Cello
Hired by the late Mstislav Rostropovich to join the National Symphony Orchestra and heralded as a “sterling cellist” by the Washington Post, STEVEN HONIGBERG gave his New York debut recital in Weill Hall and has since performed and recorded to critical acclaim. Honigberg has been featured numerous times as soloist with the NSO; most recently in May 2015 in a pair of performances at the Kennedy Center of Krzysztof Penderecki’s Triple Cello Concerto with NSO Music Director Christoph Eschenbach conducting. He won rave reviews for the 1988 world premiere of David Ott’s Concerto for Two Cellos performed with the National Symphony and conducted by Msistlav Rostropovich, with repeat performances on the NSO’s 1989 and 1994 United States tours.
Mr. Honigberg was the Director of the Chamber Music series at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC for ten years where he premiered a number of new works by such composers as Lukas Foss, Benjamin Lees, Herman Berlinski, Robert Starer, Joanna Bruzdowicz, Robert Stern and David Diamond. He participated in extensive recordings of concerts held at the museum, including four recordings of music from the music series and CDs of Korngold and Ernst Toch chamber music. During this period Mr. Honigberg’s Potomac string quartet recorded landmark recordings of the complete quartets (11) of David Diamond, which John von Rein, music critic for the Chicago Tribune, chose as one of his top 20 CDs in the early 2000s. Honigberg has also recorded the complete works of Beethoven for cello and piano, and the complete works of Chopin for cello and piano with his mother, pianist Carol Honigberg.
Mr. Honigberg graduated from the Juilliard School of Music with a Master’s degree in Music, where he studied with Leonard Rose and Channing Robbins. Other important cello teachers included Pierre Fournier and Karl Fruh. Honigberg presently teaches cello at Georgetown University.
From 1990-2009, Honigberg was principal cellist, chamber music director of the Edgar M. Bronfman series in Sun Valley, Idaho where he was featured as soloist with the summer symphony in concerti by Barber, Bartók, Bloch, Boccherini, Dvořák, Elgar, Goldschmidt, Haydn, Korngold, Popper, Saint-Saëns, Schumann, Shostakovich, Tchaikovsky, and Walton.
Mr. Honigberg is a member of Gerard Schwarz’s All-Star Orchestra, which in August 2012 convened in New York City to record 8 one-hour programs for PBS television. He is also a member of the Smithsonian Chamber Society and Phillips Camerata. As author, in 2010 his first book was published: Leonard Rose: America’s Golden Age and Its First Cellist. Honigberg performs on a Lorenzo Storioni cello made in Cremona in 1789.