Elissa Cassini - Violinist and Artistic Director

Franco-American violinist Elissa Cassini’s captivating performances explore the full expressive range of the violin. Elissa’s concerto appearances include the celebrated favorites of Beethoven, Bruch, Mozart,Schumann and Sibelius, as well as recent works such as Ellen Taaffe Zwilich’s Concerto or Philip Glass’s “American Four Seasons”.

Her passion for new music was sparked when Pierre Boulez invited her to lead the orchestra at the Lucerne Festival in 2009. She has since collaborated with many internationally acclaimed living composers such as Beat Furrer, Georg Friedrich Haas, Tristan Murail and Kaija Saariaho. Elissa’s premieres include “Conditions de Lumière” a concerto by Jérome Combier with the Argento Ensemble in New York, Ensemble Cairn in Paris, and the NEM in Montreal; Nicolas Bacri’s Concerto Op. 116, with the Orchestre de Massy in France; Anders Eliasson’s Concerto for Strings with the Arcos Chamber Orchestra at the Berlin Konzerthaus. While still a student at the Juilliard School, Elissa gave her debut recital at Carnegie Weill Recital Hall, presented by Artists International. New York audiences have also heard Elissa perform at Zankel Hall, Merkin Hall, the Park Avenue Armory, Miller
Theater and Le Poisson Rouge.

A passionate chamber musician, Elissa is regularly invited to festivals in France, the Netherlands, the UK, Canada and Brazil. She has shared the stage with such notable artists as Gary Hoffman, Elisabeth
Leonskaja, Itzhak Perlman, Ivry Gitlis, as well as celebrities such as Wynton Marsalis, Caetano Veloso and Sting. Fond of mixing styles and seeking to transcend the traditional recital format, Elissa is the
creative director of the Duplexity Project.