Slava Grigoryan

Slava Grigoryan was born in 1976 in Kazakhstan and immigrated with his family to Australia in 1981. As a major prizewinner at the Tokyo International Classical Guitar Competition, Slava was signed by the Sony Classical Label in 1995 and has since released 6 solo albums and many collaborative recordings. At the age of 18, his first tour was with guitar legends Paco Peña and Leo Kottke. Slava Grigoryan has performed as a soloist at international festivals such as Brighton, City of London, Harrogate, Newbury, Salisbury, and Chelsea Arts Festivals in the UK, the Dresden Musikfestpiel, the Guitar Festival of Great Britain, the Darwin International Guitar Festival, the GFA Festival in La Jolla, California, the Wirral International Guitar Festival, the Al Bustan Festival in Beirut, the Hong Kong Arts Festival, the New Zealand Arts Festival, the Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide, Brisbane and Perth International Arts Festivals and WOMAD festivals in the UK, USA, Australia and South Africa.

He has appeared with many of the world's leading orchestras, including the London Philharmonic, BBC Concert Orchestra, the Northern Sinfonia, The Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Israel Symphony Orchestra, Dresden Radio Orchestra, the Klagenfurt Symphony Orchestra in Austria, the Halle Orchestra, the Hong Kong Sinfonietta, the New Zealand Symphony, the Australian Chamber Orchestra and all of the Australian Symphony Orchestras. He has also performed with many string quartets and chamber ensembles including the Goldner, Flinders and Australian String Quartets in Australia, and the Endellion, Skampa, and Chillingirian quartets in the UK, and the Southern Cross Soloists. He was a founding member of Saffire - The Australian Guitar Quartet (featuring Karin Schaupp, Gareth Koch and Leonard Grigoryan) with whom he toured Europe, North America and Australia.

In 2005, he toured Australia with American great, Ralph Towner, and legendary jazz guitarist from Austria, Wolfgang Muthspiel. The first recording of this trio, known as MGT, was released in 2008. His debut classical album for ABC Classics, Sonatas and Fantasies, was released in March 2002 and was awarded Best Classical Album at the 2002 ARIA Awards. 2003 saw the release of two new albums on the ABC Classics label, Play (with Leonard Grigoryan) and Saffire (The Australian Guitar Quartet), which went on to win the 2003 Best Classical Album ARIA. Since then he has recorded a further two albums with Saffire, an album of music by Australian composer Shaun Rigney, a recording of the Rodrigo Concertos with his brother Leonard and the Queensland Symphony Orchestra, an album of music composed by Nigel Westlake entitled Shadowdances, and an album of baroque guitar concertos with the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra under Benjamin Northey.

The collaboration with brother Leonard Grigoryan is developing as his most significant one. They have now released their fourth duo recording, Distance, and have performed together in the UK, USA, Germany, Austria, France, Italy, Spain, Russia, Estonia, Croatia, Hungary, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Indonesia, South Africa and the UAE as well as playing regular tours of Australia. Slava Grigoryan was appointed as Artistic Director of the Adelaide International Guitar Festival for 2010 and 2012.