By The Record
October 14, 2009 10:34 AM
Violinist Rachel Barton Pine plays concertos with orchestras around the world, performs on Baroque violin with an early music ensemble and has created more than a dozen recording projects ranging from tributes to underappreciated violinists like Maud Powell and Black composers of the 18th and 19th centuries to Scottish folk music and the world premiere of a 200-year-old violin concerto.
But to her, the breadth of her work is far from unusual.
Pine might concede that rehearsals and gigs with her heavy-metal band are a bit unusual for a violinist. Apparently though, they're still not enough to label her interests eclectic.
“My tastes are not in the least eclectic, any more so than your average person,” Pine asserted. “Chances are they're going to have quite a broad spectrum of stuff on their iPod, but they just might not have any classical on there.”
Pine, who began playing violin at age 3 and debuted in front of her hometown Chicago Symphony at age 10, might not accept eclectic as a description, but “busy” is one she's comfortable with, especially since her long-time love of heavy metal music has turned into membership in a real band called Earthen Grave.
“I've been doing my metal covers for more than a decade,” she said. “It's been really great to be this catalyst for people to discover classical music for the first time. I get wonderful e-mail testimonials from people who say ‘I never tried this stuff, but now I love it.'”
“I'm a missionary for classical music,” Pine said.
Local audiences will get a chance to hear Pine perform Barber's “Violin Concerto” this weekend in concerts with the Stockton Symphony. The program also features Grieg's “Holberg Suite” and Beethoven's “Symphony No. 7 in A Major.”
Read Thursday's Record for more on this story.
