Gordon Back (born c.1950) is a
Welsh pianist, teacher and music administrator, best known for his association with the violinist
Yehudi Menuhin
Yehudi or Jehudi (Hebrew: יהודי, endonym for Jew) is a common Hebrew name:
* Yehudi Menuhin (1916–1999), violinist and conductor
** Yehudi Menuhin School, a music school in Surrey, England
** Who's Yehoodi?, a catchphrase referring to t ...
and the
Menuhin Competition, of which he has been Artistic Director since 2002.
Back was born in Wales and educated at
Neath Grammar School, and played with the Glamorgan Youth Orchestra. He studied at the
Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester, and obtained a Lady Grace James Scholarship, as a result of which he studied in Italy under
Guido Agosti Guido Agosti (11 August 19012 June 1989) was an Italian pianist and piano teacher.
Agosti was born in Forlì in 1901. He studied piano with Ferruccio Busoni, Bruno Mugellini and Filippo Ivaldi, earning his diploma at age 13. He studied counterp ...
and
Sergio Lorenzi. In 1978, he made his name internationally by playing at the
Alice Tully Hall
Alice Tully Hall is a concert hall at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in the Upper West Side neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. The hall is named for Alice Tully, a New York performer and philanthropist whose donations assist ...
in New York City alongside
Dong-Suk Kang
Dong-Suk Kang (born April 28, 1954) is a South Korean violinist.
Biography
Kang was born in Seoul, and played his first concert at the age of eight. He went to New York in 1967 to study at the Juilliard School and completed his education with Iva ...
,
and has since been an official accompanist at the
Tchaikovsky Competition
The International Tchaikovsky Competition is a classical music competition held every four years in Moscow and Saint Petersburg, Russia, for pianists, violinists, and cellists between 16 and 32 years of age and singers between 19 and 32 years of ...
and the
Carl Flesch Violin Competition
The Carl Flesch International Violin Competition (also known as the International Competition for Violinists "Carl Flesch" and the City of London International Competition for Violin and Viola (Carl Flesch Medal)) was an international music competi ...
, among others.
Having accompanied artists such as
Yo Yo Ma
Yo-Yo Ma ('' Chinese'': 馬友友 ''Ma Yo Yo''; born October 7, 1955) is an American cellist. Born in Paris to Chinese parents and educated in New York City, he was a child prodigy, performing from the age of four and a half. He graduated from ...
,
Emma Johnson and
Sarah Chang, he was appointed head of the Department of Accompaniment at London's
Guildhall School of Music in 1980,
and became a fellow in 1984.
Gordon Back met Menuhin in the 1970s when he accompanied some of the violinist's master classes, and was official accompanist at the first Menuhin Competition in 1983. Following Menuhin's death in 1999, he began taking the competition further afield, to Norway, China and the United States among other locations.
He describes it as "as much a festival as a competition". In 2016 he appeared in a
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
television documentary, "Who's Yehudi?", to mark the centenary of Menuhin's birth. In response to observations about the predominance of Asian competitors in recent competitions, Back says, "Musicians who studied in America with some of the world's best professors go back to Asia to teach because the fees are good and they're respected."
.