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Moores School of Music Recital: Rita Porfiris,viola

Presented by University of Houston - Moores School of Music at University of Houston - Moores Opera House

August 29, 2010

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The Moores School of Music at the University of Houston presents a Moores School of Music Recital, Sunday, August 29 at 2:30pm, in the Moores Opera House.  Featuring Rita Porfiris, * viola.

Also Featuring:  Anton Miller,* violin, and Timothy Hester, piano.

Born in New York, violist RITA PORFIRIS (pictured) balances an active life as a performer and teacher. Currently on leave as a 15- year veteran of the Houston Symphony, she starts a new position of Asst Professor of Viola at The Hartt School in September 2009. She is also on the faculty of New York University and the Texas Music Festival, and has been on the faculties of the University of Houston Moores’ School of Music, Florida International University, the Harlem School for the Arts in New York, the Milwaukee Chamber Music Festival, and Vermont’s Point Counterpoint. She has given master classes and clinics across the U.S., Japan, and Brazil.

Her former positions include Guest Principal Violist with the Indianapolis Symphony and Principal Violist with the New World Symphony and extra in the Radio-Sinfonie Orchester Berlin and the Baroque Orchester Berlin. She has performed in major concert halls and music festivals worldwide and as a soloist has appeared with numerous orchestras including the Orquesta Filarmonica de la Ciudad de Mexico, the New World Symphony and the Houston Symphony. An avid champion of modern music and the recipient of many new works’ dedications, she recently performed the world premiere of Confrontacion for Viola and Orchestra written for her by composer Max Lifchitz.

Much sought after as a chamber musician, she is the Artistic Director and co-Founder of Musica da Camara Festival Eterna Primavera, a winter string quartet festival in Cuernavaca, Mexico. As a founding member of the Plymouth Quartet she toured the United States, Europe, and South America, and was quartet in-residence at the Ojai Festival, Mainly Mozart, Point Counterpoint, and the Internationale Quartettakademie Prag-Wien-Budapest. Rita is the recipient of Austria’s prestigious Prix Mercure, a top prize winner in the Fischoff Chamber Music Competition and the Primrose International Viola Competition, and a laureate of the Paolo Borciani International Quartet Competition.

Always trying to bridge the gap between popular culture and classical music, Rita has been the subject of articles and interviews in media across the globe including the New York Times, Chamber Music America, International Symphony Musician, the NBC Nightly News, NPR, PBS, and the BBC. Her various chamber music recordings can be found on Opus One and Modern Masters labels. She has published an article in the Journal of the American Viola Society detailing the importance of physical fitness in preparing for virtuosic modern works. In Houston Rita received daily training with the Navy SEAL Physical Training course. Her top push-up score is 134 in two minutes.

She received both her BM and MM in Viola Performance from The Juilliard School.

Scheduled Program:
Works by Jongen, Larsen, Wallen, Williams, Gavier.

*Indicates Guest Artist.