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Short Biography (188 words)
Gregory Maytan has been praised for his ‘infectious vitality’ and for his ‘lyrical freshness’ by The Strad, who also awarded his CD of Scandinvian music with the distinction of CD of the Month. The Nordsee Zeitung, Strings Magazine and the American Record Guide have also reviewed Maytan’s performances favorably.
Maytan has performed virtually all the major violin concertos with orchestra, and regularly performs in recitals and concerts in Europe and the US. He has performed on the Dame Myra Hess series, and also at venues such as Ravinia and Tanglewood. He has also performed in Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan, Japan and China.
Maytan has been nominated for a Grammis award (Swedish Grammy) and has had his CD receive the distinction of ‘Classical CD of the Year’ by Hifi Magazine. He has also completed a Fulbright Specialist Grant at the Norwegian Academy of Music.
Maytan performs on a 1683 Giovanni Grancino violin, generously loaned to him by the Jarnaker foundation, administered by the Swedish Royal Academy of Music. He graduated from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music as a student of Miriam Fried, Alexander Kerr and Paul Biss.
Long Biography (1035 words)
Gregory Maytan has been praised by The Strad for his ‘infectious vitality,’ ‘lyrical freshness,’ and ‘sparkling energy’. Other reviewers of his records and concerts have noted his ‘brilliant playing’ (Jacobsson, HiFI magazine) and his ‘heart-racing excitement and verve’ (Scott, Strings Magazine); he has been praised as ‘a technically extraordinarily well-versed violinist’ (Loskant, Nordseezeitung), and also for ‘his lovely, deep and profound sound’ (Hultman, Vasterbottens Kuririen). His recent ‘confident’ performance of the Beethoven Violin Concerto was described as ‘vigorous and intelligent’ and ‘beautifully expressed and nuanced’ (Sparks, Commercial Appeal), and the BBC praised his ‘seemingly effortless poise’ of his ‘sensitive, devoted performances’ (Haylock, BBC Music Magazine).
Maytan performs regularly as a soloist, chamber and orchestral musician and has performed extensively in Europe and the US. He has performed chamber music with the likes of Dylana Jenson, Bernt Lysell, and Mathias Tacke (Vermeer Quartet). Recent engagements include multiple performances of the Beethoven, Prokofiev, Paganini, Sibelius, Bruch, Maier, Beethoven, Barber and Tchaikovsky Violin Concertos with orchestras in Nevada, Tennessee, Texas, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, South Dakota and Sweden. He has also performed as a soloist in the Paganini and Tchaikovsky concertos in tours throughout China, Austria, Hungary and Slovakia under conductors such as Dennis Russell-Davies, Raymond Harvey, and Evind Gullberg-Jensen. An avid chamber musician, he has participated in the prestigious chamber music festival ‘Musikveckan’ in Junsele, Sweden; the Belvedere Chamber Music Festival in Memphis, TN; the Grumo Festival in Italy, the Korsholm Festival in Finland, the CICA Festival in Eureka Springs, AR, Dallas, TX and Taipei, Taiwan; and the Sagatuck Chamber Music Festival in Sagatuck, MI. He has performed at venues such as Ravinia, Tanglewood, and the Chicago Cultural Center and has performed solo recitals twice on Chicago Public Radio as part of the Dame Myra Hess series.
Maytan’s first CD, consisting of music from his native Scandinavia, was selected by The Strad as the top recital CD of April 2009 and highly praised by Strings Magazine and the American Record Guide. He other recordings include the sonatas of Faure, Franck, and the Chausson Poeme, as well as other Scandinavian music. Most recently, he has recorded a CD featuring the violin concerto by Amanda Maier (1853-94) together with the Helsingborg Symphony (where he also performed the concert as a soloist in a subscription concert), as well as several other previously unrecorded chamber works. Maytan is likely the first violinist ever to record the complete works for violin by Amanda Maier.
He has participated in the International Chamber Music Festival in Vienna, Austria, where he was a featured prize winner, and he has been awarded significant cash awards in the Swedish Royal Academy’s competition for post-graduate violinists during the years 2006, 2007 and 2008. He has performed and toured with numerous orchestras, and his concerts have been broadcast on radio and television in the U.S. and Europe. A sought-after teacher, he has presented masterclasses and recitals at numerous universities across the US and abroad, among them the University of North Texas (Denton), Butler University (Indianapolis), Michigan State University (Lansing), the University of Alabama (Tuscaloosa), the University of Auckland (New Zealand), the Sydney Conservatory (Australia) the University of Arizona (Tucson) the University of Nevada (Reno), the Yamaha Concert Hall in Taipei, Taiwan, and the Norwegian State Academy of Music in Oslo, Norway. He has also himself participated in masterclasses with Zakhar Bron, Leonidas Kavakos, and Michela Martin.
Maytan maintains a growing and thriving studio in Grand Rapids, MI, where he teaches a select number of high school students along with his University students. Students of Maytan have won and placed in numerous regional and local competitions, including the Lima, Ohio young artist competition; the Skip Gates competition; and the GVSU and Valparaiso concerto competitions. They have been awarded full scholarships to the Meadowmount School of Music, to Kneisel Hall and to the Aspen School of Music and have also been invited to perform on NPR’s series ‘From the Top’. One student was selected as one of 12 national finalists for the MTNA competition in Anaheim, CA where she represented Michigan as well as four surrounding states. Students have been selected to be concertmasters of the Michigan All-State Orchestra as well as the Grand Rapids Youth Symphony. Most recently a student won concerto appearances and performed the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto with the Lansing Symphony and Western Illinois Symphony. They have also been admitted into the New York String Seminar and have performed in masterclasses for the likes of Pinchas Zuckerman and Arnold Steinhart and have played chamber music with Joseph Silverstein and Itzak Perlman. Students have been admitted as violin majors to some of the top violin programs in the nation, such as Indiana University, New England Conservatory, Cleveland Institute of Music, University of Southern California and University of Michigan, and have gone on to study with teachers such as Jaime Laredo and Jan Sloman.
Maytan is a member of the contemporary musical ensemble Luna Nova. He also maintains a regular collaboration with his outstanding pianist Chi-Chen Wu as a member of the newly formed Rainier Duo. During the summer of 2014 Maytan presented a series of 16 concerts throughout Sweden through the agency Motile, performing in such venues as the main concert hall at Norrlandsoperan in Umea, Sweden. He has served as guest concertmaster of the Vasteras Sinfonietta, the Kalamazoo Symphony, the Northwest Indiana Symphony, the West Michigan Symphony and the Illinois Symphony Orchestra and is permanent concertmaster of the Battle Creek Symphony. Maytan has also performed as concertmaster and section leader for legendary conductors Kurt Masur and Christoph Von Dohnanyi at Tanglewood.
During the 2017 spring semester Maytan was awarded and completed a Fulbright Specialist Grant at the Norwegian State Academy of Music where he taught and performed. A pedagogical book collaboration with professor Terje Moe Hansen is planned for release in late 2017.
He earned his doctorate in violin performance from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music in Bloomington, where he studied with the renowned violinists Miriam Fried and Paul Biss. He is currently performing on a violin from 1683 made by Giovanni Grancino, on loan from the Jarnaker Foundation administered by the Swedish Royal Academy of Music.
Maytan is represented by the Great Lakes Performing Artist Associates.