Colburn School Honors Violinist Akiko Meyers At TASTE OF COLBURN, 3/18/17

On March 18, 2017, the Colburn School will honor alumna Anne Akiko Meyers at Taste of Colburn, an annual benefit event held on the school's Grand Avenue campus to support scholarship funds for the Colburn Community School of Performing Arts. Ms. Meyers will receive the Distinguished Alumni Award. In recognition of their philanthropy and contributions to the Colburn School community, Alice and Joe Coulombe will be recognized as civic honorees.

Anne Akiko Meyers studied violin at the Community School under the mentorship of Alice and Eleonore Schoenfeld from 1977 to 1983. Celebrated around the world, Ms. Meyers has been actively touring for over 30 years, recorded over 34 albums, and was honored as Billboard's top-selling classical artist of 2014. A champion for living composers, Meyers actively commissions and regularly premieres works including those by Mason Bates, John Corigliano, Morten Lauridsen, Arvo Pärt, Wynton Marsalis, and Einojuhani Rautavaara.Chicago Classical described her as as "one of the most adventurous soloists on the international scene today" and the New York Timeshas said her "playing flows from the heart."

Colburn School President and CEO Sel Kardan said, "Anne Akiko Meyers is a valued alumna of the Community School of Performing Arts, and she represents the importance of providing committed students access to excellent faculty, ample performing opportunities, and supportive musical community. She has forged an inspiring performing career and been a steadfast champion of new music, ensuring that great works will continue to be composed and performed for years to come. We're extremely proud of Ms. Meyers, and are pleased to honor her at this year's Taste of Colburn."

Anne Akiko Meyers said "I am honored and thrilled to return to the Colburn School of Performing Arts for Taste of Colburn, as the school provided the foundation for my career as a performer and musician. Richard D. Colburn loaned me my first 'real' instrument and believed in my talent at a young age. He and the wonderful faculty, including Alice and Eleonore Schoenfeld, helped lead me through many important steps in my development. I am so proud to return to my alma mater to help support a new generation of musicians at the Colburn School. Thank you all for everything you do to support students and the institution to help discover the deep impact that music has to change one's life forever."

Alice and Joe Coulombe will be recognized as civic honorees for their philanthropic and community contributions. The 2016 Taste of Colburn event marks the first time the Colburn School has chosen civic honorees. Sel Kardan said, "Alice and Joe Coulombe have been tireless champions of the performing arts in the Los Angeles area for decades, and their generosity has been instrumental in supporting the growth of the Colburn School and its programs for many years. We are very proud to honor them and their steadfast commitment to arts education."

Taste of Colburn is an annual event that includes dining and drinks from downtown and Los Angeles area establishments, as well as a variety of live performances throughout the Colburn School campus. Performances showcase students from the Community School's ensembles and programs, including orchestra, jazz, dance, and chamber music. Proceeds from the event benefit Community School need-based financial aid. The event also features a silent auction. Full program information will be available at a later date.

Event Time
Saturday, March 18, 2017
Event, live music, and food service begins at 5pm
Showcase performance in Zipper Hall at 7:30

Location
Colburn School Campus

Tickets
Tickets are available now. Visit colburnschool.edu/tasteofcolburn for more information.
Adults: $150
Children: $50
Half of the adult purchase ticket price is tax deductible.

About Anne Akiko Meyers
Anne Akiko Meyers is one of the world's most celebrated violinists, known for her passionate performances, purity of sound, deeply poetic interpretations, innovative programming, and commitment to commissioning new works. Ms. Meyers possesses a rare ability to connect with audiences from the concert stage, online, and on television and radio broadcasts. She has actively maintained an extensive touring schedule for three decades and regularly performs in recital, as guest soloist with many of the world's top orchestras, and is a best-selling recording artist who has released 34 albums. In 2014, Mrs. Meyers was the top-selling traditional classical instrumental soloist on Billboard charts.

During the 2016 season, Ms. Meyers returned to the Cartagena Music Festival to perform Vivaldi's The Four Seasons with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, the Casals Festival in Puerto Rico to perform the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto, the Beethoven Festival in Warsaw performing the Szymanowski Concerto No. 1, and she headlined the "Last Night of the Proms" in Kraków, Poland. Other performances included the Mason Bates Violin Concerto with the National Symphony at the Kennedy Center and a tour with the New Zealand Symphony.

In 2017, Ms. Meyers will perform the world premiere of Einojuhani Rautavaara's Fantasia, a piece written for her, with the Kansas City Symphony conducted by Michael Stern. She will perform a recital at the 92nd Street Y in New York and return to the Nashville Symphony performing the Bernstein Serenade with Giancarlo Guerrero, among many other performances. Ms. Meyers's 35th album entitled Fantasia: The Fantasy Album with the Philharmonia Orchestra, conducted by Kristjan Järvi, will be released in the spring on the eOne Music label.

During the 2015-16 season, Ms. Meyers appeared in a nationwide PBS broadcast special and on a Naxos DVD featuring the world premiere of Samuel Jones's Violin Concerto with the All-Star Orchestra led by Gerard Schwarz, and the French premiere of Mason Bates's Violin Concerto with Leonard Slatkin and the Orchestre de Lyon. In 2015 she released Passacaglia: Arvo Pärt, a celebration Arvo Pärt's 80th birthday with Naïve Records, which included works for violin and orchestra, recorded in close collaboration with the composer and conductor Kristjan Järvi leading the MDR Leipzig Orchestra. The same year she released Serenade: The Love Album featuring Leonard Bernstein's Serenade and ten newly arranged pieces from the American Songbook and classic movies with the London Symphony Orchestra and Keith Lockhart conducting. Ms. Meyers's complete RCA Red Seal recordings are now available on Sony Music.

Recently, Ms. Meyers stepped in on 24 hours of notice to perform and lead the conductorless Orpheus Chamber Orchestra in the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto in Carnegie Hall and Pennsylvania to rave reviews. In 2014, eOne Music released The American Masters featuring the world premiere recordings of the Mason Bates Violin Concerto and John Corigliano's "Lullaby for Natalie," written for the birth of her first daughter, and the Samuel Barber Violin Concerto with the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Leonard Slatkin. This recording made Google Play's, Best of 2014 and was heralded by critics and audiences alike. Ms. Meyers's prior release, Four Seasons: The Vivaldi Album, debuted at #1 on the classical Billboard charts and was the recording debut of the "Ex-Vieuxtemps" Guarneri del Gesu violin, dated 1741, which was awarded to Ms. Meyers for her lifetime use. This instrument is considered by many to be the finest sounding violin in existence.

Ms. Meyers's recent performances have included recital and concerto appearances in North America, South America, Europe, and Asia, with the Chicago, Detroit, Nashville, National, and Richmond Symphony Orchestras of the Mason Bates Violin Concerto, a work she co-commissioned and premiered with the Pittsburgh Symphony in December 2012. A champion of living composers, Ms. Meyers has actively added new works to the violin repertoire by commissioning and premiering works by composers such as Mason Bates, Jakub Ciupinski, John Corigliano, Brad Dechter, Jennifer Higdon, Samuel Jones, Wynton Marsalis, Akira Miyoshi, Arvo Pärt, Gene Pritsker, Einojuhani Rautavaara, J. A. C. Redford, Huang Ruo, Somei Satoh, Adam Schoenberg, and Joseph Schwantner.

Ms. Meyers has collaborated with a diverse array of artists outside of traditional classical, including jazz icons, Chris Botti and Wynton Marsalis, avant-garde musician Ryuichi Sakamoto, electronic music pioneer Isao Tomita, Il Divo, and singer Michael Bolton. She performed the National Anthem in front of 42,000 fans at Safeco Field in Seattle, appeared twice on The Tonight Show, and was featured in a segment on MSNBC's Countdown with Keith Olbermann that became the third most popular story of the year.

Recently, she was featured on CBS Sunday Morning, CBS's The Good Wife, NPR's Morning Edition with Linda Wertheimer, All Things Considered with Robert Siegel, and the popular Nick Jr. show Take Me To Your Mother with Andrea Rosen. Best-selling novelist J. Courtney Sullivan consulted with Ms. Meyers for The Engagements and based one of the main characters loosely on her career. She also collaborated with children's book author and illustrator Kristine Papillon on Crumpet the Trumpet, in which the character Violetta, the violinist, is played by Ms. Meyers.

Ms. Meyers was born in San Diego, California and grew up in Southern California. Her teachers include Alice and Eleonore Schoenfeld at the Colburn School, Josef Gingold at Indiana University, and Felix Galimir, Masao Kawasaki and Dorothy DeLay at The Juilliard School. She received the Avery Fisher Career Grant and serves on the advisory board of Composers Concordance and Young Concert Artists. She was recently awarded "The Luminary Award" for her support of the Pasadena Symphony. She lives with her husband and two young daughters in Los Angeles, California.

About Alice and Joe Coulombe
A community volunteer for 40 years, Alice Coulombe was a founding member and former chair of the Pasadena Arts Commission and a member of the City Centennial Committee. She continues to serve as president of the Metropolitan Associates, a local nonprofit that raises funds to support the arts for children. Ms. Coulombe was also a Huntington Library docent for 35 years and helped design the school tours in the Japanese Garden. Mrs. Coulombe is probably best known for her 30-year tenure as Music Center volunteer in Los Angeles. Her special love is opera, and she was the founding president of The Music Center Opera League as well as one of the founders of the LA Opera Company. Alice is on the board of the LA Opera and former chair of the Board Relations Committee. Alice received a Bachelor's degree in Humanities and a Master's degree in Education from Stanford University. Alice and her husband Joe have lived in Pasadena for 40 years and together have three grown children and six grandchildren.

About the Colburn School
The Colburn School comprises four academic units united by a single philosophy that all who have a desire to study the performing arts should have the opportunity and access to excellent training. The degree granting Conservatory of Music, the open enrollment Community School of Performing Arts, the Music Academy for pre-college musicians, and the pre-professional Dance Academy, a program of the Colburn School's Trudl Zipper Dance Institute, provide training to over 2,000 students from the Los Angeles area and across the world. The renowned teachers, performers, and scholars that make up Colburn's dedicated faculty serve as invaluable mentors to guide students' artistic development.

The Community School of Performing Arts acts as an entry point to performing arts education, offering beginning to pre-collegiate training in music, dance, and drama to students of all ages and skill levels. Young musicians from around the world study at the pre-college Music Academy, which features a rigorous curriculum of conservatory preparatory training to high school aged students. The pre-professional Dance Academy prepares a select class of young dancers for careers in ballet. Dance classes at the Community School and the Dance Academy are programs of the Trudl Zipper Dance Institute. Finally, the Conservatory of Music is one of the preeminent training grounds for classical musicians, with undergraduate and advanced degrees in music performance.

A robust community engagement initiative delivers performing arts education to low-income students in the surrounding areas through outreach and scholarship programs. Located in downtown Los Angeles, the Colburn School's campus boasts state-of-the-art performance and rehearsal spaces. Each season, the school presents over 300 concerts and performances, many of which are free and open to the public, at its downtown home and throughout Southern California.

Community School of Performing Arts
With classes taught by highly skilled instructors in music, dance, and early childhood arts education, the Colburn Community School of Performing Arts has served children of all ages and levels since its inception in 1950. A member of the National Guild for Community Arts Education, the Community School is accredited by the National Association of Schools of Music (NASM) and offers music classes in applied musical instruction, music theory, chamber ensembles, and large ensembles. As an open-enrollment school, the Community School does not require academic degrees to enroll in its courses, which cover a broad range of styles, age levels, and degrees of difficulty.