Cellist Amit Peled to Release Peabody Cello Gang Album 10/27

On Friday, October 27, 2017, CTM Classics releases The Amit Peled Peabody Cello Gang, an album of cello ensemble works produced by acclaimed Israeli cellist and sought-after pedagogue, Amit Peled, a professor at Baltimore's Peabody Institute. The recording features a world premiere arrangement of Schubert's Arpeggione Sonata in A Minor, D. 821 for four cellos by Tom Zebovitz; Popper's Requiem, Op.66; and Handel's Sonata for Two Cellos in G Minor, Op.2 No.8. Peled performs on the 1733 Pablo Casals Goffriller cello.

The Peabody Peled Cello Gang is composed of students from Amit Peled's studio at the Peabody Institute at Johns Hopkins University. The students range in age from undergraduate freshmen to second year master's students, and the group comes together often to perform works written or arranged for cello ensemble. Peled and the Peabody Cello Gang also tour around the country, performing standard cello concerti with Peled as soloist and the Gang as orchestral accompaniment, as well as cello choir repertoire from the album and more.

Amit explains, "As a young student, I was fortunate enough to experience the magic of performing music on stage with my great mentors Bernard Greenhouse and Boris Pergamenschikow, in addition to our regular one-on-one lessons. The difference between listening to them explain how to create a phrase and forming that phrase with them on stage was huge and significant. Janos Starker once said, 'I personally can't perform without teaching and I can't teach without performing.' Ever since those transformative and magical moments, I knew that I would become a teacher and pass on the tradition of sharing music with my own students on stage. This day arrived when the Cello Gang was created."

About Amit Peled
Israeli cellist Amit Peled, a musician of profound artistry and charismatic stage presence, is acclaimed worldwide as one of the most exciting and virtuosic instrumentalists on the concert stage today. At 6'5" tall, Peled started life as a basketball player and was called "larger than life" and "Jacqueline du Pré in a farmer's body" when he enveloped his cello. Peled strives to break down the barriers of the concert hall, about which The Baltimore Sun wrote, "His amiable and inviting personality is exactly the type everyone says we'll need more of if classical music is to survive."

During the 2017-2018 season, Peled will continue to share the sound of Pablo Casals' 1733 Goffriller cello with audiences around the globe, an instrument personally handed to him by Maestro Casals' widow, Mrs. Marta Casals Istomin. Upcoming highlights include Bach Suite cycles in the United States, Europe, and Israel; a new Naxos release with the Tempest Trio (Ilya Kaler, violin; Amit Peled, cello; Alon Goldstein, piano); a debut collaboration with the Peabody Chamber Orchestra with Maestra Marin Alsop; performances of the Shostakovich Cello Concerto and Penderecki's Second Cello Concerto conducted by the legendary composer himself; a release of Brahms' Cello Sonatas; Schubert's Arpeggione Sonata recorded on the Casals cello; and a worldwide musical celebration of Beethoven's Cello/Piano Sonatas to commemorate the composer's 250th anniversary.

In September 2017, Peled published a children's book, A Cello Named Pablo, written by Marni Fogelson and illustrated by Avi Katz. Funded by a successful Kickstarter campaign, it follows Peled's journey from the basketball courts of rural Israel to the world's great concert halls playing one of the most famous string instruments of all time and continuing the legacy of the great Pablo Casals.

Peled has performed as a soloist with many of the world's top orchestras and in major concert halls such as Carnegie Hall and Alice Tully Hall in New York, Salle Gaveau in Paris, Wigmore Hall in London, Konzerthaus in Berlin, and Tel Aviv's Mann Auditorium. Of his enthusiastically received Alice Tully Hall concert debut performing the Hindemith Cello Concerto, The New York Times wrote that Peled produces a "glowing tone, a seductive timbre and an emotionally pointed approach to phrasing that made you want to hear him again." His extensive discography includes critically acclaimed CDs on the Naxos, Centaur, and Delos Labels. His recent release of Casals Homage, which features the legendary 1915 Pablo Casals program, topped the iTunes charts.

As an active chamber musician, Peled is a founding member of the famed Tempest Trio with pianist Alon Goldstein and violinist Ilya Kaler. Their Dvorak CD on Naxos has been described as "The best 'Dumky' on disk ever!" by Fanfare Magazine. Peled frequently performs and gives master classes at prestigious summer music festivals such as the Marlboro Music Festival, Newport Music Festival, Seattle Chamber Music Festival, Heifetz International Music Institute, Schleswig Holstein and Euro Arts Festivals in Germany, Gotland Festival in Sweden, Prussia Cove Festival in England, The Violoncello Forum in Spain, and Keshet Eilon Festival in Israel, among others.

Track List

Amit Peled (cello), Ismael Guerrero (cello), Joseph Staten (cello), Jiaoyang Xu (cello)

Amit Peled (cello), The Peabody Cello Gang (cello), Eli Kalman (piano)

Amit Peled (cello), Andrea Casarrubios (cello), Hui-Chuan Chen (piano)

Watch the Peabody Cello Gang perform Popper's Requiem below!

Visit www.amitpeled.com for more information.