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Curt Thompson is Founder and Executive Director of the Mimir Chamber Music Festival, held annually at TCU where he serves as Associate Professor of Violin and Director of Chamber Music Studies. The Festival, which will celebrate its 12th season July 6-17, 2009, has enjoyed critical acclaim by MetroPlex audiences and media. Both the Dallas Morning News (four times) and Fort Worth Star-Telegram (three times) have cited Mimir in their annual “Top 10 Musical Events of the Year” listings.
Thompson has performed recitals throughout Europe, Central America, and South America including performances at Salle Gaveau (Paris), the Bulgarian State Academy of Music (Sofia), and the Teatro Nacional de Costa Rica (San José). With TCU colleagues Messrs. Feghali and Castro-Balbi he performed at Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall, featuring the world premiere of Search for Piano Trio by composer Samuel Zyman. Thompson has been a featured artist in the Copland/Shostakovich Festival (Rio de Janeiro), the Festival de Primavera (Oaxaca, Mexico), Elim Festival (Pohang, Korea) the Seventh Centennial Festival of Villarobledo, Spain, and Clefworks Chamber Music Festival (Montgomery, AL).
Thompson’s debut recording on the Naxos label of the violin sonatas by Charles Ives has received outstanding reviews worldwide, including Gramophone, The Strad, The Wire, and The New York Times, where it was included in a listing of “Critics’ Favorites” and was called “…a hole in one…perfectly demonstrating [Ives’] spicy, earthy rawness and appeal….” His performance of the four Ives sonatas in 1998 was included in the “‘Top 10’ Musical Events of the Year” listing in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. As a concerto soloist, Mr. Thompson will appear this season with the Qingdao Symphony Orchestra (Qingdao, China), San Luis Potosi Symphony (San Luis Potosi, Mexico), and the Corpus Christi Symphony Orchestra. He has also been soloist with the Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra (Colombia), the San Angelo Symphony, the Texas Chamber Orchestra, and others. He is Concertmaster of the Corpus Christi Symphony, the San Angelo Symphony, and the Texas Chamber Orchestra, and has served as Concertmaster of the Fort Worth Symphony (by special invitation) and the Spoleto Festival Orchestra (Italy).
In addition to his duties at TCU, he has given master classes at several institutions including the Royal Academy of Music (London), the Bulgarian State Academy of Music (Sofia), El Escorial Conservatory (Spain), and the University of Saõ Paulo (Brazil). In 2007 he served on the jury of the Pancho Vladigerov International Violin Competition (Plovdiv, Bulgaria). During the spring 2002 semester, he maintained a violin studio as Guest Artist/Lecturer at his alma mater, Indiana University, where years earlier he received Bachelor and Master of Music degrees and the prestigious Performer’s Certificate while studying with Nelli Shkolnikova. In 2003 Thompson completed the Doctor of Musical Arts degree at Rice University where he studied with Sergiu Luca.
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