David Gillham has an extensive solo and chamber music career, having performed throughout Asia, Europe, the Americas and South Africa. He has performed in major venues such as Tokyo’s Opera City and Bunka Kaiken Recital Halls, Baxter Concert Hall in Cape Town, SA and the Chicago Cultural Centre, as part of the prestigious Dame Myra Hess Memorial concerts.
An internationally respected pedagogue, David is regularly invited to teach, give master classes and serve on competition juries in North America, Europe and Asia.
In 2011, he joined the Faculty at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada.
As an enthusiastic interpreter of chamber music, Mr. Gillham is currently a member of the
Vetta chamber players, the
Archytas Ensemble and the
Ridge Piano Trio. He enjoyed extensive concertizing with the
Arianna String Quartet as its second violinist from 2005-2012. In addition, he enjoys collaborating with musical personalities such as Regis Pasquier, Violaine Melançon, Johannes Moser, Noah Bendix-Balgley, James Dunham, Atar Arad, Anton Nel, Jose Franch Ballester, Jane Coop and Robert Silverman, to name just a few. He is regularly invited to festivals such as the Hammelburg, (Germany), Zodiac ( France ), FEMUSC (Brazil), Kuandu (Taiwan), Sonoran (USA), Pender Harbour and the Domaine Forget International Music Festival in Charlevoix, Quebec.
Inspired by Franco Gulli and Enrico Cavallo to continue performing the standard violin and piano duo repertoire with the same stylistic precision and unity as a string quartet, Mr. Gillham has performed the violin and piano duo repertoire with pianist Chiharu Iinuma for 20 years. Concerts have taken the duo to China, Taiwan, Japan, and across both the United States and Canada.
For
Centaur Records, the duo has recorded sonatas by Grieg, Mendelssohn, Respighi and Beethoven.
As a soloist with orchestra, Mr. Gillham has given performances with the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony, the Gateway Festival Orchestra of St. Louis, the Korea Jade Philharmonic, the West Coast Symphony, the Grand Forks Symphony and the Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra. With the UBC Symphony Orchestra, Mr. Gillham has toured Western Canada, performing the Tchaikovsky violin concerto and performed John Corigliano’s Chaconne from the
Red Violin, with the composer in attendance as part of UBC’s Corigliano Festival.
Beyond the standard repertoire of solo and chamber music, Mr. Gillham has dedicated himself to the performance and recording of today’s composers. His recording of Marcus Goddard’s two string quartets and string trio with the
Archytas ensemble on the
Palladino label, was released in 2020. He has also recently recorded Stephen Chatman’s Pender Harbour Suite for piano trio with pianist Corey Hamm and cellist Eric Wilson.
In 2018, Mr. Gillham had the honour of performing Juno-nominated composer Alice Ping Yee Ho’s Coeur Đ° Coeur for violin and piano with Corey Hamm live on CBC at the Juno Awards Classical Showcase Concert.
Mr. Gillham’s students have appeared as soloists with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, The Vancouver Philharmonic Orchestra, the Vancouver Metropolitan Orchestra and the Philharmonia Northwest of Seattle. Many of his former students hold positions in major symphony orchestras, and have continued their studies at institutions such as the Colburn Conservatory in Los Angeles and the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. Mr. Gillham is regularly invited to teach at universities such as Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music, the Wuhan Conservatory, the Kaohsiung Normal University, the University of Music and Theatre in Hamburg, McGill University and the University of Toronto.
Mr. Gillham is the co-ordinator of the violin sessions at the Domaine Forget International Music Festival and Academy in Charlevoix, Quebec. The intensive four-week program for gifted and advanced students from around the world regularly features masterclasses by renowned violinists such as Vadim Gluzman, Rachel Barton Pine, Vadim Repin, Christian Tetzlaff and Midori.
A graduate of Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, the Peabody Conservatory and the University of Manitoba, in 2002, Mr. Gillham was awarded the Queen Elizabeth Golden Jubilee Medal for his contribution to the arts in Canada.
He plays on a violin made by Carlo Tononi in Venice, Italy, in 1725.
