David Le Page was born in Guernsey and began learning the violin at the age of seven. He gained a place at the Yehudi Menuhin school, aged eleven, where he studied with Margaret Norris and received chamber music coaching from Peter Norris and Hans Keller. He was a prize winner in both the BBC Young Musician of the Year and the Yehudi Menuhin competition and completed his studies in Bern with Igor Ozim and in London with Sidney Griller.
David has worked with a diverse selection of artists and ensembles including the Kreutzer quartet, Billy Jenkins, Thomas Ades, Chroma, Paul Zukovsky, Keith Tippett, Errolyn Wallen, Guy Johnson, Julius Drake, Abdullah Ibrahim, John Tavener, Sir Michael Tippett, Phillip Sheppard, Lucy Bailey, the Medici quartet, Charles Owen, the Gogmagogs and the St Petersburg quartet. He is director of the English Mozart Ensemble and has formed his own groups the Le Page Ensemble, Camera Obscura and Subway Piranhas.
Since 1995 he has been the violinist with the Composers Ensemble giving world premieres of works by John Woolrich, David Matthews, Gerald Barry, Tansy Davies and Julian Anderson amongst others. In 2006 they gave the first performance of Thomas Ades ‘Court Studies’ at the Aldeburgh festival with the composer at the piano. The ensemble has made many recordings for the BBC and has appeared at most of the major festivals in the UK including Cheltenham, Huddersfield, Brighton and Spitalfields.
In 1999 David was appointed leader of the Orchestra of the Swan, a Stratford-upon-Avon based chamber orchestra, which has garnered critical acclaim for its imaginative programming and commitment to new music. The orchestra has commissioned many new works and has gained a reputation for inspiring live performances. David regularly appears as soloist and director with orchestra. Solo appearances this season have included the Beethoven violin concerto, Haydn Sinfonia Concertante and premieres of Paul Patterson’s double violin concerto ’Allusions’, and ‘Gonzalez’ by Joe Cutler. Next season David will give four performances of Piazolla’s ‘Four Seasons’ including one at the newly refurbished Birmingham Town Hall.
Recordings include the Complete Tippett quartets, Shostakovich quartets, ‘The Music of Neglected English Composers’ with Roger Eno, Keith Tippett’s piano quintet ‘Linuckea’, Music by Gerald Barry, Vivaldi’s ‘Four Seasons’ (also on DVD), ‘Frantic Mid-Atlantic’ with Evelyn Ficarra, ‘The Rune of Hospitality’ with Mark Chambers, ‘Pierrot Dreaming’ music by Thea Musgrave and the Goldberg Variations with Le Page Ensemble. He is currently recording the Sonatas and Partitas by Bach and an album of his own material ‘As The Crow Flies’ due for release in 2007.
David has worked with a diverse selection of artists and ensembles including the Kreutzer quartet, Billy Jenkins, Thomas Ades, Chroma, Paul Zukovsky, Keith Tippett, Errolyn Wallen, Guy Johnson, Julius Drake, Abdullah Ibrahim, John Tavener, Sir Michael Tippett, Phillip Sheppard, Lucy Bailey, the Medici quartet, Charles Owen, the Gogmagogs and the St Petersburg quartet. He is director of the English Mozart Ensemble and has formed his own groups the Le Page Ensemble, Camera Obscura and Subway Piranhas.
Since 1995 he has been the violinist with the Composers Ensemble giving world premieres of works by John Woolrich, David Matthews, Gerald Barry, Tansy Davies and Julian Anderson amongst others. In 2006 they gave the first performance of Thomas Ades ‘Court Studies’ at the Aldeburgh festival with the composer at the piano. The ensemble has made many recordings for the BBC and has appeared at most of the major festivals in the UK including Cheltenham, Huddersfield, Brighton and Spitalfields.
In 1999 David was appointed leader of the Orchestra of the Swan, a Stratford-upon-Avon based chamber orchestra, which has garnered critical acclaim for its imaginative programming and commitment to new music. The orchestra has commissioned many new works and has gained a reputation for inspiring live performances. David regularly appears as soloist and director with orchestra. Solo appearances this season have included the Beethoven violin concerto, Haydn Sinfonia Concertante and premieres of Paul Patterson’s double violin concerto ’Allusions’, and ‘Gonzalez’ by Joe Cutler. Next season David will give four performances of Piazolla’s ‘Four Seasons’ including one at the newly refurbished Birmingham Town Hall.
Recordings include the Complete Tippett quartets, Shostakovich quartets, ‘The Music of Neglected English Composers’ with Roger Eno, Keith Tippett’s piano quintet ‘Linuckea’, Music by Gerald Barry, Vivaldi’s ‘Four Seasons’ (also on DVD), ‘Frantic Mid-Atlantic’ with Evelyn Ficarra, ‘The Rune of Hospitality’ with Mark Chambers, ‘Pierrot Dreaming’ music by Thea Musgrave and the Goldberg Variations with Le Page Ensemble. He is currently recording the Sonatas and Partitas by Bach and an album of his own material ‘As The Crow Flies’ due for release in 2007.
Press Quotes
“His
deceptively relaxed style belied a wonderful technique, rhythmic
urgency, subtle phrasing and a really deep understanding of where the
music was going. The effect was simply magical.”
The Henley Standard
"In
Bartok's Rumanian Dances and in the concert's culminating work, Vaughan
Williams' Fantasia on a Theme By Thomas Tallis, it was the consistently
sweet-toned solos of leader David Le Page that stood out."
The Guardian
“Le Page was both virtuoso and poet.”
The Classical Source
“Quietly ecstatic...”
The Guardian
"David Le Page and Catherine Leech brought bustling wizardry to their solo parts in a work which should be added to the canon of English string orchestra works without delay."
Birmingham Post