Artist's Biography
A native of New Zealand, Tim Deighton has lived the past twenty years in the United States, where he is fortunate to enjoy a varied performing career. He has appeared as recitalist, soloist with orchestra, and chamber musician throughout the Americas, Australasia, Europe, and Africa.
Having long held a fascination for new music, he has performed premieres of more than fifty new works for viola, most of which were commissioned by or written for him. His first solo CD, Viola Aotearoa, featuring music for viola by New Zealand composers, was released in 2002 on the Atoll label. His playing on this disc was described in The Strad as “brilliant and differentiated,” and the CD was one of the New Zealand Listener’s Top 10 classical recordings of 2002. As a member of the contemporary chamber music duo The Irrelevants, he and saxophonist Carrie Koffman have commissioned and premiered many new works. Their new CD entitled Dialogues will be released later this year. The newly formed Chihara Trio will present commissioned works by several composers this season (including Paul Chihara, from whom the trio takes its name), and will present a recital at Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall in March, 2010.
Recent chamber music collaborations include those with the American String Quartet, Quartet Accorda, and the New Zealand String Quartet, and with musicians outside the traditional classical field such as the traditional Mäori musical instrumentalist (Taongo Puoro) Richard Nunns. Many of Deighton’s solo and chamber music performances have been broadcast on U.S., European, and Australasian radio. He is a National Recording Artist for Radio New Zealand, and was a member of the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra. Recent orchestral work includes concerts with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra.
Deighton has appeared at four International Viola Congresses as recitalist, chamber musician, and soloist with orchestra, and as master class presenter and panelist. During the summers he serves on the faculty of the International Musical Arts Institute (IMAI) in Fryeburg, Maine. Other festivals at which he has recently appeared include Music at Penn’s Woods (PA), The Pierre Monteux Festival (ME), the Gold Coast Music Festival (CA), the Dublin International Symphonic Festival, Ireland, the Adam New Zealand Festival of Chamber Music, the ASM Festival, Panama, and Rencontres Musicales Internationales des Graves, France.
He currently holds the position of Professor of Viola at Penn State University. Other recent guest teaching engagements include master classes in the UK at the Royal College of Music, the Royal Northern College of Music, and Chethams School of Music, and at universities and conservatories in South and Central America.
