Violist Kevin Bishop’s playing has been described by critics as
bringing “lushness to the movement that easily touched the soul” (Inland
Valley Daily Bulletin.) Martin Perlich of KCSN FM has called him "a young
night in shining armor for classical music."
Kevin, age 21, is active in the Los Angeles area as a chamber, solo, and
orchestral musician. He has been the youngest member of two professional
orchestras: The Redlands Symphony and West Coast Chamber Orchestra. He made
his concerto debut with orchestra at 14, performing the Hoffmeister Viola
Concerto, and his radio performance debut at 15, performing Faure’s Piano
Quartet live on K-Mozart 105.1 FM Los Angeles. By the age of 18, he had been
interviewed by KUSC 91.5FM and KCSN 88.5FM, and was featured in a national
article published by Chamber Music America. At 20 Kevin was a member of the
Grammy Philharmonic Orchestra, performing at the internationally televised
2008 Grammy Awards. He has been a winner in the Dan Stover Music
Competition, Claremont Symphony Young Artists Competition, and University of
Redlands Concerto Competition, and has performed as a guest with the renown
Avanti String Quartet. As a teenager he had the opportunity to perform with
members of the Los Angeles Philarmonic and St. Petersburg String Quartet on
various professional chamber music concerts. His string quartet has released
a CD of new works and has been the resident faculty and performing artists
at the 2007 Celebration of Strings Festival in Arizona. He is currently
principal violist of the Southern California Brahms Festival, which is
presenting the complete chamber music of Brahms in the 2007-2008 season, and
is assistant principal violist of the Debut Orchestra in Los Angeles.
Recent engagements include a performance of the solo viola parts in
Peter Knell's Variation Fantasy and Britten's Sinfonietta, on a radio
broadcast as acting principal of the Debut Orchestra. In May of 2008, Kevin
will perform William Walton's Viola Concerto with Pasadena’s Youth Symphony
West.
Kevin’s entrepreneurial spirit led him to found, as a teenager, the
Western Society of Chamber Music. This non-profit organization- featuring
monthly concerts, a community orchestra, and an educational program for high
school students- has received national attention and nationally competitive
grants. Kevin is Executive and Artistic Director, and is very active as a
performer and teacher within the organization.
Kevin has been on staff at the Rocky Mountain Summer Conservatory in
the summers of 2006 and 2007 as Chamber Music Coordinator and Music
Librarian. He has also attended the Port Townsend Chamber Music Festival in
Washington, the ASTA Chamber Music Institute in California, and the Wildwood
Music Institute. He has benefited from master classes with musicians such as
Paul Neubauer, Yitzak Schotten, and the Ives String Quartet. Work in
alternative genres include collaboartions with the Foo Fighters and with
John Paul Jones (member of Led Zepplin.) Recently, Kevin has also been
active as an orchestral conductor.
Kevin attends the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he
studies with world renown violist Helen Callus under full scholarship. In
addition, he currently studies conducting with Richard Rintoul at UCSB. He
has previously studied viola with Kira Blumberg, Linda Kline-Lamar, and
Tamsen Beseke.
