Paul Kantor is one of the leading violin pedagogues and one of the most sought-after teachers in North America today. He is currently the Sally Shepherd Perkins Professor of Violin at the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University, having previously served as the Eleanor H. Biggs Distinguished Professor of Violin at the Cleveland Institute of Music. He received his Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degrees from The Juilliard School, studying violin with Dorothy DeLay and chamber music with Robert Mann. He has taught at the Juilliard School, the New England Conservatory, and Yale University, and served as Chair of the String Department at the University of Michigan for 13 years. He continues as Artist in Residence at The Glenn Gould School of the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto, since his appointment in 2008. Along with his son, violinist Timothy Kantor, he founded and directs the Gabriel Del Orbe Violin Program in the Dominican Republic.
Additionally, Mr. Kantor has presented master classes at the Starling-DeLay Symposium, Indiana University, the Eastman School, the University of Southern California and the New World Symphony, among others. His students consistently win top awards at major competitions including the Indianapolis, Montréal, Stulberg, Buenos Aires, Klein, and Fischoff. For the past 37 years, he has been on the Artist/Faculty of the Aspen Music Festival and School, where he has been concertmaster of both the Festival Orchestra and Chamber Symphony. He has performed as soloist with numerous symphony orchestras, and has served as concertmaster of the New Haven Symphony, the Lausanne Chamber Orchestra and the Great Lakes Festival Orchestra. Mr. Kantor was a member of The New York and Lenox string quartets, the Berkshire Chamber Players and the National Musical Arts Chamber Ensemble in Washington, D.C.
Mr. Kantor has performed the world premieres of Dan Welcher’s Violin Concerto, (subsequently recorded with Larry Rachleff and Symphony II) as well as John Corigliano’s “Red Violin Caprices.” His recordings can be found on the labels of Equilibrium, CRI, Delos and Mark Records. In 2014, he was honored with the Artist Teacher Award from the American String Teachers Association. Mr. Kantor is married to the distinguished pianist, Virginia Weckstrom.
