David Leisner

David Leisner (born December 22, 1953) is a classical guitarist, composer, teacher at the Manhattan School of Music and one of the leading authorities on focal dystonia, due to being impaired by the injury for 12 years and recovering through methods that he developed and now teaches his students.

Biography

David Leisner sprang onto the guitar scene with top prizes in the 1975 Toronto and 1981 Geneva International Guitar Competitions. As his performing career blossomed, Leisner suddenly became disabled by focal dystonia, interrupting his career for twelve years until he recovered on his own from methods that he developed from studying the physical aspects of playing the guitar. Since his comeback, he has completed major tours of Australia and New Zealand, as well as debuts and reappearances in Japan, the Philippines, Germany, Hungary, Switzerland, Austria, Denmark, Ireland, the UK, Italy, Czech Republic, Greece, Puerto Rico and Mexico. He has also performed with the Atlanta Symphony, and on concert series in such notable venues as Boston's Jordan Hall and Gardner Museum, the Cleveland Museum of Art, Spivey Hall in Atlanta, Royce Hall in Los Angeles, the Folly Theater in Kansas City, the St. Francis Auditorium in Santa Fe, and the Augustine Guitar Series in New York City. A three-concert solo series in New York's Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall included the first all-Bach recital in New York's history, and in recent years Leisner has been the Artistic Director of Guitar Plus, an annual series in New York devoted to chamber music with the guitar.

Leisner's acclaimed solo CDs have included a wide range of music, including Bach, Villa-Lobos, Mertz and Schubert, contemporary composers, his own compositions, and an album of "favorites", including the Britten Nocturnal and the Bach Chaconne. He has recorded guitar concertos by Hovhaness and Andrew Thomas, as well as chamber music by Haydn, Rorem, Pinkham and Hovhaness. His recordings have drawn praise from musicians of all kinds and magazines worldwide.[1]

Celebrated for expanding the guitar repertoire, David Leisner has premiered and commissioned many new works and has been an advocate for neglected works of the past (see Musical Research below). He has premiered works by David Del Tredici, Peter Sculthorpe, Virgil Thomson, Ned Rorem, Philip Glass, Richard Rodney Bennett, Osvaldo Golijov, Randy Woolf, Carlos Carillo and Gordon Beeferman.

As a composer, Leisner's works have been performed worldwide by such eminent artists as Sanford Sylvan, Wolfgang Holzmair, Paul Sperry, Robert Osborne, Kurt Ollmann, Patrick Mason, Juliana Gondek, Susan Narucki, D'Anna Fortunato, Warren Jones, Eugenia Zukerman, David Starobin, Benjamin Verdery, the Los Angeles Guitar Quartet, the Cavatina Duo, the Arc Duo, the Saturday Brass Quintet, the Eastman and Oberlin Percussion Ensembles, and a number of orchestras in the US. He has also received grants from the Aaron Copland Fund for Music, the American Music Center, the Alice M. Ditson Fund, the New England Foundation for the Arts, and Meet the Composer. His orchestral, chamber, vocal and guitar works are published mostly by Theodore Presser Co., with other publications by Doberman-Yppan, Columbia Music and G. Schirmer. Recordings of his works are available on the Cedille, SonyClassical, Dorian, Centaur, Town Hall, Signum, Acoustic Music, ABC, Athena, Fleur de Son and Barking Dog labels.

David Leisner is currently co-chairman of the guitar department at the Manhattan School of Music. He formerly taught at the New England Conservatory for 22 years. A graduate of Wesleyan University, he studied guitar with John Duarte, David Starobin and Angelo Gilardino and composition with Richard Winslow, Virgil Thomson, Charles Turner and David Del Tredici.

Research on focal dystonia

In the 1980s, David Leisner was disabled by focal dystonia, an injury that affected his right hand when playing guitar. He sought the advice of medical professionals from western medicine to acupuncturists, but no one could heal his hand. Although during this period he became an important and respected personality in the composition world, he was unable to keep away from the stage. He began performing music utilizing only a few of the fingers on his right hand, and performed difficult works that dazzled audiences, most unaware that he was injured. Eventually, through his own personal study of the engagement of large-muscle groups, he healed himself completely and now teaches his discoveries to students in masterclasses and private lessons.

Musical research

Leisner has repeatedly made important contributions to the classical guitar world through his research and historical discoveries. He has been responsible for reviving the music of Johann Kaspar Mertz (1806-1856), and he has recorded versions of the music of Heitor Villa-Lobos as displayed in its original manuscripts. Most recently, Leisner is championing the music of Wenzeslaus Matiegka (1773-1830), a 19th-century composer that Leisner describes as the "Beethoven of the guitar."

Discography

Solo guitar:

Chamber music and concertos:

Recordings of Leisner compositions:

Compositions

Solo guitar:

Voice and guitar:

Orchestra

Chamber music with guitar

Chamber music

"'Solo instrument"'

Voice and piano

References

  1. ↑ David Leisner, Review of David Leisner's FAVORITES. American Record Guide. By Ken Keaton. Jan./Feb 2012. Retrieved 26 Jan. 2012

Sources

External links

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 7/6/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.