, even though we were playing a tricky piece to conduct. As part of our publicity and outreach, Rachel played a short, live studio performance on our local public radio that was jaw-droppingly amazing. I look forward to working with her many, many more times in the future.
KYLE WILEY PICKETT, MUSIC DIRECTOR
SPRINGFIELD SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA (MO) & TOPEKA SYMPHONY
It’s not just her technique, although clearly there’s nothing she can’t do on the fingerboard or with her bow. No, what’s most impressive is that she is already an artist who can make the music sing.
THE BALTIMORE SUN
Lee comes home with irresistible panache [headline]
Her sound is big and luscious enough to ride the orchestral crests comfortably, yet supple enough to make the singing paragraphs soar. Her bow work combines dazzling dexterity with an idiomatic feel for Prokofiev’s [Concerto #2] quirky Slavic rhythms. Not only did she pour out endless floods of ardent lyricism in the slow movement, but she also dispatched the finale’s whirling bravura with irresistible panache.
CHICAGO TRIBUNE
Rachel Lee’s performance was nothing short of exquisite; words could not describe this violinist’s talents, Indeed, Lee is among the most talented musicians in the world.
THE SAN FRANCISCO EXAMINER
Lee is the real thing. She played the [Tchaikovsky] Violin Concerto with a rich, mellifluous sound and negotiated the work’s demanding running passages with chiseled clarity. Lee was particularly eloquent in the concert’s second movement, and she brought a dazzling, forceful technique to bear on the third movement.
THE GREENVILLE NEWS (South Carolina)
Lee seemed not the least intimidated by [Paganini’s fiendishly difficult 1816 Violin Concerto #1]. She coped with the music’s acrobatic turns and leaps with immaculate precision, but amid all the violin fireworks she also played with expressive phrasing and warmth of tone. This was especially apparent in the slow movement that she turned into a welcome oasis of Italianate lyricism. In the racehorse Finale, Lee’s execution of the bouncing spiccato passages was truly dazzling. The audience gave Lee a well-deserved standing ovation.
THE BUFFALO NEWS
Priday is an alluring, enigmatic performer, delighting in the contrasts of ethereal serenity and electrifying volcanism. Her interpretation of the concerto [Prokofiev #1] was an exploration of these ideas, opening on a single glistening gossamer thread that became darker, thicker, and more menacing. Accentuating the harmonic angst of the second subject and its edgy awkwardness, she revealed the volcano–a lava-flow of shredding scales and explosive pizzicato. She’s a live wire!
#CONCERT REVIEW (Cape Town, South Africa)
by Andy Wilding
The brilliant young-Korean-American violinist, Rachel Lee Priday, whose solo career with major orchestras now spans the globe, is also a noted chamber artist. Lee Priday performed her sonata [Beethoven #7] with splendid confidence and depth of emotion, emphasizing the power of the C minor repeated figures and their sweet complements in the relative major. She and pianist [Michael] Brown made eye contact repeatedly, and their ineffable communication yielded strikingly coordinated dynamics and, in the second movement, exquisitely stunning pauses between forceful exhortations, romantic phrases, and blazing C major scales. Beethoven’s dazzling human insight and sense of humor radiated through cascades of questions-and-answers, quick shifts from major to minor, and deliciously offset accents. The fourth movement was a revelatio9n of Beethoven the conjurer at the heights of his powers, the marvelously slow beginning giving way to a steaming allegro with multiple rhythmic and harmonic punctuations. In the end these astounding young players, whose exchanges gathered height and tremendous intensity, constructed yet another musical edifice, topped off by a wild presto with echoes of passionate gypsy dance.
THE BERKSHIRE EDGE (Massachusetts)
BSO delivers moving, thrilling concert [headline]
The Violin Concerto No. 3 of Saint-Saëns is a showpiece for the composer’s gifts for melody and orchestral color. The soloist, Rachel Lee Priday, boasts an impressive resumé of concert and recital performance. She played the opening theme powerfully and easily tossed off the work’s challenging pyrotechnics.
THE ELLSWORTH AMERICAN (Maine)
The American violinist Rachel Lee Priday came out to play the solo in Brahms’s concerto in D. [Williams] Eddins and Priday seemed unified in their singular conception of Brahms and the piece. Theirs was the raging, thundering, table-thumping, heaven-storming, kick-stomping Brahms, a composer of boundless fury and unlimited ecstasy, albeit one who expresses his extremes in backward-looking classical forms and traditional structures, and an abiding sense of beauty and lyricism. Eddins and Priday phrased all sections of the entire concerto in tandem, arcing wondrous long lines of thought and emotion over bar line after bar line. They kept close communion throughout, sometimes even seeming to dance together to the music. Priday, who plays with enormous and strong sound, soared with bravura through her virtuosic part; as the orchestra took up the theme in the finale, she urged them to play it faster.
VIOLINIST.COM
| 10/8/2022 (7pm) | HARMONIA ORCHESTRA (Seattle, WA) William C. White, conductor Barber: Violin Concerto |
| 10/15/2022 (7:30pm) | SPRINGFIELD SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA (MO) Kyle Wiley Pickett, conductor Barber: Violin Concerto |
| 10/18/2022 (7:30pm) | UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON SCHOOL OF MUSIC (Seattle) Meany Hall for the Performing Arts Beethoven: Violin Sonata #7 |
| 10/20/2022 (7:30pm) | COLORADO STATE UNIVERSITY (Fort Collins) Organ Recital Hall, University Center for the Arts Beethoven: Violin Sonata #7 |
| 11/5/2022 (7:30pm) | PENSACOLA SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA (FL) Peter Rubardt, conductor Bruch: Scottish Fantasy |
| 11/12/2022 (7:30pm) | TOPEKA SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA (KS) Kyle Wiley Pickett, conductor Barber: Violin Concerto |
| 1/15/2023 (2:30pm) | VERDE VALLEY SINFONIETTA (AZ) William White, conductor J. White: Violin Concerto in f# |
| 1/20/2023 (7:30pm) | ST. JOHN’S COLLEGE (Sante Fe, NM) The Lyceum Korngold/Schwarz: Much Ado About Nothing |
| 1/22/2023 (7pm) | ST. JOHN’S COLLEGE (Sante Fe, NM) The Lyceum Korngold/Schwarz: Much Ado About Nothing |
| 1/27/2023 (7pm) | KITSAP MUSIC TEACHER’S ASSOCIATION/CENTRAL KITSAP SCHOOL DISTRICT Central Kitsap Performing Arts Center (Silverdale, WA) Schubert: Violin Sonatina |
| 2/27/2023 (7:30pm) | UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON SCHOOL OF MUSIC (Seattle) Daniel Boico, conductor J. White: Violin Concerto in f# |
| 3/9/2023 (7pm) | KWAZULU-NATAL PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA Daniel Boico, conductor J. White: Violin Concerto in f# |
| 3/11/2023 (11am) | CAPE TOWN CONCERT SERIES (South Africa) Baxter Theatre Centre Schubert: Violin Sonatina |
| 3/12/2023 (7:30pm) | JOHANNESBURG MUSICAL SOCIETY (South Africa) Wits Linder Auditorium Schubert: Violin Sonatina |
| 3/16/2023 (7:30pm) | JOHANNESBURG PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA (South Africa) Daniel Boico, conductor J. White: Violin Concerto in f# |
| 4/19/2023 (6pm) | NATIONAL NORDIC MUSEUM (Seattle, WA) Mozart: Clarinet Quintet |
| 6/15/2023 (7:30pm) | METHOW VALLEY CHAMBER MUSIC FESTIVAL (WA) Methow Valley Community Center |
| 6/17/2023 (7:30pm) | METHOW VALLEY CHAMBER MUSIC FESTIVAL (WA) Methow Valley Community Center |
| 10/14/2023 (8pm) | NEW YORK REPERTORY ORCHESTRA David Leibowitz, conductor J. White: Violin Concerto in f# |
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Elgar: Salut d’amour, Op. 12 |
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Bartók: Six Romanian Folk Dances |
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Brahms: Sonatensatz (Scherzo) in c |
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Boulogne: Violin Concerto #9 in G, Op. 8 (mvt. I: Allegro) |
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Brahms: Violin Concerto in D, Op. 77 (mvt I: Allegro non troppo) |
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Cerrone: Sonata for Violin & Piano |
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Tchaikovsky: Violin Concerto in D, Op. 35 (mvt. III: Allegro vivacissimo) |
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Artist Profile |
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Prokofiev: Violin Concerto #2 in g, Op. 63 (mvt I: Allegro moderato) – audio only |
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Rachel Lee Priday’s YouTube Channel |