Anne Akiko Meyers, is one of the most internationally renowned and respected classical musicians of our time. Known for her passionate performances, purity of sound, deeply poetic interpretations, innovative programming and best-selling recordings, Anne frequently performs with the world’s top orchestras and presents ground-breaking recitals. She has dramatically expanded the modern violin repertoire with significant new commissions.
During the 2018-2019 season, Anne was the featured soloist in several performances celebrating the opening of the Arvo Pärt Centre in Estonia, by special invitation of the legendary composer himself. She also performed Schindler’s List for a Great Performances television special honoring John Williams, also at the composer’s personal invitation. Anne premiered Rautavaara’s final work, Fantasia and Mason Bates’ Violin Concerto with the Helsinki Philharmonic and Jan Söderblom, live-streamed worldwide and premiered Fantasia in Japan. Other highlights include a US tour with guitarist Jason Vieaux, the release of her 37th album, Mirror in Mirror, on Avie Records and a WQXR broadcast appearance as one of the most innovative classical musicians to watch in 2019.
Upcoming performances include the Barber Violin Concerto at Ravinia with James Gaffigan and the Lucerne Symphony Orchestra and the debut of the Adam Schoenberg Concerto at the Enescu Festival in Romania. In October, she performs with Kristjan Järvi and the MDR Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra at the Leipzig Gewandhaus, Sapporo’s Kitara Hall and Tokyo’s Suntory Hall.
A champion of living composers, Meyers has dramatically expanded the violin repertoire by commissioning and premiering works by composers including Julia Adolphe, Mason Bates, Jakub Ciupiński, John Corigliano, Michael Daugherty, Jennifer Higdon, Samuel Jones, Arturo Marquez, Wynton Marsalis, Akira Miyoshi, Arvo Pärt, Gene Pritsker, Einojuhani Rautavaara, Somei Satoh, Adam Schoenberg, and Joseph Schwantner. Anne has premiered new music with the symphony orchestras of Chicago, Dallas, Detroit, National, Nashville, Phoenix, Pittsburgh, San Diego, Helsinki, Hyogo, Leipzig, London, Lyon, and New Zealand, among others.
Anne was Billboard’s top-selling traditional classical instrumental soloist in 2014 and many of her 37 albums have debuted at #1 on Billboard classical charts. Her recording of Rautavaara’s Fantasia was selected as the only classical instrumental work on NPR’s 100 best songs of 2017. Her world premiere performance of Samuel Jones’s Violin Concerto with the All- Star Orchestra led by Gerard Schwarz was a nationwide PBS broadcast special and a Naxos DVD release. She can be heard on two new recordings – one celebrating Arvo Pärt’s 80th birthday on Naïve Classics and a box set of Anne’s RCA Red Seal discography on Sony Classics.
Anne has collaborated with a diverse array of artists outside of traditional classical, including jazz icons Chris Botti and Wynton Marsalis; avant-garde musician, Ryuichi Sakamoto; electronic music pioneer, Isao Tomita; pop-era act, Il Divo; and singer, Michael Bolton. She performed the National Anthem in front of 42,000 fans at Safeco Field in Seattle, appeared twice on The Tonight Show and was featured in a segment on MSNBC’s Countdown with Keith Olbermann that became that show’s third most popular story of the year.
Anne has been featured in profiles or performances on CBS Sunday Morning, CBS ’“The Good Wife,” NPR’s Morning Edition with Linda Wertheimer, and All Things Considered with Robert Siegel and recently curated “Living American” on Sirius XM Radio’s Symphony Hall. She was on the popular Nick Jr. show, Take Me To Your Mother, with Andrea Rosen. Best-selling novelist, J. Courtney Sullivan, consulted with Anne for The Engagements and the author based one of the main characters loosely on Anne’s career. She also collaborated with children’s book author and illustrator, Kristine Papillon, on Crumpet the Trumpet, where the character Violetta the violinist is played by Anne.
Anne Akiko Meyers was born in San Diego and grew up in Southern California. She studied with Alice and Eleonore Schoenfeld at the Colburn School of Performing Arts, Josef Gingold at Indiana University, and Felix Galimir, Masao Kawasaki, and Dorothy DeLay at the Juilliard School. Anne received the Avery Fisher Career Grant, the Distinguished Alumna Award from the Colburn School of Music, the Luminary Award from the Pasadena Symphony and is on the advisory council of the American Youth Symphony Orchestra. She performs on the Vieuxtemps Guarneri del Gesù, dated 1741, considered by many to be the finest sounding violin in existence. Anne and the violin were recently featured on the cover of The Strad magazine in a two-part story and she was the star performer at their inaugural Stradfest.
