Eileen Wingard

By Eileen Wingard SANTA MONICA, California –Since its inception in 1955, under the visionary leadership of Sylvia Kunin, the Young Musicians Foundation has nurtured a long list of outstanding concert artists and conductors. In the past several weeks, I personally attended performances by four YMF competition winners, Violinist Zina Schiff in recital in San Francisco, […]

By Eileen Wingard SAN DIEGO — Awaiting the performance of Victor Ullmann’s one-act opera, Der Kaiser Von Atlantis, on Friday evening, June 2,  I recalled the other performances in San Diego of music created in the Nazi’s Show Ghetto of Terezin. On February 5, 1989, at the 54th Street Jewish Community Center, the JCC Music Committee

By Eileen Wingard SANTA BARBARA, California–During a bright, sunny afternoon on May 6, the Santa Barbara Music and Arts Conservatory’s 28th Annual Young Soloists Showcase took place in the charming Granada Theatre on State Street.   The guest conductor, leading a 33-piece professional orchestra to accompany the young performers, was my niece, Avlana Eisenberg. The nine

By Eileen Wingard SAN FRANCISCO — Two distinguished musicians were honored by my sister Zina Schiff at her violin recital in Temple Emanu-El’s concert series in San Francisco last Monday evening. She dedicated her program to the memory of violinist Israel Baker, one of her former teachers and life long friends, and she gave premiere performances to

By Eileen Wingard SAN DIEGO — Yoav Talmi, former conductor of the San Diego Symphony Orchestra, performed his final concert with the Orchestre Symphonique du Quebec last May, 2011, after a 13-year tenure. He is succeeded by the French conductor, Fabien Gabel. Talmi’s final concert included his own composition, De Profundis, a work in three

By Eileen Wingard SAN DIEGO — Cellist Julian Schwarz, an up and coming artist, was the featured soloist at the Tifereth Israel Community Orchestra’s most recent program, performed April 1 at Ner Tamid Synagogue and April 3 at Tifereth Israel Synagogue. After two years of study at the Colburn School in Los Angeles, the brilliant

By Eileen Wingard LA JOLLA — This month students will have their turn when the final “Jewish Poets—Jewish Voices” evening of the year is presented at 7 p.m. Tuesday, March 27,  in the Astor Judaica Library at the Lawrence Family JCC . The program will feature Becca Meyers from High Tech High School, Lily Greenberg

By Eileen Wingard RANCHO SANTA FE, California — Yes, Israel is a leader in high tech start-ups. But it also continues to produce a plethora of high quality musicians. Proving that point were two concerts last week featuring scholarship recipients of the America-Israel Cultural Foundation, one of the institutions which nurtures high quality music education

By Eileen Wingard SAN DIEGO –Israeli-born pianist, Ory Shihor, celebrated performer, pedagogue and administrator, will share his artistry in a program of works by Mozart and Schubert at the Dove Library in Carlsbad on Sunday, Feb. 26, at 2:00 p.m. The multi-faceted musician teaches piano in three of the divisions of the famous Colburn School

By Eileen Wingard SAN DIEGO –Pianist Daniel Wnukowski performed the remarkable fete of playing all five Beethoven Piano Concerti on three consecutive nights with the Tifereth Israel Community Orchestra (TICO) under the direction of David Amos. Attending the Monday and Tuesday evening concerts in the Cohen Social Hall of Tifereth Israel Synagogue, we were impressed

By Eileen Wingard SAN DIEGO–Lighting up the musical firmament over an eight day period in February, four outstanding Israeli musicians will be featured in performances in our fair city. Super Star Itzhak Perlman will present a Violin Recital in Copley Symphony Hall on Sunday evening, February 18. Eight days later, Israeli Pianist Ory Shihor will

By Eileen Wingard   LA JOLLA, California — The opening evening of the 2012 poetry reading series in the Astor Judaica Library featured three women, Frieda Levinsky, Elizabeth Schwartz and Sue Marder. Levinsky, a native of Poland and a Holocaust survivor with famous Talmudic scholars among her ancestry, is an award-winning published poet. One of

By Eileen Wingard LA JOLLA, California — Two remarkable young men will be the next featured soloists on the January 29, Musicians in the Making program at 2 p.m. at the Astor Judaica Library of the Lawrence Family Jewish Community Center. Pianist and bass-baritone Elliott Wulff, 17, is a senior at Rancho Bernardo High School

By Eileen Wingard SAN DIEGO–The greatest violinist of the 20th century is brought to life in an excellent documentary, G-d’s Fiddler: Jascha Heifetz by Peter Rosen. Heifetz’s biography is outlined through photos, video clips, testimonials by famous violinists Itzhak Perlman, Ivry Gitlis and Ida Haendel, former students Andre Granat, Sherry Kloss and Ayke Agus and two