Saul Bitran (violin), first violinist of the award-winning Cuarteto Latinoamericano, is an Associate Professor at Boston Conservatory at Berklee. A devoted teacher and chamber music coach, his former students now populate many of the finest orchestras in the world. Bitran was on the faculty of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania from 1987 to 2008, and he was also involved with Venezuela’s Sistema for over twenty years. There, together with the Cuarteto Latinoamericano, he created the Latin American Academy for String Quartets, which operated in Caracas from 2008 until 2013. He has also taught at music festivals, including the Dartington International Summer School, Centre d’Arts Orford, Apple Hill Center for Chamber Music, Grenoble Festival, San Miguel de Allende Chamber Music Festival, and many others. Bitran’s noted solo appearances have included the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Seattle Symphony, San Antonio Symphony, and the National Arts Center Orchestra in Ottawa, as well as with prominent conductors Esa-Pekka Salonen, Gerard Schwarz, Eduardo Mata, and Keith Lockhart, among others.
Bitran is a cum laude graduate of the Samuel Rubin Academy of Music in Tel Aviv, Israel, where he studied with Professor Yair Kless. “Bitran’s staggering virtuosity in the live violin part was jaw-dropping” – Florida Sun-Sentinel.