Eugene Purdue currently holds the position of Violin Teaching Faculty at the Mead Witter School of Music of the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Previously he was the founding 1st violinist of the Thouvenel String Quartet, a group whose performance at the Concertgebouw of Amsterdam was described as “The Finest String Quartet I Ever Heard” by the distinguished Dutch critic Jan van Voorthuysen. The Thouvenel toured internationally performing in many of the leading concert halls of the United States and Europe. Highlights include New York’s Carnegie Recital Hall and Alice Tully Hall, the Kennedy Center, the Vienna Koncerthaus and the Concertgebouw of Amsterdam. Additionally, they were one of the first western groups to tour China which included a Beijing concert broadcasted to an estimated 400 million listeners and a performance in Lhasa, Tibet for Jimmy Carter and the Panchen Lama. Winners of the Weiner International String Quartet Competition and finalists in the Naumburg Chamber Music Competition they were also featured on NBC’s Today Show.
A graduate of Indiana University, Mr. Purdue has studied with Tadeusz Wronski, Josef Gingold, Franco Gulli and Daniel Guilet with summer studies with Dorothy Delay. He has served on the faculties of the Music Institute of Chicago and Midwest Young Artists of Ft. Sheridan, Il. His students and former students have been prize-winners in the following national or international competitions: Naumberg (New York), Klein (San Francisco), Johannsen (Washington DC), Lukas Foss (New York), Fischoff (Notre Dame), St Paul String Quartet Competition, Walgreens National Concerto Competition (Chicago). Mr. Purdue is also the author of several pedagogical works including Violin Tech: Physical Aspects, Violin Tech: Scales and Arpeggios for Violin, a performance edition of the Ravel Quartet and several articles for Strings Magazine.