James Kanal

James is a certified Alexander Teacher, Licensed Body Mapping Educator, violin teacher, and freelance violinist based in the New York metropolitan area. He serves on the faculties of the Elizabeth Faidley Studio, Manhattan School of Music Precollege Division, and is also the Arts Division Administrator and Violin Faculty at the Elisabeth Morrow School in Englewood, NJ. His violin students have won numerous competitions and performed as soloist with orchestra.

As an expert in movement education, James is sought-after as a clinician on the benefits of Alexander Technique and Body Mapping in performance and pedagogy. He offers private lessons, workshops, and masterclasses to performers of all types on how understanding the body’s natural design can improve movement, leading to performance enhancement as well as injury prevention. James has presented masterclasses and workshops at numerous schools and organizations including the Manhattan School of Music, New York University, Mannes School of Music, Ithaca College, Montclair State University, New Jersey City University, Luzerne Music Center, Biennial Andover Educators Conference, and the Suzuki Association of the Americas National Conference. He has also served on the board of the Association for Body Mapping Education.

James studied violin performance at Montclair State University, the Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst in Graz, Austria, and Ithaca College. While in Ithaca, he completed long-term Suzuki teacher training (Books 1-10) with Carrie Reuning-Hummel and licensed as a Body Mapping Educator in 2014. In 2018, James finished the three-year teacher certification program at the American Center for the Alexander Technique in New York City.

Notable influences include: Boris Kucharsky, Susan Waterbury, Jennifer Johnson, Sylvia-Elisabeth Viertel, and Weigang Li. James has performed in master classes with Shmuel Ashkenasi, Cho-Liang Lin, the Shanghai Quartet, Mark Fewer, the St. Lawrence Quartet, and Judith Ingolfsson.