William McGregor, bass violin
Young-Ji Kim, piano
Saturday, November 20, 2021 at 4:00 pm
Ticket: $50
Having won the Gold Medal at the prestigious Stulberg International Competition, bass violin prodigy William McGregor brings his superstar talents to Silo Hill. In an electrifying program, including a Brahms’s cello sonata, a Bach Unaccompanied Suite, and Paganini’s Moses Variations, this 20-year-old phenom challenges the bass’s legacy as an orchestra-only instrument and demonstrates there is more to the double bass than oom-pah-pah!
A note of clarification: William McGregor’s concert, originally scheduled for Spring 2020, sold out three months prior to its performance date. It was disappointing for Silo Hill, Steinway, our artists, and our patrons when the concert was postponed and tickets returned because of the coronavirus. But at Silo Hill, music and talent prevail!
William plays well beyond his years…with great maturity, sensitivity and emotion.
Margaret Hamilton, Executive Director, Stulberg International String Competition
. . . tremendous freedom to communicate emotion with the instrument, which is why he wins all these competitions.
Albert Lazlo, The Juilliard School
William McGregor
William McGregor began his double bass studies at age 2 in Ann Arbor, Michigan. As a 9-year old, William was accepted into The Juilliard School Pre-College, where he studied with Albert Laszlo. From that time through today, this musical prodigy is winning accolades in an unprecedented number of competitions, festivals, and concerts.
In 2011 and 2012, William was awarded a Fellowship scholarship at the Aspen Music Festival and School, where he was the youngest full-time student at the Festival. He was selected to perform in Aspen’s Spotlight Recital with the Aspen Concert Orchestra. That same year, William won the Juilliard School Pre-College Open Concerto Competition and performed with the Juilliard Pre-College Symphony at Lincoln Center. In 2012, after winning the grand prize at the Ensemble 212 NYC Young Artist Competition, William made his Carnegie Hall debut, performing Paganini's Mosè in Egitto. Months later, William won 1st Prize in the Salome Chamber Orchestra Young Artist Competition in New York City. He also received the "Most Promising Young Artist" award with Salome and performed as soloist with the Salome Chamber Orchestra at Carnegie Hall the following year. In 2016, William was awarded, for the second time, the Juilliard Pre-College Open Competition and performed in solo with the Pre-College Orchestra under the baton of Maestro George Stelluto. In 2017, William won, by unanimous decision, the First Place Gold Medal at the Stulberg International String Competition. Not only is William recognized for his musical talents, but for his academic abilities as well, having been named a U.S. Presidential Scholar in the Arts, resulting in a Kennedy Center performance.
Most recently, William performed with the Baltimore Chamber and Grand Rapids Symphony Orchestras. He currently is a student at Curtis Institute of Music studying with Harold Robinson and Edgar Meyer.
Young Ji Kim
A native of Seoul, South Korea, YOUNG JI KIM began her piano studies at the age of five. She received her Bachelor of Music degree (summa cum laude) from Ewha Women’s University in Korea. She earned a Master of Music in Collaborative Piano at The Juilliard School, studying with Jonathan Feldman and Margo Garrett. During her tenure at Juilliard, she was a recipient of the Arthur Gold and Robert Fizdale, P. & A. Shaffer and William Petschek Piano Scholarships. She then attended University of Maryland to earn a Master of Music in Solo Piano Performance under the tutelage of Bradford Gowen and continued her studies at UMD, earning a Doctor of Music in Piano Performance.
In Korea, she was a prize-winner at the Samick Piano Competition and Music ChunChu Competition. She also won the University of Maryland Concerto Competition in 2009 and performed Rachmaninoff’s Paganini Rhapsody with University of Maryland Symphony Orchestra in 2011.
Earlier, she attended the Geras Piano Festival in Austria (1997), the Lazar Berman Piano Festival in Lübeck, Germany (1998) and the Aspen Music Festival in 2008, where she performed in a live radio broadcast. She has also performed at a Lazar Berman Master Class (1998), an Andre Watts Master Class (2003), the Rising Stars concert series sponsored by the Fairfax County Library in McLean, Virginia (2005) and several solo recitals at the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center. Young Ji was the official pianist at the 37th Annual Feder String Competition (2008) by the Washington Performing Arts Society in Washington DC.
Young Ji has been on the piano faculty at Jewish Community Center of Greater Washington and Holton-Arms School in Bethesda, Maryland. At the Juilliard School, she was a teaching fellow at Piano Minor Program.
