Nicholas Kitchen, Violin

NICHOLAS KITCHEN
Violinist

Violinist Nicholas Kitchen has performed throughout the world both as soloist and chamber musician, most significantly as founding member and first violinist of the Borromeo String Quartet for 30 years. He has extensively performed and worked on projects with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, the Library of Congress, and Performance Today, and has initiated many innovative collaborations, combining multiple forms of artistic expression with performance. The BSQ has performed his acclaimed transcriptions of Bach’s Goldberg Variations and the Well-Tempered Clavier Book I internationally, the latter of which the Quartet released on an acclaimed premiere recording which hit the billboard charts. A passionate educator, he often leads discussions enhanced by projections of handwritten manuscripts, investigating with the audience the creative process of the composer, and has lectured and given master classes across the globe, and has encourage audiences and students of all ages to explore and listen to both traditional and contemporary repertoire in new ways. Teaching at the New England Conservatory of Music, Nicholas has pioneered the use of computers and page-turning pedals to make it possible for the Borromeo and students to always work from the complete score, which has allowed him to become involved in the serious study of composer’s manuscripts. In the case of Beethoven, this manuscript study has led him to exciting discoveries of a new dynamic and articulation system within the manuscripts, praised and supported by scholars and institutions and performed world-wide. He is Artistic Director of the Heifetz International Music Institute.