Wednesday, February 19, 2020

Jivan Xander Ramesh | 2nd Prize | Strings | 5th Edition | ENKOR Int'l Music Competition


Jivan Xander Ramesh is a surprising musical talent in a non-musical family. Before the age of 3 he expressed a desire to play cello. On his fifth birthday he became the youngest string player to play at Carnegie Hall . He also started composing at the age of 4, and recently had his composition, “La Travesia” played by the New York Philharmonic musicians at David Geffen Hall in the Lincoln Center, with himself joining them on cello.

Jivan has won numerous awards playing the cello, including the Tilles Scholar Award, the Regina Rubinoff Award for Strings, and Dianne Danese Flagello Scholarship. This fall he joined Juilliard PreCollege on scholarship majoring in composition. Previous to that he attended the Manhattan School of Music PreCollege on scholarship majoring in Cello. Jivan continues to study with cello pedagogue Marion Feldman, and is playing with a professional orchestra, the Chinese Music Ensemble of New York.

He also composes in many musical styles, including baroque, classical, romantic, atonal, jazz, Chinese, Silk Road-ish, Indian, and fiddle. He has won a number of composition contests, received commissions to compose pieces for festivals and orchestras, and is scoring music for an Indie film. Jivan is also a member of the New York Metropolitan Opera Children’s Chorus and can be heard singing on stage at Lincoln center this season in three Puccini operas, ""Turandot"", ""La Bohème"", and ""Tosca"".

Besides being a musician, Jivan is an actor, karate black belt, programmer, and science enthusiast. Jivan also enjoys typical boyhood fun like swimming, kayaking, sailing and playing with his many pets. He hopes one day to be a paleogeneticist and composer/cellist.

Vocalise Op 34 No 14, Sergei Rachmaninoff, 6:31
https://youtu.be/-yKZ86xr6Ss