Rita Porfiris

Rita Porfiris (born 16 July 1969) is an American violist and arranger based in Canton, Connecticut.

Rita Porfiris
Rita Porfiris performing in 2018 in Taiwan on the King Henry IV Viola
Background information
Born (1969-07-16) July 16, 1969
New York City, United States
GenresClassical
InstrumentsViola

Early life and training

Born in New York to parents of Greek and Chinese descent, Porfiris began the violin at age five as a Suzuki Method violin student. At age nine she started playing with the conductorless chamber orchestra group Tucson Junior Strings.[1]

While in junior high school she started playing the viola and three years later won the Arizona American String Teacher’s Association[2] Grand Prize. A formative experience of her early musical life was her membership in Young Audiences,[3] traveling to border towns in Mexico to play chamber music for young children. In 1986 she was named a National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts Scholar.[4][5]

In 1988 as a member of the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival Orchester she accompanied Leonard Bernstein on his first concert tour back to the Soviet Union since 1959.[6][7]

She earned two degrees from the Juilliard School and attended the Salzburg Mozarteum. Her viola studies were with William Lincer[8] and Paul Doktor, and chamber music studies with Norbert Brainin of the Amadeus Quartet, Harvey Shapiro, and members of the Juilliard Quartet.[9]

Career

The early career of Rita Porfiris started as a member and rotating principal violist of the New World Symphony[10] under Michael Tilson Thomas,[11] where she also performed as soloist. While there she formed the Plymouth Quartet, which went on to win a prize at the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition[12] and receive Austria’s Prix Mercure. With the quartet she toured South America and Europe, and was in-residence at Florida International University. At the age of 24 she joined the Houston Symphony. In 1997 she won second prize at the Primrose International Viola Competition[13][14] and joined the faculty at the University of Houston Moores School of Music. She remained at the Houston Symphony and Moores School until 2009, when she joined the faculty of The Hartt School at the University of Hartford,[15] where she now serves as Associate Professor of Viola and Chair of Chamber Music.[16] She has also been on the faculty of New York University.

Her articles on physical fitness and the viola and on related topics have been published in the Journal of the American Viola Society[17][18] and she was featured on the July–August 1998 cover of Symphony Magazine for playing an ergonomic viola.[19]

She has served on the jury for the Washington International Competition for Strings[20] and was a selection committee member for the United States Fulbright Scholar Program.

She performs regularly as a soloist[21] and chamber musician.[22] She is the violist in the Miller-Porfiris Duo with her husband, violinist Anton Miller.[23]

Premieres, arrangements, recordings

Rita Porfiris has commissioned and performed the world premiere or U.S. premiere of many solo and chamber works for the viola. Composers she has premiered and/or commissioned include Errollyn Wallen,[24] Max Lifchitz,[25][26] Frank Wallace,[27] Peter Aviss, Ken Steen,[28] Mario Diaz Gavier, David Ashley White,[29] Robert Avalon, and others.

She has recorded (as well as commissioning and premiering) the Lifchitz Confrontaçion for Viola and Chamber Orchestra with the North/South Ensemble;[30] Errollyn Wallen’s Five Postcards;[31] a chamber version of Strauss’ Don Quixote by and with cellist Laszlo Varga; and recorded the first complete collection of Robert Fuchs’ Twelve Duets.[32]

Discography

Partial list of recorded works for solo viola or chamber:

She has also arranged many works for viola and orchestra, violin and viola, and viola ensemble.[40]

References
  1. Tucson Junior Strings
  2. https://astaaz.org/
  3. https://www.youngaudiences.org/ Young Audiences
  4. https://www.youngarts.org/
  5. Philanthropy News Digest
  6. Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival, Leonard Bernstein official website
  7. "Bernstein in Moscow," New York Times July 25, 1988, p. C14
  8. William Lincer Foundation, Biography of William Lincer
  9. To confirm that the information in this article (which provides biographical information about a living person) is consistent with the official webpage of the subject of this article, Rita Porfiris, see http://ritaporfiris.com/site/about-rita/
  10. Lawrence Budmen (review), "A musical homecoming: New World Symphony alumni return to Miami Beach for a special concert," Music & Vision, June 16, 2005
  11. Tim Smith, "Words and Music: Musicians of the New World Symphony, Finishing its Fifth Season, Offer Some Praise and Criticism of the Orchestral Academy," South Florida Sun-Sentinel, May 9, 1993 ; Tim Smith, "Raising the Musical Pulse, and Standards, of a 'Wasteland'," New York Times Feb. 1, 1998, AR43.
  12. Fischoff History of Winners, 1994
  13. http://www.americanviolasociety.org/Competitions/Primrose.php
  14. "Competition Results," Strad, 00392049, vol. 108, no. 1288, Aug. 1997, p. 810.
  15. Hartt School Announcement republished at Broadway World News Desk, "Rita Porfiris Appointed Assistant Professor of Viola at Hartt School" Jun. 2, 2009
  16. https://www.hartford.edu/hartt/about-us/faculty/music/strings/rita-porfiris.aspx
  17. See Rita Porfiris, "In the Studio: A Technique for Learning Modern Music FAST, or How 137 Pushups in 2 Minutes Helped Me Prepare for the Berio 'Sequenza,' " Journal of the American Viola Society (2004) Vol. 20, No. 2, pp. 15, 17-18.
  18. "Violists of the Houston Symphony, Journal of the American Viola Society (2005) Vol. 21, No. 2, pp. 77-79
  19. James M. Keller, “Instruments of Opposition” Symphony July–August 1998, pp 48-55,108-110. See also Charles Ward, “More than Comic Relief, Odd Looking Viola is Friendlier to Musicians” The Houston Chronicle, Feb. 3 1998, p-D1, D3.
  20. https://www.thestrad.com/news/washington-international-string-competition-names-2018-winners/7936.article
  21. See, for example, Tim Smith, "Concert Artists of Baltimore Series features works by Ralph Vaughan Williams with Rita Porfiris, viola soloist," Baltimore Sun, May 6, 2016, p. T.12; Tim Smith, "Spirited music-making in Concert Artists season finale," Baltimore Sun, May 10, 2016 ;Viva Viola! with Salisbury Symphony Orchestra, October 17, 2015 ; Keith Powers, "Ocean State Composers (review)," Providence Journal, June 7, 2018
  22. See, e.g., Charles Ward, "Classical gets a refreshing makeover in Houston's barmusic series," Houston Chronicle, September 29, 2004 ; Samuel Black (review), "Chamber music festival off to thrilling start," Duluth News Tribune, June 7, 2010.
  23. See, for example, Jeff Korbelick, "Miller-Porfiris Duo to Perform with Lincoln's Symphony Orchestra," Lincoln JournalStar Jan. 29, 2014; John Cutler, "Love in the Air for 'Symphonic Valentine', " Lincoln JournalStar Feb. 1, 2014; Jónas Sen, "Andagift og andleysi í Kammermúsíkklúbbnum," Fréttablaðið (Reykjavik, Iceland), Sept. 22, 2018, p. 117 of pdf ; Lee Howard, "Miller, Porfiris wow crowd during Saturday's Eastern Connecticut Symphony Orchestra performance," The Day (New London CT), January 28, 2018 ; Jónas Sen, "Strengjaleikurinn þurr eins og sandpappír," Fréttablaðið (Reykjavik, Iceland), August 9, 2018, p. 24 (p. 36 of pdf); Kelly Strayhorn Theater Pittsburgh, June 20, 2017, http://www.chambermusicpittsburgh.org/our-concerts/series/just-summer/miller-porfiris-duo-violin-viola-silent-films; Midtown Arts Theatre Center Houston, January 17, 2017, Culture Map; “Which Came First?” Silent Film Classics: with Strings Attached http://data.instantencore.com/pdf/1051429/MATCH+press+release.pdf; An die Musik, February 14, 2017, Miller-Porfiris Duo in Baltimore; Chamber Music Society of Little Rock, Ron Robinson Theater, September 10, 2016; the official performance calendar of the Miller-Porfiris Duo can be found here.
  24. "British Composer, Pianist, Singer-Songwriter Errollyn Wallen to Perform at Symphony Space," 2/21/2014
  25. ArkivMusic, "Crosscurrents"
  26. Maria Nockin (review), “Crosscurrents: Music for Chamber Orchestra by American Composers,” Fanfare: The Magazine for Serious Record Collectors, vol. 35, no. 3, Jan. 2012, pp. 585–586, at 586.
  27. April 12, 2014 World premiere of "Changes upon the Guitar," from Frank Wallace’s As It Could Be, This is Classical Guitar
  30. MusicWeb International, "Crosscurrents," June 12, 2012
  31. New York Times, ArtsBeat, July 18, 2013
  32. Grant Chu Covell, "String Theory," La Folia (March 2018)
  33. Donald Rosenberg, Review (extract) of "Eight Pieces," Gramophone Magazine, May 2014
  34. Terry Robbins, Review of "Divertimenti", The Whole Note, May 2017
  35. Lee Passarella (review), Audiophile Audition, August 11, 2014.
  36. Donald Rosenberg review (extract) of "Eight Pieces," Gramophone Magazine, May 2014.
  37. Terry Robbins, Review of "Divertimenti", The Whole Note, May 2017
  38. Terry Robbins, Review of "Divertimenti," The Whole Note, May 2017
  39. John Campbell, CD Review, Artsong Update
  40. See, e.g., John Sunier review of Eight Pieces, Audiophile Audition, August 11, 2014
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