Download Prema Kesselman

Prema Kesselman-Flautist
Biography
Flautist Prema Kesselman is an active soloist, chamber and orchestral musician,
performing throughout the USA and Europe. As first prize winner of the
Malcolm Arnold Concerto Prize, Prema performed her successful professional
concerto debut on the Malcolm Arnold Flute Concerto No. 2 with the Royal
Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Tolga Kashif on 3 June 2007. She also
presented a New York solo recital debut at Carnegie Hall in 2005, which The New York Concert Review
wrote "Ms. Kesselman handled it all with assurance and a cool and focused tone…rock solid and note perfect…limpid and
beautiful…a fluid and tight-ensembled performance...The final chord brought a standing ovation and an encore."
Prema began her serious musical training in Los Angeles, California, where she attended the Colburn
School of Performing Arts. Since her concerto debut at the age of fifteen, she has soloed with orchestra
ten times and has garnered prizes and awards from over twenty state, national and international
competitions. Prema was recently awarded 1st Place in the 2006 Sigma Alpha Iota Graduate Performance
Awards National Competition in Orlando, Florida. Her solo performances have been broadcast on Los
Angeles's KUSC 91.5 FM "Sundays at Four" and on WorldSpace digital satellite radio network throughout
four continents. In addition, she performed in the Aspen Music Festival and Norfolk Chamber Music
Festival, and in the following prestigious venues: Academy of Music, Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Herbert
Zipper Concert Hall, Kimmel Center, Sai Kulwant Hall-Prashanti Nilayam, Sydney Opera House, and the
Toronto Centre for the Arts.
Highlights of Prema's recent concert schedule included a performance of the Bach Triple Concerto at the
Bach Festival of Philadelphia and solo recitals at the Hampstead and Highgate Festival-Lauderdale House,
Bath Recital Artists' Trust Series-The Pump Room and St Martin in the Fields. Prema is currently
Principal Flute in the Young Janacek Philharmonic having performed with them at the 2006 and 2007
Cantiere Internazionale d'Arte di Montepulciano, Italy and Festival International des Musiques
D'Aujourd'Hui Strasbourg. She also performed solo flute/piccolo/alto flute in the national premiere
production of Benjamin Britten's chamber opera, The Turn of the Screw, in Santiago, Chile. Prema was
previously 2nd Flute with Haddonfield Symphony and substitute flute with the New World Symphony
and performed under the batons of Daniel Hege, Daniel Lewis, Otto-Werner Mueller, Esa-Pekka Salonen,
Leonard Slatkin, and David Zinman.
As Principal Flute in the Metropolitan Sinfonia she will be performing the World Premiere of a Flute
Concerto written by renowned American composer, Maurice Wright at St. George's Bristol on 1
December 2007 and giving its London premiere at St. John's Smith Square on 12 January 2008. Prema
will complete a Master of Music in Flute Performance Studies at Trinity College of Music (TCM) where
she was sponsored by the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation. Prema was awarded the Friends of New York
TCM London Prize for her outstanding performance achievements and won the Gold Medal Prize, the
College's highest award for solo performance. She is continuing on the Postgraduate Advanced Diploma
course sponsored by the Derek Butler Trust, studying flute with Wissam Boustany. Prema has taken part
in mentor schemes with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Academy of St. Martin in the Fields and
Chamber Orchestra of Europe. Prema received a Bachelor of Music in Flute Performance with
Distinction at Temple University-Boyer College of Music in Philadelphia where she studied flute with
David Cramer and was awarded the Max Aronoff Prize, President's Scholar Award, Presser Scholar
Award and 1st prize in the Annual Soloist Competition. More information about Prema can be found at
www.premakesselman.com.