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Mark Menzies

About this Artist

Residing in the United States since 1991, MARK MENZIES has established a worldwide reputation as a violist and violinist. He has been described in the Los Angeles Times as an “extraordinary musician” and a “riveting violinist.” His career as a viola and violin virtuoso, chamber musician, and conductor and advocate of contemporary music has seen performances in Europe, Brazil, Mexico, Australia, Japan, New Zealand, and across the United States, including a series of appearances at New York’s Carnegie Hall.

Mark Menzies has a considerable reputation as a chamber music performer. In addition to being a member of the Formalist Quartet as violinist and violist, there are chamber music recordings featuring Menzies, including Process and Passion; a Pogus label release of chamber music by Roger Reynolds; and the world-premiere recording made with 175 East, a New Zealand-based ensemble, of ...above earth’s shadow, a chamber-scale violin concerto by Michael Finnissy that was released on vinyl in 2013.

Mark Menzies is currently viola and violin professor at the California Institute of the Arts, where he also coordinates their chamber orchestra, new music ensembles, and conducting studies. Over the last six seasons, he has designed and performed a significant role in CalArts New Century Players’ concerts at REDCAT, CalArt’s downtown theater as part of the Walt Disney Concert Hall complex; a highlight was in 2011, a five-concert festival of Sofia Gubaidulina’s music – in her presence – where, as one critic described the final concert, “...the building tension paid off with a huge reward in the closing full orchestra performance of Gubaidulina’s violin concerto Offertorium with soloist Mark Menzies and the full force of the CalArts Orchestra.”