Biography
Hailed for having “established herself as a very fine interpreter…” (NYCR), the Russian-born pianist Yelena Grinberg is rapidly gaining recognition as one of the most vibrant poetic young artists on the classical music scene. She is well known for her intellectual precision and keen musical insight, and for her passionate performances as both a chamber musician and a solo lecture-recitalist with a strong preference for unusual and thematically innovative programming.
As a winner of the Artists International Competition (2005), Ms. Grinberg performed her sold-out New York Debut recital of the Baroque Reflections program at Carnegie’s Weill Hall and was highly acclaimed for her “grand performance in a grand tradition” (NYCR).
Dr. Grinberg is an Adjunct Professor at Fordham University where she teaches Music History and coaches piano and chamber music. She is also on the piano faculty at the Crestwood Music Education Center in Eastchester, New York. In addition, she maintains an active private piano studio on the Upper West Side.
Dr. Grinberg is the founder and the artistic director of the Grinberg Classical Salon Series – a unique series of intimate and enlightening home salon concerts on the Upper West Side, in which she has presented such renowned artists such as Jerome Lowenthal, Oxana Yablonskaya, Madeline Bruser, clarinetist Julian Milkis, mandolinist, Joyce Balint, and NYU’s Professor of Music, Dr. Michael Beckerman.
This Fall 2018 Season, Dr. Grinberg will be curating a series of Scandinavian-themed solo and chamber music salons inspired by the 175th birthday of Edvard Grieg (1843-1907), including a two-part series with violinist, Emilie-Anne Gendron as part of their G-Sharp Duo – Celebrating Grieg and His Circle – as well as solo piano lecture-performances – Fantastical Bach and Grieg at His Greatest. In the past seasons, Dr. Grinberg has given an extensive series of thematic solo and chamber music concerts in tribute to birthday anniversaries of Mendelssohn, Schumann, Liszt, Charles-Valentin Alkan, C.P.E. Bach, Strauss, Tchaikovsky, Busoni, Czerny, Dvorak, Monteverdi, Granados, and Couperin, with recent performances at New York’s Bohemian National Hall with violinist Emilie-Anne Gendron and The Metropolitan Museum’s Balcony Bar with cellist, Dorothy Lawson, violinist, Emilie-Anne Gendron, and flutist, Suzanne Buerkle.
At Juilliard, Dr. Grinberg has been a faculty member in the Piano Minor Department and taught the undergraduate course on Piano Topics. She has also coached piano duo and chamber music as an adjunct faculty member in Columbia University’s Music Department and was the organizer of the Barnard-Columbia-Juilliard (BCJ) concert series at Columbia University’s Miller Theater.
Born in Moscow, Dr. Yelena Grinberg began her professional piano studies at The Gnessin School of Music for Gifted Children at the age of five. She came to the United States in 1992 and entered Juilliard’s Pre-College Division that same year. She has participated in numerous international festivals, including Verbier Festival & Academy in Switzerland, Oxford Philomusica in Oxford, England, International Music Festival in Puigcerda, Spain, and International Music Festival in Tours, France, where she performed with Moscow Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Dmitry Yablonsky.
As a student of the prestigious Barnard-Columbia-Juilliard dual-degree program, she graduated from Barnard College at Columbia University summa cum laude, and as a member of Phi Beta Kappa, with a major in English Literature and a minor in Philosophy. She holds both her Doctorate and Masters degrees in Piano Performance from The Juilliard School, where she studied with Jerome Lowenthal and Oxana Yablonskaya, and, privately, with Richard Goode.
Reviews
“In the Allegro, stormy sections interspersed with passages of exquisite loveliness given extra sweetness by Ms. Grinberg’s sensitive touch…”
– Jon Sobel, Co-Exec. Editor of Blogcritics, 2011
“There was an overall sense of aesthetic delight…”
– Anonymous Art Review, Wall Street, 2010
“[She has] established herself as a very fine interpreter…”
– New York Concert Review, 2005
“…a grand performance in a grand tradition”
– New York Concert Review, 2005