Gray was the 1st place winner of the 2011 Crain-Maling Foundation Chicago Symphony Orchestra Youth Auditions.
15-year-old cellist Johannes Gray debuted with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra at 14, soloing four times as 1st place winner of the 2011 Crain-Maling Foundation Chicago Symphony Orchestra Youth Auditions. Johannes was formerly an active member of the Music Institute of Chicago for 11 years. He studies with Hans Jørgen Jensen and Gilda Barston. With dazzling technical ability, compelling musicality and magical presentation, Johannes strives to stir the emotions of his audiences by communicating through his music.
Johannes, starting cello at age two, has performed extensively throughout the United States, as well as in Canada, Germany and Switzerland. He has performed in many venues including Symphony Center’s Orchestra Hall, Minneapolis’ Orchestra Hall, Ravinia’s Pavilion Stage and Martin Theatre, the Preston Bradley Hall at the Chicago Cultural Center, Northwestern University’s Pick-Staiger Concert Hall, the Kirche von Ligertz, and Ganz Hall, among many others. As well as performing in traditional venues, Johannes aspires to share his love of music with public schools, senior centers, community libraries, and events for good causes, including performing a concert for an owl at a zoo. In February of 2012, Johannes was featured on NPR’s From the Top radio program, the nation’s most popular young artist classical music radio program.
He performs repertoire ranging from Beethoven, Brahms, and Dvorak, as well as lesser-known pieces by Victor Herbert, Heitor Villa-Lobos, and Pablo Casals. As well as soloing with the Chicago Symphony, Johannes performed as guest artist with the Elmurst Symphony Orchestra, the Highland Park Strings, the Skokie Valley Symphony, the Oistrak Symphony Orchestra, and the Midwest Young Artist’s Symphony Orchestra.
In addition to the 2011 Crain-Maling Youth Auditions, Johannes has been awarded first place in many other competitions such as the Walgreens National Concerto Competition, the Sejong Music Competition where he received a special award for Best Interpretation of the Korean Piece, all four age divisions of the Chinese Fine Arts Society Music Competition in Honor of Confucius, as well as its Amei Hu Lin Scholarship Duet Competition, with pianist Ryan Jannak-Huang, the DePaul Concerto Festival for Young Performers, and the Society of American Musicians Competition.
As a chamber musician, Johannes performs with two highly acclaimed string quartets, Quartet Stracciatella and Quartet Ventoso. Johannes with Quartet Stracciatella won the Gold Medal at the 2012 Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition, held in South Bend, Indiana on May 11th-13th. As winner, Stracciatella will perform on NPR’s From the Top program. In the community, Stracciatella has performed at the Ryerson Woods and at a benefit concert to raise money for, and raise awareness of, the rare disease histiocytosis. Johannes with Quartet Ventoso won the Audience Choice Award and the prestigious Haydn Award at the 2012 St Paul String Quartet Competition in St Paul, Minnesota. In February, Quartet Ventoso won first place in the Society of American Musician’s Jules M. Laser chamber music competition, and as a result performed in March on the Music in the Loft concert series in Chicago and will perform live on WFMT’s Introductions radio show. Quartet Ventoso has also performed as guest artists for organizations such as: the Music In The Loft Gala, performing alongside world famous chamber groups, such as the Ying Quartet and the Lincoln Trio, as well as additional programs such as the MIC pre-gala kick-off event, Lively Arts of Chicago, Cedille Records gala (introduced by Henry Fogel), McGraw Wildlife Foundation, and Ravinia Festival’s Kraft Kids for Kids Program. Also, Johannes performs chamber music with his family string quartet and clarinet quintet the Shades of Gray. Johannes and his family have presented a biannual ‘family concert’ at their home since May of 2000, when he had just turned three.
Johannes has played for many of today’s leading cellists including Aldo Parisot, Amit Peled, Anthony Elliot, David Finckel, Janos Starker, Laurence Lesser, Lynn Harrell, Ralph Kirshbaum, Robert Nagy, Timothy Eddy, Wendy Warner, and Yo-Yo Ma. In addition to playing for Yo-Yo Ma, Johannes had a chance to collaborate with him in chamber music. For the last two summers, Johannes participated in the Young Performers Program at Music@Menlo in Menlo Park, California under the direction of David Finckel and Wu Han. This summer, Johannes attended Ivan Galamian’s Meadowmount School of Music located in the Adirondack Mountains of upstate New York.
Outside of music, Johannes loves birds and is an avid reader. His favorite author is Michael Crichton, because of the scientific aspect of his fiction books, as well as his compelling writing. He practices his cello every day under the watchful eyes of his cat, Athena. Currently, Johannes is a sophomore at New Trier High School, where he enjoys his academic classes and friends.
Johannes performs on a Montagnana model cello designed and crafted specially for him by Lawrence Wilke.
Program:
Foss: Capriccio
Valentini: Sonata in E Major
Sarasate: Zigeunerweisen
Dvorak: Silent Woods
Villa-Lobos: Song of the Black Swan