Biography

Martin Chalifour began his tenure as Principal Concertmaster of the Los Angeles Philharmonic in 1995. This concert honors his tenth year in that post. The recipient of various grants and awards in his native Canada, he graduated with honors from the Montreal Conservatory at the age of 18 and then moved to Philadelphia to pursue studies at the Curtis Institute of Music.

In 1986 Chalifour received a Certificate of Honor at the Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, and was a laureate of the Montreal International Competition the following year. Since then he has concertized extensively, playing hundreds of concerto performances from a repertoire of more than 50 works. He has appeared as soloist with conductors such as Pierre Boulez, Andrew Davis, Charles Dutoit, Christoph Eschenbach, and Esa-Pekka Salonen. Outside the United States he was a guest soloist with the Auckland Philharmonic, the Montreal Symphony, the Queensland Symphony (Brisbane, Australia), the Hong Kong Philharmonic and the Malaysian Philharmonic among others.

Chalifour began his orchestral career in 1984 with the late Robert Shaw and the Atlanta Symphony, playing as Associate Concertmaster for six years. Subsequently he occupied the same position for five years in the Cleveland Orchestra, where he also served as Acting Concertmaster under Christoph von Dohnányi. While in Cleveland, Chalifour taught at the Cleveland Institute of Music and was a founding member of two chamber ensembles, Myriad and the Cleveland Orchestra Piano Trio.

Chalifour is a frequent guest at several summer music festivals, including the Mainly Mozart Festival in San Diego, the Sarasota Music Festival, and the Ottawa International Music Festival. Maintaining close ties with his native Quebec, he returned there recently to teach and appear as soloist with the Quebec Symphony, with Yoav Talmi conducting. He also performed several chamber music concerts with cellist Lynn Harrell at the Amelia Island Festival in Florida and at the Madison Chamber Music Festival in Georgia. Chalifour and two of his Philharmonic colleagues, Joanne Pearce Martin and Peter Stumpf, recently joined forces and formed the Los Angeles Philharmonic Piano Trio to explore the wonderful repertoire written for this combination. All three artists met in 1981 while studying at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. The trio performed Beethoven’s Triple Concerto in September 2005 at the Hollywood Bowl.

Chalifour is a professor at the University of Southern California's Thornton School of Music. He is a resident of San Marino, California.