David Russell

Violinist David Russell is widely considered to be one of the top violin pedagogues of our time. While still in his teens, Professor Russell was appointed to the violin faculty of Ivan Galamian’s Meadowmount School of Music, a school which produced violinists such as Itzhak Perlman, Michael Rabin, Pinchas Zuckerman, Joshua Bell, and many others of international acclaim. 

Professor Russell’s career highlights also include having served on the violin faculty of The Cleveland Institute of Music (ranked one of the nation’s top three music schools) for 24 years, as well as Visiting Violin Faculty at Oberlin College Conservatory of Music. He has also been a faculty member at some of the world’s most important summer music festivals and academies, including the renowned ENCORE School for Strings, a program whose faculty produced international concert soloists, the Concertmasters of the New York Philharmonic and the Chicago Symphony, and leaders in the profession across the globe. He has served on many other world-class violin faculties in the U.S, Canada, England, Wales, France, Spain and Israel. 

Throughout his career Russell has been invited to give public performances and masterclasses in places as diverse as North and South America, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. He has been a featured performer and teacher in the “World String Masters” Series in the Museum of Ancient History of Lisbon, Portugal, and has presented violin masterclasses in the National Library of Argentina in Buenos Aires, the Shanghai Conservatory of Music in China, Ecole Alsacienne in Paris, Conservatorio de Musica “Rafael Orozco” in Cordoba, Spain, and at the Centro Studi Musicali della Valtiberina in Sansopolcro, Italy. He has been designated a Distinguished Member of the Jury for international violin competitions in Switzerland, Argentina, and the United States.

Professor Russell’s students have won major international violin competitions, including the Menuhin Competition, have been signed with prestigious managements, and have been awarded coveted positions with the top orchestras in the United States (The Cleveland Orchestra, Boston Symphony, New York Philharmonic, Minnesota Orchestra) as well as notable orchestras abroad. His students have performed as soloists at the Kennedy Center and Carnegie Hall, and have consistently been invited to participate in the world’s foremost music festivals, such as the Aspen Music Festival, National Orchestral Institute, and others. 

Former Concertmaster of the Pittsburgh Symphony, renowned soloist, conductor and Distinguished Professor of Violin Andrés Cárdenes has said of Professor Russell: 

“David is a born pedagogue in every way. His grasp of fundamentals, his ability to communicate and connect with students and his deep understanding of all things violin, are truly inspiring, even (especially) to his colleagues. Watching him teach, analyze and get straight to a young person’s needs is a clinic unto itself. He has an uncanny ability to instantly recognize students’ strengths, build on them and then calmly organize even the most poorly trained pupil, getting them to improve very quickly with just a few suggestions. He is not prone to long discourses-he simply builds up the student and gives them confidence to correct their flaws. His knowledge of the repertoire is superb and he is equally at home teaching every genre and period of music presented to him.”

Russell has recently been featured along with other international luminaries of the 20th and 21st century violin profession in the book 1Teaches 2 Learn by author Eloise Hellyer, (published by Continental Publishing Company, Ann Arbor, MI, 2020), and in interviews and features on violinist.com, and on global podcasts.

In addition to teaching and performing, Professor Russell has created several acclaimed international projects linking music with humanity. Notably, he served as Artistic Director of Violins of Hope-Charlotte, a $ 1.2 million event he brought to UNC Charlotte from his work in Israel, which featured 18 violins salvaged from the prisoner orchestras that once existed in Nazi concentration camps. The project received world-wide acclaim for its focus on hope during one of the darkest periods of human history.

Of his efforts with that project, Charlotte Symphony Music Director Christopher Warren Green wrote: “Mr. Russell’s passion and dedication…is a true testament of his desire and belief that humanity and music are critically interrelated.” Of Violins of Hope, UNC Charlotte Chancellor Philip Dubois wrote: “Professor Russell stimulated a community-wide re-creation of the essence of humanity; our common destiny.  He spawned a veritable industry in helping the community in Charlotte to understand and practice compassion.” 

In recognition for his work in Violins of Hope, Russell was elected the 2013 UNC Charlotte nominee for the State of North Carolina’s O. Max Gardner Award, which recognizes the faculty member from the entire UNC system whose work “has made the greatest contribution to the welfare of the human race.”

Russell’s work has been featured in a documentary short film produced by TwoCities Productions, Inc. titled: “The Power of Conscience,” which focused on his concert and lecture activities in the historic village of of Le Chambon-sur-Lignon, France, a site where Protestant Christians helped hide and save 5,000 Jewish refugees during World War II. 

Professor Russell has also created and currently directs an international festival and masterclass series in Granada, Spain. Masterclass Al-Andalus focuses on the impact of the 800-year period of Spanish history when Christians, Jews, and Muslims coexisted in relative peace as they created their dynamic culture, a culture whose legacy might still offer a positive path for our world today. In Masterclass Al-Andalus, Russell has created an education-based music festival focused on the example of tolerance exemplified between traditionally opposed ethnic and religious groups during the period of history when Spain was known as “Al-Andalus.”

Russell currently serves as the Anne Reynolds Belk Distinguished Professor of Violin at UNC Charlotte. His July 2025 masterclass in Granada will appear on iClassical Academy on Medici TV in the near future, and his recent album, “Andalusian Legacy,” has been released on the Albany Records/ Parmarecordings label and is currently receiving airplay across the globe.