Photo: Nachinkin

Yuri Bashmet, viola / conductor

Yuri Bashmet has been nominated for a 2010 Grammy award in the Best Instrumental Soloist(s) Performance (with Orchestra) category for his Bartók concerto with Pierre Boulez and the Berliner Philharmoniker (released on Deutsche Grammophon)

'...without doubt, one of the world's greatest living musicians.'
The Times

'The evening's highlight was Schnittke's Viola Concerto, a subtle and lyrical masterpiece written for its peerless soloist, Yuri Bashmet. To hear a more authentic performance would be impossible, a finer one inconceivable.'

Evening Standard

'Mr Bashmet is probably the most formidable exponent of the viola today. More than that, he is a string player of altogether uncanny powers. His tone is vocal, expressively vocal, devoid of artifice. He can move without a break from the most hushed, liquid legato to a huge, hall-filling fortissimo.'
New York Times

Yuri's recent release on Deutsche Grammophon features Bartók's Viola Concerto with the Berlin Philharmonic and Pierre Boulez - Yuri Bashmet, soloist in the viola concerto, is equally indispensable. Forget about the viola as the string family’s shrinking violet: Bashmet’s big round tone struts and swoons through a piece that might not be 100 per cent pure Bartók, but gives quite enough pleasure and intoxication of its own.

The Times

Yuri's release with the Moscow Soloists on Onyx received a Grammy

Yuri is the Founder and Artistic Director of the Moscow Soloists