Tessa Lark

Violinist Tessa Lark is one of the most captivating artistic voices of our time, consistently praised by critics and audiences for her astounding range of sounds, technical agility, and musical elegance. In 2020 she was nominated for a Grammy in the Best Classical Instrumental Solo category, and she is also a highly acclaimed fiddler in the tradition of her native Kentucky.

Highlights of Lark’s 2023-24 season include the world premiere of Carlos Izcaray’s Violin Concerto – written for her – under the composer’s baton; and concerts with the Stuttgarter Philharmoniker that mark her European orchestral debut. She reprises Michael Torke’s violin concerto, Sky – also written for her, and the 2020 recording of which earned her a Grammy nomination – with Oklahoma’s Signature Symphony and the Sarasota Orchestra; returns to South Carolina’s Greenville Symphony, the Virginia Symphony, the Buffalo Philharmonic and England’s City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra; and performs as a chamber musician in duos with double bassist Michael Thurber and jazz guitarist Frank Vignola.

Lark’s newest album, The Stradgrass Sessions, features a mix of original compositions by the violinist and her collaborators – double bassist Edgar Meyer, pianist Jon Batiste, mandolinist Sierra Hull and fiddler Michael Cleveland – with a sonata by Eugène Ysaÿe, Bartók violin duets arranged for violin and mandolin and the world premiere recording of John Corigliano’s STOMP. Her debut commercial recording was the Grammy-nominated SKY, and her discography also includes Fantasy on First Hand Records; Invention, marking the debut album for the violin-bass duo made up of Lark and her fiancé, Michael Thurber; and a live performance recording of Astor Piazzolla’s Four Seasons of Buenos Aires with the Buffalo Philharmonic.

The violinist has performed with orchestras, recital venues and festivals around the world. She is a recipient of the Hunt Family Award, one of Lincoln Center’s prestigious Emerging Artist Awards, as well as a 2018 Borletti-Buitoni Trust Fellowship and a 2016 Avery Fisher Career Grant. In addition to her performance schedule, Lark champions young aspiring artists and supports the next generation of musicians through her work as Co-host/Creative of NPR’s From the Top. She also serves as Mentor and board member of the Irving M. Klein International Strings Competition.

Lark is a graduate of New England Conservatory and completed her Artist Diploma at The Juilliard School. She plays a ca. 1600 G.P. Maggini violin on loan from an anonymous donor through the Stradivari Society of Chicago.

This event will feature a preconcert lecture on the evening’s program by Mr. James M. Keller courtesy of the Rosalie Heller Annual Memorial Lecture Endowment held by the Los Alamos Community Foundation. The 30 minute lecture will start an hour before the concert.

Mr. Keller is in his 25th season as Program Annotator of the San Francisco Symphony and is Program Annotator of Santa Fe Opera and the Bravo! Vail Festival. During 25 years with the New York Philharmonic, he occupied an endowed chair as Program Annotator and was Leonard Bernstein Scholar-in-Residence. He is the author of Chamber Music: A Listener’s Guide (Oxford University Press) and contributed chapters to books including George Crumb and the Alchemy of Sound and Leonard Bernstein, American Original. He spent a decade each as staff writer-editor at The New Yorker and critic-at-large for the Santa Fe New Mexican.