Home Daniel Veis
Daniel VEIS PDF Print E-mail
“ marvel of virtuosity"   The New York Times


DANIEL VEIS has been widely recognized as the finest Czech cellist since winning the Silver Medal at the prestigious 1978 Tchaikovsky International Competition in Moscow when he was twenty-four years old and also the First Prize at the Prague Spring International Competition, a competition previously won also by Rostropovich.
He was born in Prague and studied there at the Academy of Performing Arts as well as at the Moscow Conservatoire for five years, with Natalia Shakhovskaya.

Since 1979 he has performed regularly as soloist with many of the major orchestras and at numerous festivals including concerts at Avery Fisher Hall in New York, Royal Albert Hall in London, Suntory Hall in Tokyo with conductors such as Sir Charles Mackerras, Serge Baudo, Gaetano Delogu, Yan Pascal Tortelier, Jukka-Pekka Saraste, Vaclav Neumann, Jiri Bělohlávek, Libor Pešek and many others. He has recorded, for Supraphon and other labels, the complete cello and piano works by Brahms (including cello version of violin sonata in G major), Schumann, Mendelssohn and Martinů, as well as music by Dvořák and Saint-Saëns. Other recordings include music by Sommer, Kabeláč and Hanuš.

His repertoire is very large indeed and includes a great number of contemporary compositions. In 1989 he had the honour of being appointed permanent cello soloist of the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra. In addition to his solo career he has been a professor and also vice-dean at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague and for 15 years was a member of the Dvorak Piano Trio, with whom he toured and recorded extensively. At present he is professor of cello at Park University in Kansas. He gives master classes worldwide and is frequently invited to serve on juries of international competitions such as the Tchaikovsky in Moscow, the Lutoslawski in Poland and the Prague Spring International, in the last case also as chairman.

He has been playing a G.B.Guadagnini of 1754 for many years and now a G.F. Pressenda instrument, Torino, 1852.