Artistic Director

Pauline Martin’s Washington recital captured the Washington Post headline Pauline Martin’s Dazzling Debut.  Kenneth Townsend wrote:  “a balanced, colorful and thoroughly engrossing performance . . . rewarded by loud, sustained applause.”  The Canadian born pianist continues to earn world-class recognition for her solo and chamber music performances and recordings, and has been the focus of several radio and television broadcasts in the U.S., Canada and Europe. Her March, 2009 performance of Mozart’s Concerto K. 365 with the Detroit Symphony Civic Orchestra was recorded by Chinese National Television for broadcast to over a billion viewers.

Martin has appeared as soloist with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, the New American Chamber Orchestra, Florida West Coast Symphony and Orchestra London Canada, among others, with such conductors as Lan Shui, Thomas Wilkins, Leslie Dunner, Yves Abel, Charles Burke, Kirk Muspratt, Paul Wolfe, Alexis Hauser, Roselin Pabon, David Katz and Laszlo Gati. An advocate for music of our time,  she has premiered numerous works and has earned high praise from composers George Crumb, Sir Malcolm Arnold, Susan Botti, Lukas Foss, Gary Schocker, Leslie Bassett, James Hartway and others for her dynamic and virtuosic interpretations.

Whether stepping in at the last minute to perform the Schumann Concerto with the Windsor Symphony “with grace and poise” (Windsor Star), or tackling such repertoire giants as the Chausson Concerto for Violin, Piano and String Quartet with Pittsburgh concertmaster Andres Cardenes and the Lafayette Quartet  or Schoenberg’s ‘Pierrot Lunaire’ (Oakland University’s ‘Celebrate the Century’ series), “ Pauline Martin thrives on challenges” notes one reviewer.  She is “…a find…  thoroughly accomplished and responsive to the unpredictable demands of performance” (Detroit News). The energy, immediacy and keen attention to stylistic detail which infuse her playing no doubt stem from an early immersion in the realm of chamber music at the center of a musical family.  When barely a teenager, she became sonata partner and accompanist to an entire studio of college violinists; by the time she completed her Masters’ degree at Indiana University, she would solo with an orchestra comprised entirely of her numerous chamber music colleagues in the school.

She now performs collaboratively with internationally acclaimed violinist Yehonatan Berick (the Berick & Martin Duo) and has appeared with many leading instrumentalists including violinist James Ehnes, clarinetist David Shifrin, flutist Bonita Boyd, pianists Ralph Votapek and Midori Koga, cellists Jeffrey Solow and Robert deMaine, bassist James VanDemark and hornist Erik Ruske, among others.  She frequently performs with principal players of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra and is a featured guest with the Detroit Chamber Winds and Strings.  The Ann Arbor, Aria International, New College (Sarasota), Summer Serenades (Rockville, Maryland), Scandinavian Winter Days (Reykjavik, Iceland), Mackinac Island, Grove, Detroit Symphony Tchaikovsky and Meadowbrook Music Festivals are among her credits. She is currently Artistic Director of  the Pro Mozart Society of Greater Detroit.

Inspired by her mentor, Menahem Pressler,  Martin formed the St. Clair Trio, which was immediately recognized as a “major new ensemble” by the Detroit Free Press following the group’s Mackinac Island Festival debut. The Trio’s compact disc, Hobson’s Choice, received a first round Grammy nomination in 1996.  Described as “magnificent” by Strad Magazine, this Koch International Classics disc features Pauline Martin in solo and chamber works by the Oscar-winning British composer Sir Malcolm Arnold. Old Acquaintances, a Koch CD of works by Franz Waxman, performed by the ‘St. Clair Trio and Friends’, was a winner of the Chamber Music America/WQXR award for outstanding new releases of 2000. The Trio also holds a Motor City Music Award for City Sketches, which features works by Detroit composer James Hartway.  The St. Clair Trio salutes retiring violinist Geoffrey Applegate and welcomes virtuoso Yehonatan Berick in the 2008-09 season.

Pauline Martin has served as a faculty member at Michigan State, Wayne State and Oakland Universities and as Assistant Instructor at Indiana University, completing Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees with Menahem Pressler, and the University of Michigan, where she earned a Doctorate of Musical Arts under the tutelage of Gary Graffman, Theodore Lettvin and former Artist in Residence Andre Watts.  She has performed and lectured to the academic community in Canada and the American Midwest, including the Music Teachers’ Association State Conventions of Michigan and South Dakota, the American Association of University Women and the Michigan Federation of Music Teachers, for which she is in demand as judge at the local, state and division levels. She also has served as artist-teacher for several Irving S. Gilmore Foundation events. Martin celebrates the achievements of her students as competition winners, recitalists, concerto soloists, festival participants, recording artists and teachers.

Visit Pauline Martin’s Professional Website www.paulinemartin.com.