Joel Quarrington, double bass

JOEL QUARRINGTON has long been recognized as Canada's foremost double bassist and is regarded as one of the world's leading players. His colourful performance style has entertained audiences across the country and around the world. Toronto Life magazine recently wrote: "If Joel Quarrington had been born a century or so ago, we'd be reading about his exploits in liner notes and music journals."

Born in Toronto, Joel Quarrington began playing the bass at the age of eleven in order to complete a bluegrass/folk trio with his two older brothers, Tony and Paul. Tony Quarrington is the acclaimed jazz guitarist and composer and Paul is the well known novelist and writer. Joel began formal studies of the double bass when he was thirteen with Thomas Monohan, the late principal bassist of the Toronto Symphony. Upon graduation from the University of Toronto, he was awarded the "Eaton Scholarship" as the school's most outstanding graduate. Subsequent studies took him to Italy and Austria where he studied with two legendary bass masters, Franco Petracchi and Ludwig Streicher.

Joel is a winner of the Geneva International Competition, and has made solo appearances in Canada, the United States, Europe and China. He has played concerti with many Canadian orchestras including those of the National Arts Centre, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Hamilton, and as well as the Toronto Symphony.

After more than a decade of leading the bass sections in the Hamilton Philharmonic and later the Canadian Opera Company Orchestra, in September 1991 he assumed the position of principal double bass of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. For the last two seaons he has been performing with the National Arts Centre Orchestra as it's principal double bassist under the direction of their brilliant music director, Pinchas Zukerman. In the fall of 2004, Joel will return to his post in the Toronto Symphony.

Joel Quarrington is a faculty member of Toronto's Royal Conservatory of Music and has taught in masterclasses for such esteemed schools as Philadelphia's Curtis Institue and London's Royal Academy of Music. Joel Quarrington is also a renowned chamber musician and has performed with many of the world's leading string quartets including the Orford, Vermeer, Cleveland, Colorado, St. Lawrence, Allegri and Tokyo Quartets. He is much sought after for chamber music festivals throughout North America. Joel founded the Toronto string orchestra, the "Amadeus Ensemble" in 1984. Earlier he was a member of the "Chamber Players of Toronto' and later "Via Salzburg" as well as touring with the famous "Orpheus Chamber Orchestra" of New York.

One musical association that Joel is particularly honoured to be a part of, was his 1982 recording session with the great Glenn Gould for the soundtrack of Timothy Findley's "The Wars". Written for solo cello and bass and based on Brahm's Intermezzi, this turned out to be the last music composed by Gould before his untimely death.

Joel performs on an Italian bass made in 1630 by the Brescian master, Giovanni Paolo Maggini. He is a strong advocate of the unusual practice of tuning the bass in fifths, an octave lower than the cello. This is the tuning he uses exclusively.

Joel's latest CD, Virtuoso Reality on CBC Records was released to critical acclaim, as was his earlier NAXOS CD of music by Giovanni Bottesini. He recently began preparing Vol. 2 of the NAXOS Bottesini series, recording duos with celebrated soprano Nancy Argenta and with the Philadelphia Orchestra's principal bassist, Harold Robinson.

In his spare time, Joel is a truly terrible "erhu' player (chinese two string violin) and has recently released his seventh erhu cd, "Erhu's (the) Greatest; A Golden Decade" which is a compilation disc and features the Quarrington Brothers 1999 appearence on Peter Gzwoski's CBC radio show "Morningside" as well as highlights from such memorable recordings as "Country Erhu '98", "Everybody Digs the Erhu", "The Three Erhus at the Acropolis" and "Erhus From Beyond the Galaxy".