April 28: Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts announced pianists Joyce Yang, Kirill Gerstein, Yuja Wang, and David Aaron Carpenter (viola) as the four 2010 Avery Fisher Career Grant recipients.
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Four Avery Fisher Career Grants Awarded for 2010
On April 28th at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts,
Nathan Leventhal, the Program's Chairman, Charles Avery Fisher and Nancy Fisher
announced four 2010 Avery Fisher Career Grant recipients:
David Aaron Carpenter, violist; Kirill Gerstein, pianist;
Yuja Wang, pianist; Joyce Yang, pianist
The Avery Fisher Artist Program, established by the late Avery Fisher as part of a major gift to Lincoln Center in 1974, serves as a monument to Mr. Fisher’s philanthropy and love of music, with the Career Grants in particular exemplifying his devotion to helping young artists. Since the first Career Grants were given in 1976, 118 have been awarded (including this year’s grants), and all recipients are currently working musicians. Identified early in their careers, among former Career Grant recipients are Carter Brey, James Ehnes, Leila Josefowicz, Jeffrey Kahane, and Edgar Meyer.
Festivities were held at Lincoln Center’s Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse for an invited audience. This year’s announcement, made by the Program’s Chairman Nathan Leventhal, along with Charles Avery Fisher and Nancy Fisher (children of the late Avery Fisher), and performances by three of the four recipients were taped for broadcast by Classical 105.9 WQXR ~ FM, with host Robert Sherman, to be aired on Wednesday, May 12th, from 9 - 10 pm. The fourth recipient, Kirill Gerstein, was unable to participate due to his performance schedule. The 2010 awards mark the 31st time WQXR has broadcast these festivities, having been a broadcast partner since the first Career Grants were awarded in 1976. This year, WNET SundayArts will also be featuring the 2010 recipients.
Under the banner of Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, the Avery Fisher Artist Program has launched a new website as of March 2009. Information about the Program (Avery Fisher Prize and Career Grants), is available online at www.averyfisherartistprogram.org. Links to today’s 2010 Career Grant performances, as well as select past recipients’ Career Grant ceremony performances, are also available on this website.
Avery Fisher Career Grants of the Avery Fisher Artist Program are designed to give professional assistance and recognition to talented instrumentalists as well as chamber ensembles who the Recommendation Board and Executive Committee of the Avery Fisher Artist Program believe to have great potential for major careers. The award stipend is $25,000. This amount is made available to each recipient, to be used for specific needs in furthering a career. Recognizing the need for video in a young career, the Avery Fisher Artist Program, with the aid of Live From Lincoln Center’s Executive Producer John Goberman, provides recipients with an unrestricted DVD of the day’s performance to aid them in publicizing their work.
Up to five Avery Fisher Career Grants may be given each year with recipients being U.S. citizens or permanent U.S. residents. Recipients are nominated by the Program's Recommendation Board, which comprises nationally known instrumentalists, conductors, composers, music educators, managers and presenters. Final selections are made by the Executive Committee, whose members are: Emanuel Ax, pianist; David Finckel and Wu Han, Artistic Directors, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center; Henry Fogel, Dean, Chicago College of Performing Arts at Roosevelt University; Anthony Fogg, Artistic Administrator, Boston Symphony Orchestra; Pamela Frank, violinist; Ara Guzelimian, Provost and Dean, The Juilliard School; Nathan Leventhal, Chairman, Avery Fisher Artist Program; Reynold Levy, President, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts; Yo-Yo Ma, cellist; Zarin Mehta, President and Executive Director, New York Philharmonic; Jane S. Moss, Vice President, Programming, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts; and Joseph W. Polisi, President, The Juilliard School. Mrs. Avery Fisher, Charles Avery Fisher and Nancy Fisher are advisors to the Executive Committee. The Program periodically also awards the Avery Fisher Prize. The Avery Fisher Artist Program is grateful to Lincoln Center, Inc., and its president Reynold Levy for continued support.
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Pianist Joyce Yang had only finished her freshman year at Juilliard when she snared the silver medal at the 12th Van Cliburn International Competition, becoming the youngest prizewinner in the competition's history. Between classes, she toured the world, performing on multiple occasions with the New York Philharmonic, and the Chicago, San Francisco and Houston symphonies, among many others. In 2010 she received an Avery Fisher Career Grant. Now, Juilliard has given its celebrated alum the William Petschek Piano Recital Award: a recital at Alice Tully Hall. Previous Petschek recipients have included Jeremy Denk, Jon Kimura Parker and Orion Weiss. 
