Igor Zubkovsky

Igor Zubkovsky started playing cello at the Gnessin Music School in Moscow and first appeared as a soloist with the Minsk State Philharmonic Orchestra at the age of twelve, performing Haydn C Major Cello Concerto.

In 1994, Zubkovsky graduated from the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory where he studied cello with Natalia Shakhovskaya, the First Prize Winner and a Gold Medalist of the 1962 Tchaikovsky Competition, and chamber music with Alexander Bonduriansky. He then went on to earn a postgraduate degree which he completed in 1997.

With a remarkable record of performances, awards and academic distinctions, he was awarded a full scholarship to the Peabody Conservatory of Music in Baltimore, Maryland where in 1999 he earned a Graduate Performance Diploma.

Zubkovsky won top prizes at the several international competitions, including Diploma at the International Jeunesses Musicales Competition in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, Second Prize at the International Cello Competition in Minsk, Belarus, and the Grand Prix at the First Tansman International Competition of Musical Personalities in Łódź, Poland. As part of the prize, he recorded a CD on DUX label and was invited to perform Alexandre Tansman's Fantasie with Lodz Philharmonic under conductor Paweł Przytocki.

In 1992-1997 Zubkovsky was a member of the critically acclaimed ensemble “Brahms Trio” in Moscow. With the group he won Second Prize at the International Chamber Music Competition in Trapani, Sicily and First Prize at the Joseph Joachim Chamber Music Competition in Weimar, Germany.

Igor Zubkovsky has an active concert life, playing solo and chamber music recitals and performing as a soloist with orchestras.

He has performed with such orchestras as the Minsk State Philharmonic Orchestra, the Voronezh State Symphony Orchestra, the Kishinev State Symphony Orchestra, Moscow Conservatory Symphony Orchestra, Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra, Lodz Philharmonic, University of Maryland Symphony Orchestra, Harrisburg Symphony Orchestra, and Altoona Symphony Orchestra. In addition to numerous appearances in Russia and the United States, he has performed in Belarus, Moldova, Great Britain, Poland, Austria, Italy, Spain, Germany, France, Finland, Australia, Turkey and Taiwan.

Zubkovsky has collaborated with such prominent musicians as pianists Stephen Prutsman, Ann Schein, Rohan de Silva, Michael Endres, Alexander Melnikov, Olga Kern, Bernadene Blaha, Daniel del Pino, Judith Lynn Stillman and Pedja Muzijevic, clarinetists Evgeny Petrov and Anton Dressler, singers Marianna Busching and Danielle Talamantes, violinists Earl Carlyss, Odin Rathnam, Eugeny Bushkov, Emil Chudnovsky and Natasha Korsakova, violist Yuri Bashmet, and the members of the Borodin Quartet.

He has appeared at the Merkin Concert Hall in New York City, the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, Bolshoi and Maly Hall of the Moscow Conservatory, the Belgrade Philharmonic Hall, the Hall of Columns of the Moscow Palace of Unions, National Gallery of Art, Corcoran Gallery of Art and Department of State in Washington, D.C. As a chamber musician, he also participated at the Schwetzingen Festival, Kuhmo Chamber Music Festival, Newport Music Festival and Lancaster Festival.