All posts by Susan Spiegel

Hyeyeon Park

Described as “a pianist with power, precision, and tremendous glee” (Gramophone Magazine) and praised for her “very sensitive” (Washington Post) and “highly nuanced” (Lucid Culture) playing, Hyeyeon Park has appeared as a soloist and chamber musician on major concert stages throughout the United States, Canada, Mexico, Germany, Austria, Italy, Spain, Japan and her native Korea.

Since making her debut at the age of ten performing Beethoven’s First Piano Concerto with Seoul Symphony Orchestra, Park soloed with Seoul Philharmonic, Seoul Symphony, KNUA Chamber Orchestra, Gangnam Symphony Orchestra, Seoul Arts Center Festival Orchestra and Incheon Philharmonic, to name but a few. Her recent concerts have been presented at the Dame Myra Hess Recital Series in Chicago, the Trinity Wall Street Series in New York City, Philips Collection in Washington, D.C., as well as such distinguished venues as Zankel Hall at Carnegie Hall, Merkin Recital Hall, Kennedy Center and Seoul Art Center, among others.

A Seoul Arts Center “Artist of the Year 2012,” Park is prizewinner of numerous international competitions, including Oberlin International Piano Competition (U.S.), Ettlingen International Piano Competition (Germany), Hugo Kauder International Piano Competition (U.S.), Maria Canals International Piano Competition (Spain), Prix Amadeo International Piano Competition (Germany) and Corpus Christi International Music Competition (U.S.). Her performances have been broadcast on KBS and EBS television in Korea, RAI3 (Italy), WQXR (New York), WFMT (Chicago), WBJC (Baltimore), WETA (Washington, D.C.), radio and channel LOOP in the States.

An avid chamber musician, Park has collaborated with such musicians as David Shifrin, Ani Kavafian, Ida Kavafian, Paul Neubauer and many others appearing frequently at Yellow Barn Festival (Vermont), Santander Music Festival (Spain), Great Mountains Festival (Korea), Music@Menlo Festival (California),and Chamber Music Northwest (Oregon). She is the founding member of Atapine-Park duo and Atria Ensemble, groups that respectively won the prizes at Premio Vittorio Gui International Chamber Music Competition (Italy) and Plowman Chamber Music Competition (Missouri). Her duo recordings for cello and piano with cellist Dmitri Atapine were distributed by Naxos to a great critical acclaim. The duo’s recent world-premiere recording of Lowell Liebermann’s complete works for cello and piano was reviewed as “a valuable disc for the collector” by American Record Guide. Her solo CD “Klavier 1853” was released in 2017 under Blue Griffin label. An advocate for new music as a passionate musician who pursued career as a composer as well, Park enjoys working closely with contemporary composers.

Park holds a bachelor’s of music degree at Korea National University with Professor Daejin Kim, master of music degree and artist diploma from Yale School of Music with Professor Peter Frankl, where she was a post-graduate artist associate following her graduation. She holds the doctor of musical arts degree from Peabody Conservatory with Professor Yong Hi Moon. Park has been recently appointed as co-director of Friends of Chamber Music Kansas City, and already serves as the co-director of Young Performers Program at Music@Menlo Chamber Music Festival and Institute. She is the associate professor of piano at the University of Nevada, Reno, where she also is the artistic director of the Apex Concerts.

Danbi Um, Violin

Praised by The Strad as an “utterly dazzling” artist, with “a marvelous show of superb technique” and “mesmerizing grace” (New York Classical Review), violinist Danbi Um captivates audiences with her virtuosity, individual sound, and interpretive sensitivity. A Menuhin International Violin Competition Silver Medalist, winner of the prestigious 2018 Salon de Virtuosi Career Grant, and a recent top prizewinner of the Naumburg International Violin Competition, she showcases her artistry in concertos, solo recitals, and in collaboration with distinguished chamber musicians.

After winning the 2014 Music Academy of the West Competition, Ms. Um made her concerto debut in the Walton Violin Concerto with the Festival Orchestra, conducted by Joshua Weilerstein. Past concerto engagements include appearances with the Israel Symphony, Auckland Philharmonic, Vermont Symphony, and the Dartmouth Symphony.

She also recently appeared in recital and in chamber music performances in such venues as the Kennedy Center, Philadelphia’s Kimmel Center, Boston’s Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, the Harris Theatre in Chicago, Wigmore Hall in London, and at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art.

Ms. Um is a winner of Astral Artists’ National Auditions. She plays a 1683 “ex-Petschek” Nicolo Amati violin, on loan from a private collection.

Melissa Reardon, Viola

Grammy-nominated violist Melissa Reardon is an internationally renowned performer whose solo and chamber playing spans all musical genres.

Melissa has recently joined the Borromeo Quartet and is the Artistic Director of the Portland Chamber Music Festival in Portland, ME, Artist in Residence at Bard College and Conservatory and a founding member and the Executive Director of the East Coast Chamber Orchestra (ECCO).

As a member of the Ensō String Quartet from 2006 until its final season in 2018, Melissa toured both nationally and internationally, with highlight performances in Sydney, Melbourne, Rio de Janeiro, New York’s Carnegie Hall, and Washington, DC’s Kennedy Center to name a few.

Lauded by Classical Voice for her “elegant” and “virtuosic” performances, the Massachusetts-born musician won first prize at the Washington International Competition and is the only violist to win top prizes in consecutive HAMS International viola competitions. A sought-after collaborative musician and teacher, Melissa has appeared in numerous festivals across the United States and around the world, and has toured with Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Ensemble, and with Musicians from Marlboro.

She held the post of Associate Professor of Viola at East Carolina University from 2007 -2013 and earned degrees from the Curtis Institute of Music and the New England Conservatory.

Melissa is married to the cellist Raman Ramakrishnan and they live in NYC with their seven-year-old son Linus.

Susie Park, Violin

Sydney native Susie Park first picked up a violin at age three, made her solo debut at five, and, by 16, had performed with every major orchestra in her country. Susie has grown into a musician distinguished by unusual passion and versatility, and today performs internationally as an orchestral, chamber, and solo artist.

Susie’s international career was launched at age 16, when she took first place in the Yehudi Menuhin International Competition in France. This led to performances and reengagements throughout the US, Europe, and her native Australia, where highlights included performances for crowds of over 120,000.

Susie went on to receive additional top honors at the International Violin Competition of Indianapolis and the Wieniawski Competition in Poland. Susie has since concertized around the world, soloing and touring with European orchestras including the Vienna Symphony, Orchestre National de Lille, and the Royal Philharmonic; American orchestras including the Pittsburgh Symphony and San Francisco Symphony; Korea’s KBS Orchestra; Orchestra Wellington in New Zealand; and all major symphony orchestras in Australia.

Working with conductors including Simon Rattle, Hans Vonk, Alan Gilbert, Fabio Luisi and Yehudi Menuhin, Susie has been heard in venues ranging from New York’s Carnegie and Alice Tully Halls, Boston’s Symphony Hall, Chicago’s Millenium Park, Philadelphia’s Kimmel Center, Washington’s Smithsonian Institute, Vienna’s Musikverein, Cologne’s Philharmonie, Düsseldorf’s Tonhalle, and Sydney’s Opera House.

Jennifer Frautschi, Violin

Two-time Grammy nominee and Avery Fisher career grant recipient violinist Jennifer Frautschi has appeared as soloist with innumerable orchestras including the Cincinnati Symphony, Chicago Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Milwaukee Symphony, Minnesota Orchestra, and St Paul Chamber Orchestra.

As chamber musician she has performed with the Boston Chamber Music Society and Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and appeared at Chamber Music Northwest, La Jolla Summerfest, Music@Menlo, Tippet Rise Art Center, Toronto Summer Music, and the Bridgehampton, Charlottesville, Lake Champlain, Moab, Ojai, Santa Fe, Seattle, and Spoleto Music Festivals.

Her extensive discography includes several discs for Naxos: the Stravinsky Violin Concerto with the Philharmonia Orchestra of London, conducted by the legendary Robert Craft, and two GRAMMY-nominated recordings with the Fred Sherry Quartet, of Schoenberg’s Concerto for String Quartet and Orchestra, and the Schoenberg Third String Quartet.

Her most recent releases are with pianist John Blacklow on Albany Records: the first devoted to the three sonatas of Robert Schumann; the second, American Duos, an exploration of recent additions to the violin and piano repertoire by contemporary American composers Barbara White, Steven Mackey, Elena Ruehr, Dan Coleman, and Stephen Hartke.

She performs on a 1722 Antonio Stradivarius violin known as the “ex-Cadiz,” on generous loan from a private American foundation with support from Rare Violins In Consortium. She currently teaches in the graduate program at Stony Brook University.

Susanna Phillips, Voice

Alabama-born soprano Susanna Phillips continues to establish herself as one of today’s most sought-after singing actors and recitalists. Ms. Phillips is a recipient of The Metropolitan Opera’s 2010 Beverly Sills Artist Award.

Known for her sparkling portrayal of Musetta in La bohème, Ms. Phillips has sung at the Met for 12 consecutive seasons in the roles of Musetta, Pamina, Donna Anna, Rosalinde, Antonia/Stella, Micaëla, Donna Elvira, and most recently as Countess Almaviva – a role very close to her heart. Role highlights at the Met include Fiordigili, which The New York Times called a “breakthrough night”, and Clémence in the Met premiere of Kaija Saariaho’s L’amour de Loin. Ms. Phillips was also a featured artist in the Met’s Summer Recital Series.

In 2005 Ms. Phillips won four of the world’s leading vocal competitions: Operalia (both First Place and the Audience Prize), the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, the MacAllister Awards, and the George London Foundation Awards Competition. She has also claimed the top honor at the Marilyn Horne Foundation Competition and has won first prizes from the American Opera Society Competition and the Musicians Club of Women in Chicago.

Ms. Phillips has received grants from the Santa Fe Opera and the Sullivan Foundation, and is a graduate of Lyric Opera of Chicago’s Ryan Opera Center. She holds both a Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degree from The Juilliard School.

Dmitri Atapine, Cello

Described as a cellist whose “playing is highly impressive throughout” (The Strad), Dmitri Atapine has appeared at leading venues such as Alice Tully Hall, Zankel and Weill Halls at Carnegie Hall, Chicago Cultural Center, and the National Auditorium of Spain. He regularly preforms with The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and is a frequent guest at festivals including Music@Menlo, Chamber Music Northwest, La Musica Sarasota, Cactus Pear, Pacific Music Festival, Aldeburgh, and Aix-en-Provence.

Mr. Atapine’s many awards include top prizes at the Carlos Prieto International Cello, and the Premio Vittorio Gui chamber competitions. His recent engagements included collaborations with such distinguished musicians as Cho-Liang Lin, Paul Neubauer, David Finckel, Ani and Ida Kavafian, Wu Han, Bruno Giuranna, David Shifrin, the St. Lawrence and Miró quartets.

Mr. Atapine’s recordings, including a world-premiere of works by Lowell Liebermann, can be found on the Naxos, Albany, Urtext Digital, BlueGriffin and Bridge record labels. Mr. Atapine holds several directorships, among them Friends of Chamber Music Kansas City, Apex Concerts, Young Performers at Music@Menlo and Ribadesella Festival.

Cello professor at the University of Nevada, Reno, Mr. Atapine holds a doctorate from the Yale School of Music where he was a student of Aldo Parisot.

Chaeyoung Park, Piano

A musician who “does not play a single note without thought or feeling,” (New York Concert Review) Chaeyoung Park is a passionate pianist who has most recently been featured on the Gilmore Rising Stars series, Bravo! Vail Music Festival, Tongyeong International Music Festival and Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall as a soloist.

Winner of the 2019 Hilton Head International Piano Competition, she has performed with orchestras across the U.S., and as a dedicated chamber musician, at the Ravinia Steans Music Institute, Yellow Barn and Four Seasons Winter Workshop.

Currently based in New York City, Park is an Artist Diploma candidate at the Juilliard School with Robert McDonald. Her debut recording features the complete Musica Ricercata by Ligeti and Piano Sonata No. 3 by Brahms on the Steinway label and is set to release in 2022.

Through Park’s various roles as a recitalist, chamber musician, and concerto soloist, she has performed at Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall, Ravinia’s Bennett Gordon Hall and Symphony Center’s Orchestra Hall, as well as livestreamed concerts presented by the Gilmore Rising Stars series, the Carlsen Center, and the Lied Center of Kansas virtual series.

Anne-Marie McDermott, Piano

Pianist Anne-Marie McDermott has played concertos, recitals, and chamber music in hundreds of cities throughout the world.

In addition to performing, she also serves as artistic director of the Bravo! Vail Music and Ocean Reef Music Festivals, as well as Curator for Chamber Music for the Mainly Mozart Festival in San Diego.

The breadth of Ms. McDermott’s repertoire reaches from Bach, Haydn, and Beethoven to Rachmaninov, Prokofiev, and Scriabin, to works by today’s most influential composers. She has performed with many leading orchestras and is a long time member of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center with whom she performs and tours extensively each season.

In recent years, Ms. McDermott premiered and recorded a new concerto by Poul Ruders with the Vancouver Symphony, returned to play Gershwin with the New York Philharmonic at the Bravo! Vail Festival, and performed concertos with the Philadelphia Orchestra led by Sir Donald Runnicles and with Le Train Bleu.

Other highlights include touring with violinist Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg and the New Century Chamber Orchestra; the complete Beethoven piano trios with Ida Kavafian and Peter Wiley; and the complete Beethoven cello sonatas with Lynn Harrell.

Recent international engagements include a performance with the Sao Paulo Symphony at the Cartagena Festival and an all-Haydn recital tour of China.

Audrey Chen, Cello

Washington state native and cellist Audrey Chen has performed around the world in venues including Carnegie Hall, the Mariinsky Theatre, Royal Albert Hall, Disney Hall, and the Kennedy Center.

She has appeared on NPR’s From the Top Radio Show, concertized with the Seattle Symphony and the Harvard-Radcliffe Orchestra, and has been featured as a guest artist with the Boston Chamber Music Society, Silk Road Ensemble, Argus Quartet, Parker Quartet, and Borromeo Quartet.

An avid chamber musician, Audrey’s festival appearances include performing at Yellowbarn, Olympic Music Festival, Music@Menlo, Ravinia Steans Music Institute, Four Seasons Chamber Music, Perlman Music Program, Tanglewood Music Center, Taos Music School, and Sarasota Music Festival.

She received her B.A. from Harvard University and an M.M. from the New England Conservatory, where her teachers included Laurence Lesser and Lluis Claret. Currently, she is pursuing a D.M.A. at the CUNY Graduate Center under Marcy Rosen while teaching at CUNY Hunter College.

Outside of music, Audrey enjoys watching films, cooking/baking, and making greeting cards. She was also recently named a 2022 recipient of the prestigious Paul and Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans.

Michael Stephen Brown, Piano

Michael Stephen Brown has been described as “one of the leading figures in the current renaissance of performer-composers” (New York Times). Winner of a 2018 Emerging Artist Award from Lincoln Center and a 2015 Avery Fisher Career Grant, he is an artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. He makes regular appearances with orchestras such as the National Philharmonic, the Seattle, Grand Rapids, North Carolina, and Albany symphonies, and was selected by pianist András Schiff to perform an international solo recital tour, making debuts in Zurich’s Tonhalle and New York’s 92nd Street Y.

He has appeared at the Tanglewood, Mostly Mozart, Marlboro, Ravinia, Music@Menlo, Tippet Rise, Bridgehampton, and Bard music festivals and performs regularly with his longtime duo partner, cellist Nicholas Canellakis.

A prolific composer, his Concerto for Piano and Strings (2020) was co-commissioned by the Gilmore Piano Festival and by the NFM Leopoldinum Orchestra in Poland and was premiered by the Kalama-zoo Symphony in 2021, with Brown as soloist. He was the composer and artist-in-residence at the New Haven Symphony for the 2017-19 seasons and a 2018 Copland House Award winner.

He is the First Prize winner of the Concert Artists Guild competition, an alum of The Bowers Program (formerly CMS Two) and earned degrees in piano and composition from The Juilliard School, where he studied with pianists Jerome Lowenthal and Robert McDonald and composers Samuel Adler and Robert Beaser.

A native New Yorker, he lives there with his two 19th-century Steinway D’s, Octavia and Daria.

David Finckel, Cello

Cellist David Finckel’s multifaceted career as concert performer, artistic director, recording artist, educator, and cultural entrepreneur distinguishes him as one of today’s most influential classical musicians. He is a recipient of Musical America’s Musician of the Year award.

David Finckel appears annually at the world’s most prestigious concert series and venues, as both soloist and chamber musician. He tours extensively with pianist Wu Han and in trios with Philip Setzer. Together with Wu Han, David serves as Co-Artistic Director of The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center (CMS). Under his artistic leadership, CMS is celebrating three global broadcasting initiatives bringing chamber music to new audiences around the world, via partnerships with Medici TV, Radio Television Hong Kong and the All Arts broadcast channel. He is also Co-Artistic Director of Music@Menlo, the San Francisco Bay Area’s premier summer chamber music festival and institute.

In the Far East, David Finckel serves as founding Co-Artistic Director of Chamber Music Today, a festival in Seoul, South Korea. David Finckel’s wide- ranging musical activities include the launch of ArtistLed, classical music’s first musician-directed and Internet-based recording company. BBC Music Magazine recently saluted the label’s twentieth anniversary with a special cover CD featuring David and Wu Han.

Through a variety of educational initiatives, David has received universal praise for his passionate commitment to nurturing the artistic growth of countless young artists. Under the auspices of CMS, he led the LG Chamber Music School from 2009-2018, which served dozens of young musicians in South Korea annually. David is Professor of Cello at The Juilliard School and Artist-in-Residence at Stony Brook University. From 2013 to 2018, he led an intensive chamber music studio at the Aspen Music Festival and School. David served as cellist of the Grammy Award-winning Emerson String Quartet for 34 seasons.

Alessio Bax, piano

Combining exceptional lyricism and insight with consummate technique, Alessio Bax is without a doubt “among the most remarkable young pianists now before the public” (Gramophone). He catapulted to prominence with First Prize wins at both the Leeds and Hamamatsu International Piano Competitions, and is now a familiar face on five continents, not only as a recitalist and chamber musician, but also as a concerto soloist who has appeared with more than 150 orchestras, including the London, Royal, and St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestras, the Boston, Dallas, Cincinnati, Sydney, and City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestras, and the NHK Symphony in Japan, collaborating with such eminent conductors as Marin Alsop, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Sir Andrew Davis, Sir Simon Rattle, Yuri Temirkanov, and Jaap van Zweden.

Recent seasons have also seen Bax make his solo recital debut at London’s Wigmore Hall, which aired live on BBC Radio 3, and give concerts at L.A.’s Disney Hall, Washington’s Kennedy Center, and New York’s Carnegie Hall.

Ulysses String Quartet

The Ulysses String Quartet has been praised for their “textural versatility,” “grave beauty,” “the kind of chemistry many quartets long for, but rarely achieve” (The Strad) as well as “avid enthusiasm … [with] chops to back up their passion” (San Diego Story), “delivered with a blend of exuberance and polished artistry” (Buffalo News).

Founded in the summer of 2015, the group won first prize in the 2018 Schoenfeld International String Competition and the grand prize and gold medal in the senior string division of the 2016 Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition. Ulysses also finished first in the American Prize and won second prize at the Osaka International Chamber Music Competition in 2017. The quartet garnered a career development grant in the 2016 Banff International String Quartet Competition and were winners of the Vietnam International Music Competition this past August.

Consisting of Christina Bouey and Rhiannon Banerdt on violin, Colin Brookes on viola and Grace Ho on cello, the Ulysses Quartet were appointed Lisa Arnhold Fellows of the Juilliard School.

Hailing from Canada, the United States and Taiwan, the Ulysses String Quartet has performed in such prestigious halls such as the Harbin Grand Theatre, Jordan Hall, and the Taiwan National Recital Hall. Recent performance highlights have included appearances at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and La Jolla Music Society Summerfest, debuts at Premiere Performances Hong Kong, the Vietnam Connection Festival and Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall, performances at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa, Buffalo Chamber Music Society, Bargemusic and Eastman School of Music, a quartet residency for the Zukerman Young Artist Program, and returns to Jordan Hall and the Vietnam Connection Festival.

For the last three years, Ulysses was in residence at the Louis Moreau Institute in New Orleans, working with the composer Morris Rosenzweig. As a special project, the group will record the quartets of composer Joseph Summer at Mechanics Hall in Worcester, Massachusetts, over the next several years.

Eirini Tornesaki, Vocalist

Eirini Tornesaki

Erini (aka Eirini Tornesaki) is a vocalist of jazz, Greek traditional music and contemporary styles, who blurs the lines between genres and explores intercultural dialogue through music. Erini was born and raised on the island of Crete, Greece where she was always moved by the stories of her family, who were refugees from Smyrna (Izmir). Fascinated by the Greek culture of Asia Minor, she developed a passion for the traditional music of the region.

Erini is a former Cirque Du Soleil singer and alumna of the Master’s Program of the Berklee Global Jazz Institute. Growing up on the Greek island of Crete, Erini was the original singer of the Cirque Du Soleil show “Kurios” between 2014 and 2017, and performed 1074 shows with them, touring the USA and Canada. She also performed the vocals on the soundtrack album of the show, appeared on the DVD and in the Day Time Emmy Award winning VR short film ‘Inside the box of Kurios’. Erini has performed in Canada, USA, Cuba, Colombia, United Arab Emirates, Cyprus, Greece and most other EU countries with artists including Luciana Souza, Christos Zotos, Mario Frangoulis, Daniel Hope, and Classico Latino amongst others.

She has appeared in venues such as Carnegie Hall, TD Garden, Ronnie Scotts Jazz Club, Abbey Road Studios, and more. Erini is currently based in Boston, MA and performs around the world as a soloist, a collaborative vocalist or with her Greek traditional music group ‘Pharos Ensemble’.

Orion Weiss, Piano

One of the most sought-after soloists in his generation of young American musicians, pianist Orion Weiss has performed with the major American orchestras, including the Chicago Symphony, Boston Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, and New York Philharmonic. His deeply felt and exceptionally crafted performances go far beyond his technical mastery and have won him worldwide acclaim.

With a warmth to his playing that reflects his personality, Mr. Weiss has performed with dozens of orchestras in North America and has dazzled audiences with his passionate, lush sound. In 2019-20 he will perform with orchestras from Austin to Milwaukee, tour with both James Ehnes and Augustin Hadelich, and perform in recital with his curated repertoire. Recent seasons have seen him in performances for the Lucerne Festival, the Denver Friends of Chamber Music, the University of Iowa, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, the Kennedy Center’s Fortas Series, the 92nd Street Y, and the Broad Stage, and at Aspen, Bard, and Grand Teton summer festivals.

An alum of CMS’s Bowers Program, highlights of recent seasons include his third performance with the Chicago Symphony, a performance of Beethoven’s Triple Concerto with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, and recordings of Gershwin’s complete works for piano and orchestra with his longtime collaborators the Buffalo Philharmonic and JoAnn Falletta. Named the Classical Recording Foundation’s ”Young Artist of the Year” in September 2010, in the summer of 2011 he made his debut with the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Tanglewood as a last-minute replacement for Leon Fleisher.

Timothy Cobb, Bass

Bassist Timothy Cobb joined the New York Philharmonic as Principal Bass in May 2014, after serving as principal bass of The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, and principal bass of the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra since 1989. He has appeared at numerous chamber music festivals worldwide, including the Marlboro Music festival, through which he has toured with the Musicians from Marlboro series.

A faculty member of the Sarasota Music Festival, he is helping to launch a new bass program for the Killington Music Festival in Killington, Vermont. Mr. Cobb also serves as principal bass for Valery Gergiev’s World Orchestra for Peace, which has earned him the title “UNESCO Artist for Peace”. Mr. Cobb serves as bass department chair for The Juilliard School as well as on the faculties of the Manhattan School of Music, Purchase College, and Rutgers University. He is also a distinguished visiting artist for Lynn University in Boca Raton, Florida.

A native of Albany, New York, Timothy Cobb graduated from The Curtis Institute of Music, where he studied with Roger Scott. While at Curtis, Mr. Cobb was a substitute with The Philadelphia Orchestra and in his senior year became a member of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under Sir Georg Solti. Mr. Cobb can be heard on all Metropolitan Opera recordings released after 1986, as well as on a recording of Giovanni Bottesini’s duo bass music with bassist Thomas Martin on the Naxos label.

Simos Papanas, Violin

Simos Papanas was born in Thessaloniki, Greece in 1979. He has studied violin, baroque violin, composition and mathematics at the New Conservatory of Thessaloniki, Oberlin College and Yale University. He studied violin with Petar Arnaoudov, Taras Gabora and Erick Friedman, baroque violin with Marilyn McDonald and composition with Christos Samaras.

He has played as a soloist with orchestras such as the Staatskaplle Dresden, the Bolshoi Theater Orchestra, the Zurich Chamber Orchestra, the Kammerorchester Basel, the Geneva Camerata, the Prague Symphony Orchestra, the Athens and Thessaloniki State Orchestras, the National Symphony Orchestra of the Greek Radio, the Sofia Philharmonic, the Sofia Soloists, the Cyprus Symphony, the Munich Symphony Orchestra, the Southwest German Symphony Orchestra, the American Bach Soloists and the Philharmonia Moments Musicaux (Taiwan).

Papanas has recorded as a soloist for Deutsche Grammophon, BIS and Centaur. He has performed in festivals such as Verbier (Switzerland), Schlesswig-Holstein (Germany), Savannah Music Festival (U.S.A.), Sommets Musicaux Gstaad (Switzerland), the international violin festival of St. Petersburg, the Athens Festival and the Tokyo Music Festival, and at venues such as Carnegie Hall, Palau de la Musica (Barcelona), St. Petersburg Philharmonic Grand Hall, Semperoper Dresden and Athens Herod Atticus Theater. His compositions have been performed and recorded around the world (U.S.A., Russia, Canada, Peru, Iran, Japan, Taiwan and most European countries), in prestigious concert halls such as the Musikverein in Vienna, the Tonhalle in Zurich and the National Concert Hall of Taipei. Since 2003 he has been concertmaster of the Thessaloniki State Symphony Orchestra.

Keith Robinson, Cello

Keith Robinson, cellist, is a founding member of the Miami String Quartet and has been active as a chamber musician, recitalist, and soloist since his graduation from the Curtis Institute of Music.

Mr. Robinson has had numerous solo appearances with orchestras throughout the U.S. including the New World Symphony, The American Sinfonietta, and the Miami Chamber Symphony, and in 1989 won the P.A.C.E. “Classical Artist of the Year” Award. His most recent recording on Blue Griffin Records features Mendelssohn’s works for cello and piano with his colleague Donna Lee. Fanfare Magazine wrote: “I have sampled several CD’s (of the works for cello and piano by Mendelssohn) and found them very fine, but my gut feeling is still to go with Robinson and Lee. This one is, quite simply, amazing”.

As a member of the Miami String Quartet, he has recorded for the BMG, CRI, Musical Heritage Society, and Pyramid recording labels, was a member of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s CMS Two Program, and won the Grand Prize at the Concert Artists Guild and Fischoff Chamber Music competitions, as well as prizes at the Evian and London competitions.

Mr. Robinson is a frequent performer at Music@Menlo, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, and Music from Angel Fire. He tours regularly with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.

Mr. Robinson hails from a musical family and his siblings include Sharon Robinson of the Kalichstein Laredo Robinson Trio, and Hal Robinson, Principal Bass of the Philadelphia Orchestra. Mr. Robinson plays a Carlo Tononi cello made in Venice and dated 1725.

Edward Arron, Cello

A native of Cincinnati, Ohio, cellist Edward Arron made his New York recital debut in 2000 at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and has since appeared in recital, as a soloist with major orchestras, and as a chamber musician throughout North America, Europe and Asia.

The 2018-19 season marks Mr. Arron’s tenth anniversary season as the artistic director and host of the acclaimed Musical Masterworks concert series in Old Lyme, Connecticut. He is also the artistic director of the Festival Series in Beaufort, South Carolina, and is the co-artistic director with his wife, pianist Jeewon Park, of the Performing Artists in Residence series at the Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, Massachusetts.

With violinists James Ehnes and Amy Schwartz Moretti, and violist Richard O’Neill, Mr. Arron tours as a member of the renowned Ehnes Quartet. He appears regularly at the Caramoor International Music Festival, where he has been a resident performer and curator of chamber music concerts for over a quarter of a century. Festival appearances include Ravinia, Salzburg, Mostly Mozart, Bravo! Vail, Tanglewood, Bridgehampton, Spoleto USA, Santa Fe, Seattle Chamber Music, Kuhmo, PyeongChang, Evian, Charlottesville, Telluride Musicfest, Seoul Spring, Lake Champlain Chamber Music, Chesapeake Chamber Music, La Jolla Summerfest, and Bard Music Festival.

He has participated in Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Project as well as Isaac Stern’s Jerusalem Chamber Music Encounters.

In 2016, Mr. Arron joined the faculty at University of Massachusetts Amherst, after having served on the faculty of New York University from 2009 to 2016.

Ida Kavafian, Violin and Viola

The versatile Violinist and Violist Ida Kavafian is Artistic Director of Music from Angel Fire (for thirty-four years); co-founder of Tashi, OPUS ONE, Trio Valtorna and Bravo! Colorado (Artistic Director for ten years); an Artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center; former violinist of the Beaux Arts Trio; faculty member of The Curtis Institute (she holds the Nina von Maltzahn Chair in Violin Studies and received the Lindback Award for Distinguished Teaching), Juilliard School and Bard College.

She has premiered numerous new works including concerti by Toru Takemitsu and Michael Daugherty, toured and recorded with jazz greats Chick Corea and Wynton Marsalis as well as Fiddler/Composer Mark O’Connor, appeared with the Guarneri, Orion, Shanghai and American String Quartets, and had a solo feature on CBS Sunday Morning.

Some of Ms. Kavafian’s many recordings include two world premieres representing her wide range – Fire and Blood by Michael Daugherty with the Detroit Symphony, Neeme Järvi conducting, and Mark O’Connor’s String Quartets. She also appears frequently with her sister, violinist Ani Kavafian in recital and concerto. Their television credits include features on CBS Sunday Morning and NBC’s Today Show.

Born in Istanbul, Turkey of Armenian descent, a graduate of Juilliard studying with Oscar Shumsky, she was presented in her NY debut under Young Concert Artists with pianist Peter Serkin.

Her violin was made by J.B. Guadagnini, in Milan in 1751.

Together with her husband, violist Steven Tenenbom, she breeds, trains and shows prize-winning Vizsla show dogs, including the 2003 #1 Vizsla in the US and the 2007 National Champion.

Ani Kavafian, Violin

Violinist Ani Kavafian enjoys a prolific career as a recitalist, chamber musician and professor. She has performed with many of America’s leading orchestras, including the New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, Cleveland Symphony, Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, Detroit Symphony, and the San Francisco Symphony.

This season, she will continue her longtime association as an artist member of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center with appearances in NYC, and around the U.S.. She will be conducting master classes at Oberlin College as well as in Detroit, and Boulder. This past summer she participated at festivals including Chamber Music Northwest, the Heifetz Institute, Sarasota Music Festival, Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, Great Lakes Festival, the Bridgehampton Chamber Music Festival, and Virtuoso Bel Canto Festival in Lucca, Italy.

Ms. Kavafian became a professor of Violin at Yale University in 2006 and will be performing the full production of Stravinsky’s Soldier’s Tale at Zamkel Hall in 2018 with colleagues and students from Yale. She has received the Avery Fisher Career Grant and the Young Concert Artists International Auditions award and has appeared at the White House on three separate occasions.

Her recordings can be heard on the Nonesuch, RCA, Columbia, Arabesque, and Delos labels. Ms. Kavafian and Kenneth Cooper have recorded Bach’s Six Sonatas for Violin and Fortepiano on Kleos Classics of Helicon Records. A recording of string trios by Mozart and Beethoven by the Trio da Salo has also been released on Kleos. Mozart Piano and Violin Sonatas with pianist Jorge Federico Osario was recently released by Artek

William Wolfram, Piano

American pianist William Wolfram was a silver medalist at both the William Kapell and the Naumburg International Piano Competitions and a bronze medalist at the prestigious Tchaikovsky Piano Competition in Moscow.

He has appeared with the San Francisco, Saint Louis, Pittsburgh, Indianapolis, National, Nashville, Dallas, Baltimore, Seattle, Milwaukee, and New Jersey symphonies, the Buffalo and Rochester philharmonics and the Minnesota Orchestra. Abroad, Wolfram has appeared with the BBC Symphony Orchestra of London, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, the Bergen Philharmonic (Norway), the Beethovenhalle Orchestra Bonn, and the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra.

Mr. Wolfram has also performed as a guest artist with prominent ballet companies including ABT, Pittsburgh Ballet, Miami City Ballet, Carolina Ballet and Boston Ballet, working with noted choreographers including Jiri Kylian, Edward Villella, Robert Weiss, and Agnes De Mille. He has recorded for Naxos a series of Franz Liszt Opera Transcriptions as well as the music of Earl Kim with piano and orchestra. For the Albany label, he recorded piano concertos of Edward Collins with Marin Alsop and the Royal Scottish National Orchestra.

Mr. Wolfram is a member of the piano faculty of the Eastern Music Festival in North Carolina, and a regular featured guest at the Colorado College Music Festival in Colorado Springs, Colorado. He also teaches a performance class at the acclaimed Manhattan School of Music.

A graduate of the Juilliard School, William Wolfram resides in New York City with his wife and two daughters and is a Yamaha artist.

Peter Wiley, Cello

Cellist, Peter Wiley enjoys a prolific career as a performer and teacher. He is a member of the piano quartet, Opus One, a group he co-founded in 1998 with pianist Anne-Marie McDermott, violinist Ida Kavafian and violist Steven Tenenbom.

Mr. Wiley attended the Curtis Institute of Music as a student of David Soyer. He joined the Pittsburgh Symphony in 1974. The following year he was appointed Principal cellist of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, a position he held for eight years. From 1987 through 1998, Mr. Wiley was cellist of the Beaux Arts Trio. In 2001 he succeeded his mentor, David Soyer, as cellist of the Guarneri Quartet. The quartet retired from the concert stage in 2009.

He has been awarded an Avery Fischer Career Grant, nominated for a Grammy Award in 1998 with the Beaux Arts Trio and in 2009 with the Guarneri Quartet. Mr. Wiley participates at leading festivals including Music from Angel Fire, Chamber Music Nothwest, OK Mozart, Santa Fe, Bravo! and Bridgehampton. He continues his long association with the Marlboro Music Festival, dating back to 1971.

Mr. Wiley teaches at the Curtis Institute of Music and Bard College Conservatory of Music.

Bella Hristova, Violin

Internationally acclaimed violinist Bella Hristova is known for her passionate and powerful performances, beautiful sound, and compelling command of her instrument.

Her numerous prizes include a 2013 Avery Fisher Career Grant, First Prize in the Young Concert Artists International Auditions, and First Prize in the Michael Hill International Violin Competition. She has performed extensively as a soloist with orchestras including the Orchestra of St. Luke’s, the New York String Orchestra, and the Kansas City and Milwaukee Symphonies.

She has performed recitals at Carnegie Hall, Merkin Concert Hall, the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, and Boston’s Isabella Gardner Museum, and regularly appears with The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. In 2017, she toured New Zealand performing the complete Beethoven Sonatas for Piano and Violin with renowned pianist Michael Houstoun. “Bella Unaccompanied,” Ms. Hristova’s recording on A.W. Tonegold Records, features works by Corigliano, Kevin Puts, Piazzolla, Milstein, and Bach.

A committed proponent of new music, she commissioned iconic American composer Joan Tower to write “Second String Force,” which she premiered and performed in recitals throughout the United States and abroad. She further collaborated with her husband David Ludwig on a violin concerto written for her through a consortium of eight major orchestras across the country.

Hristova began violin studies at the age of six in her native Bulgaria. She studied with Ida Kavafian at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, and received her Artist Diploma with Jaime Laredo at Indiana University.

Ms. Hristova plays a 1655 Nicolò Amati violin, once owned by the violinist Louis Krasner.

Stephen Lee Anderson, Actor

Actor Stephen Lee Anderson has appeared in Shakespeare’s, Richard III at the Old Vic in London and at BAM under the direction of Sam Mendes. He has appeared in numerous productions on Broadway including Bright Star, Spider-Man, Julius Caesar (with Denzel Washington), The Crucible (with Liam Neesen), Footloose, The Capeman, and The Kentucky Cycle (with Stacy Keach). He has also performed at the Atlantic Theatre Company, Vineyard Theatre, MTC, The Old Globe, La Jolla Playhouse, Huntington Theatre (IRNE Award Best Supporting Actor, Bus Stop), Long Wharf, and Denver Center.

His film and television appearances include The Treatment, Intrusion, Law & Order, Daredevil, Public Morals, Orange Is The New Black, Elementary, and Madam Secretary. He has collaborated with Steve Martin and Edie Brickell on the development of Bright Star and with Paul Simon on The Capeman.

Mr. Anderson was born in Whittier, CA and studied at San Diego State University, the Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art in London and The National Theatre Conservatory in Denver. He also studied German Lieder with Paul Shilhausky at the Mozarteum in Salzburg.

He currently lives in New York City with his wife Daun and their two boys, Ian and Evan.

Oliver Neubauer, Violin

Violinist Oliver Neubauer attends the Juilliard School where he is a proud recipient of the Kovner Fellowship and a student of Li Lin and Donald Weilerstein. Prior to his studies at Juilliard, Oliver took part in the Perlman Music Program and attended the Juilliard Pre-College Division and the Dalton School in NYC.

Oliver has performed as soloist with numerous orchestras, including the National Repertory Orchestra, the Sound Symphony Orchestra, and the Symphony of Westchester. Oliver was the first prize winner of the 2020 Adelphi Competition, recipient of the Gold Award at the 2018 National YoungArts Competition, winner of the 2017 Young Musicians Competition at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, and winner of the Artist in You Competition sponsored by the Doublestop Foundation.

He has participated in masterclasses with Ana Chumachenco (at the 2019 Kronberg Violin Masterclasses), Ani Kavafian, Edward Aaron, Jorja Fleezanis, Daniel Phillips, and others. He has also performed and worked with Carter Brey, Fred Sherry, Ani Kavafian, Michael Kannen, Ara Gregorian, the Ulysses Quartet, and Steve Tenenbom.

Oliver’s festival appearances have included the Four Seasons Winter Workshop, Mostly Music Series, Summerfest La Jolla, Music@Menlo, Lake Champlain Music Festival, Chamber Music Northwest, Music in the Vineyards, Art in Avila in Curaçao, and Music from Angel Fire. This summer, Oliver will appear at the Perlman Music Program Chamber Workshop, Music from Angel Fire, Bravo! Vail, and Verbier Festival Academy.

Oliver plays on a J.B. Guadagnini violin, generously on loan to him from the Juilliard String Instrument Collection.

Clara Neubauer, Violin

21-year old violinist Clara Neubauer attends The Juilliard School as a proud recipient of the Kovner Fellowship in the studios of Itzhak Perlman and Li Lin. She has recently performed at festivals including the Ravinia Steans Institute, Taos School of Music, Music@Menlo, Perlman Music Program, Bravo! Vail, Four Seasons Festival, Music From Angel Fire, and La Jolla Summerfest.

Winner and Silver medalist at the 2020 National YoungArts competition, Clara was the first prize winner in the 2019 Symphony of Westchester Competition and the 2017 Adelphi Young Artist Competition and was recently featured on the WQXR Young Musicians Showcase.

Clara made her concerto debut with the National Repertory Orchestra at the age of 10 and her Lincoln Center debut at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s Young Ensembles Concert in 2013. An avid chamber musician, Clara was a winner of the 2017 Young Musicians Competition at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and a Young Performer at the Music@Menlo Chamber Music Institute for five years.

She has collaborated with artists including Shai Wosner, Frans Helmerson, Anne-Marie McDermott, Daniel Phillips, Robert McDonald, Carter Brey, and the Dover Quartet.

Born on 9/11/2001, Clara shared the stage with Bernadette Peters and Robert DeNiro hosting a 9/11 Memorial benefit and can be heard leading the audio tour guide “for children and families” at the 9/11 Memorial Museum, available as a free app at the App Store.

In her free time, Clara loves to cook, read, and play ping-pong.

Kerry McDermott, Violin

Violinist Kerry McDermott has been recognized as one of the most versatile and exciting artists of her generation.

A first violinist with the New York Philharmonic, Ms. McDermott joined as its youngest member at the age of twenty-one, and has since appeared as soloist with them throughout North America. She has garnered prizes and awards in major competitions including the Montreal International Violin Competition and the International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow – where she also received a special award for “Best Artistic Interpretation”.

At age seventeen, Ms. McDermott became the youngest winner in the history of Artists International Auditions which resulted in her New York recital debut. She has performed on tour throughout Holland with Reizend Muziek, as well as North American tours with The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and the Muir String Quartet. Ms. McDermott has also appeared at Summerfest La Jolla, Angel Fire, Music in the Vineyards, Chamber Music Northwest, Bravo! Colorado, Caramour, Marlboro, Tanglewood, Wolftrap, Mostly Mozart, OK Mozart, Newport, Fredericksburg, Ravinia and on three continents with the New York Philharmonic Ensembles.

She has recorded for Cala, New World Records and Melodia, and her media appearances include a PBS/ABC/BBC Documentary, the motion picture FAME and an AT&T commercial for National Network Television.

She is a member of The McDermott Trio with her sisters, pianist, Anne-Marie and cellist, Maureen, and a Master Artist and National Reviewer for the National Young Arts Foundation.

Ms. McDermott is an alumna of the Manhattan School of Music and Yale College.

Paul Neubauer, Viola

Violist Paul Neubauer‘s exceptional musicality and effortless playing led the New York Times to call him “a master musician.”

In 2018 he made his Chicago Symphony subscription debut with conductor Riccardo Muti and his Mariinsky Orchestra debut with conductor Valery Gergiev. He also gave the U.S. Premiere of the newly discovered Impromptu for viola and piano by Shostakovich with pianist Wu Han. In addition, his recording of the Aaron Kernis Viola Concerto with the Royal Northern Sinfonia, was released on Signum Records and his recording of the complete viola and piano music by Ernest Bloch with pianist Margo Garrett was released on Delos.

Appointed principal violist of the New York Philharmonic at age 21, he has appeared as soloist with over 100 orchestras including the New York, Los Angeles, and Helsinki philharmonics; National, St. Louis, Detroit, Dallas, San Francisco, and Bournemouth symphonies; and Santa Cecilia, English Chamber, and Beethovenhalle orchestras. He has premiered viola concertos by Bartók (revised version of the Viola Concerto), Friedman, Glière, Jacob, Kernis, Lazarof, Müller-Siemens, Ott, Penderecki, Picker, Suter, and Tower and has been featured on CBS’s Sunday Morning, A Prairie Home Companion, and in Strad, Strings, and People magazines. A two-time Grammy nominee, he has recorded on numerous labels including Decca, Deutsche Grammophon, RCA Red Seal, and Sony Classical.

Mr. Neubauer is the artistic director of the Mostly Music series in New Jersey and is on the faculty of The Juilliard School and Mannes College as well as a Visiting Professor at DePaul University.

Arnaud Sussmann, Violin

Winner of a 2009 Avery Fisher Career Grant, Arnaud Sussmann has distinguished himself with his unique sound, bravura, and profound musicianship. Minnesota’s Pioneer Press writes, “Sussmann has an old-school sound reminiscent of what you’ll hear on vintage recordings by Jascha Heifetz or Fritz Kreisler, a rare combination of sweet and smooth that can hypnotize a listener.”

A thrilling young musician capturing the attention of classical critics and audiences around the world, he has appeared on tour in Israel and in concert at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall, the White Nights Festival in Saint Petersburg, the Dresden Music Festival in Germany, and the Phillips Collection in Washington, DC. He has been presented in recital in Omaha on the Tuesday Musical Club series, New Orleans by the Friends of Music, Tel Aviv at the Museum of Art, and at the Louvre Museum in Paris. He has also given concerts at the OK Mozart, Moritzburg, Caramoor, Music@Menlo, La Jolla SummerFest, Mainly Mozart, Seattle Chamber Music, Bridgehampton, and the Moab Music festivals.

He has performed with many of today’s leading artists including Itzhak Perlman, Menahem Pressler, Gary Hoffman, Shmuel Ashkenasi, Wu Han, David Finckel, and Jan Vogler. An alum of CMS’s Bowers Program, Sussmann is Artistic Director of the Chamber Music Society of Palm Beach, Co-Director of Music@Menlo’s International Program, and teaches at Stony Brook University.

Daniel Phillips, Violin

Violinist Daniel Phillips enjoys a versatile career as a veteran chamber musician, soloist, violist, and teacher. A graduate of The Juilliard School, his teachers were his father Eugene Phillips, Ivan Galamian, Sally Thomas, Sándor Végh and George Neikrug.

He is a founding member of the 31-year-old Orion Quartet, in residence at the Mannes College of Music and the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center in New York City. They have recorded the complete quartets of Beethoven and Leon Kirchner.

Mr. Phillips won the Young Concert Artists auditions and bronze medal in the Leipzig Bach Competition in 1976, and has been an up and coming young soloist ever since. He gave debut recitals at the 92nd street Y and Alice Tully Hall which received great reviews in the New York Times. He has performed as soloist with the Pittsburgh, Houston, Boston and Yakima symphonies and has been a regular performer at the Spoleto Festival, the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival and the International Musicians Seminar in the UK for the last four decades. This summer he will return to the Marlboro Music Festival in Vermont.

He teaches at the Aaron Copland School of Music at Queens College, Mannes College of Music, Bard College Conservatory, and The Juilliard School. He lives with his wife, flutist, Tara Helen O’Connor with their two cute mini dachshunds on the upper west side of Manhattan.

Anthony Manzo, Bass

Anthony Manzo enjoys performing in a broad variety of musical forums – despite the ever-present complications of travel with a double bass!

An artist with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Mr. Manzo is sought-after chamber musician who performs regularly at such noted venues as Lincoln Center, and the Spoleto Festival in Charleston, SC. Mr. Manzo is also the Solo Bassist of San Francisco’s New Century Chamber Orchestra, and a regular guest with the National Symphony Orchestra and the Baltimore Symphony when he’s at home in Washington DC.

Formerly the Solo Bassist of the Munich Chamber Orchestra, he has also been a guest principal with the Camerata Salzburg in Austria, where collaborations have included their summer residency at the Salzburg Festival, as well as two international tours as double bass soloist alongside bass/baritone Thomas Quasthoff, performing Mozart’s “Per questa bella mano”.

Mr. Manzo is also an active performer on period instruments, with groups including The Handel & Haydn Society of Boston (where his playing has been lauded as “endowed with beautiful and unexpected plaintiveness” by the Boston Musical Intelligencer), and Philharmonia Baroque in San Francisco. Additionally, Mr. Manzo is a member of the double bass and chamber music faculty of the University of Maryland.

Mr. Manzo performs on a double bass made around 1890 by Jerome Thibouville Lamy in Paris (which now has a removable neck for travel!).

Jeffrey Grossman, Harpsichord

Keyboardist and conductor Jeffrey Grossman specializes in vital, engaging performances of music of the past, through processes that are intensely collaborative and historically informed.

As the artistic director of the acclaimed baroque ensemble the Sebastians, this season Jeffrey directs concerts including Bach’s St. Matthew Passion and Handel’s Messiah from the organ and harpsichord, both in collaboration with TENET Vocal Artists, and performs Bach’s six sonatas for violin and obbligato harpsichord with Daniel S. Lee.

In recent seasons, Jeffrey has performed with TENET, the Green Mountain Project, the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Quodlibet, the Boston Early Music Festival, and numerous other ensembles across the country. For the past twelve seasons, he has also toured parts of the rural United States with artists of the Piatigorsky Foundation, performing outreach concerts intended to bring live classical music to underserved communities, most recently in Wyoming and Alaska.

Jeffrey can be heard on the Avie, Gothic, Naxos, Albany, Soundspells, Métier, and MSR Classics record labels. In addition to his performing activities, Grossman is also active as a music engraver (primarily using the SCORE music publishing system) and has prepared editions for many major publishers and ensembles. In 2014, his engraved score of Elliott Carter’s final composition won first prize in the chamber ensembles division of the Music Publishers Association Paul Revere Awards for Graphic Excellence.

A native of Detroit, Michigan, Jeffrey holds degrees from Harvard College, The Juilliard School, and Carnegie Mellon University. He currently resides in New York City.

Benjamin Beilman, Violin

Benjamin Beilman has won praise both for his passionate performances and deep rich tone which the Washington Post called “mightily impressive,” and The New York Times described as “muscular with a glint of violence.”

Mr. Beilman’s international touring schedule in 2017-18 and 2018-19 includes performances with the Houston, Oregon, Cincinnati, North Carolina and Indianapolis Symphonies, and Orchestra St. Luke’s, as well as play-directing both the Vancouver Symphony and the New Century Chamber Orchestra. Abroad, Mr. Beilman performs with the Sydney, Trondheim and City of Birmingham Symphonies, as well as the Royal Scottish National Orchestra and Scottish Chamber Orchestra. “Demons,” a new work written for Mr. Beilman by Frederic Rzewski and commissioned by Music Accord, was premiered in 2018 at Baltimore’s Shriver Hall Concert Series and the Boston Celebrity Series.

Other current and upcoming recital appearances include Lincoln Center, Wigmore Hall, Kennedy Center, Spivey Hall, Philadelphia’s Perelman Theater, and Carnegie Hall. Mr. Beilman earned worldwide notoriety upon winning First Prize in both the 2010 Young Concert Artists International Auditions and the 2010 Montréal International Musical Competition.

He has since gone on to receive a Borletti-Buitoni Trust Fellowship, an Avery Fisher Career Grant and a London Music Masters Award. Spectrum, a Warner Classics CD featuring works by Stravinsky, Janáček and Schubert was released in 2016.

Beilman studied with Almita and Roland Vamos at the Music Institute of Chicago, Ida Kavafian and Pamela Frank at the Curtis Institute of Music, and Christian Tetzlaff at the Kronberg Academy.

He plays the “Engelman” Stradivarius from 1709 generously on loan from the Nippon Music Foundation.

James Austin Smith, Oboe

Praised for his “virtuosic,” “dazzling” and “brilliant” performances (The New York Times) and his “bold, keen sound” (The New Yorker), oboist James Austin Smith performs new and old music across the United States and around the world. Mr. Smith is an artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), the Talea Ensemble and the Poulenc Trio as well as co-Artistic Director of Tertulia, a chamber music series that takes place in restaurants in New York and San Francisco He is a member of the faculties of Stony Brook University and the Manhattan School of Music and is a member and former co-Artistic Director of Decoda, the Affiliate Ensemble of Carnegie Hall.

Mr. Smith’s festival appearances include Marlboro, Lucerne, Chamber Music Northwest, Schleswig-Holstein, Stellenbosch, Bay Chamber Concerts, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and Spoleto USA; he has performed with the St. Lawrence, Parker, Rolston and Orion string quartets and recorded for the Nonesuch, Bridge, Mode and Kairos labels.

Mr. Smith received his Master of Music degree in 2008 from the Yale School of Music and graduated in 2005 with Bachelor of Arts (Political Science) and Bachelor of Music degrees from Northwestern University. He spent a year as a Fulbright Scholar in Leipzig, Germany at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater “Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy” and is an alumnus of Ensemble Connect, a collaboration of Carnegie Hall, The Juilliard School, the Weill Music Institute and the New York City Department of Education. Mr. Smith’s principal teachers are Stephen Taylor, Christian Wetzel, Humbert Lucarelli and Ray Still.

Peter Kolkay, Bassoon

Called “stunningly virtuosic” by The New York Times and “superb” by the The Washington Post, bassoonist Peter Kolkay claimed First Prize at the Concert Artists Guild International Competition in 2002 and was awarded an Avery Fisher Career Grant in 2004. He is an Artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and a member of the IRIS Orchestra in Germantown, Tenn. He is Associate Professor of Bassoon at the Blair School of Music at Vanderbilt University.

Kolkay actively engages with composers in the creation of new works. He recently performed the world premiere of Joan Tower’s bassoon concerto, Red Maple, with the South Carolina Philharmonic, and will premiere a new work for solo bassoon by Gordon Beeferman in February 2015. Kolkay has premiered solo and chamber works by Judah Adashi, Elliott Carter, Katherine Hoover, Harold Meltzer, Russell Platt, John Fitz Rogers, and Charles Wuorinen. His debut solo CD, titled BassoonMusic and released in August 2011 on CAG Records, spotlights works by 21st-century American composers. Kolkay was awarded the Carlos Surinach Prize by the BMI Foundation for outstanding service to American music by an emerging artist.

Kolkay earned a doctorate from Yale University as a student of Frank Morelli and a master’s degree from the Eastman School of Music, where he studied with John Hunt and Jean Barr. A native of Naperville, Ill., Mr. Kolkay holds a bachelor’s degree from Lawrence University in Appleton, Wis., where he studied with Monte Perkins. His other interests include travel, modern and contemporary art, and mystery novels.

Sophie Shao, Cello

Cellist Sophie Shao, winner of the prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant and top prizes at the Rostropovich and Tchaikovsky competitions, is a versatile and passionate artist whose performances the New York Times has noted as “eloquent, powerful” and the Washington Post called “deeply satisfying.”

Shao has appeared as soloist to critical acclaim throughout the United States: the Smith Center in Las Vegas, Lied Center in Lincoln, Segerstrom Hall in Costa Mesa, the Palladium in Carmel, the Walter Reade Theater and Rose Studio at Lincoln Center. Last season she performed the UK premiere of Howard Shore’s concerto “Mythic Gardens” with Keith Lockhart and the BBC Concert Orchestra at the Watford Colosseum in Watford, England and with Ludwig Wicki and the 21st Century Orchestra at the KKL in Lucerne, Switzerland. Other past concerto performances include Haydn and Elgar Concerti with Lockhart and the BBC Concert Orchestra, Beethoven’s Triple Concerto with Hans Graf and the Houston Symphony, Richard Wilson’s “The Cello Has Many Secrets” with the American Symphony Orchestra, and has returned with the ASO to perform Saint-Saens’s “La muse et la poete” at the Bard Music Festival.

Ms. Shao has given recitals in Suntory Hall in Tokyo, the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, Middlebury College, Walter Reade Theater and Rose Studio in Lincoln Center, the complete Bach Suites at Union College and in New York City. Her dedication to chamber music has conceived her popular “Sophie Shao and Friends” groups which have toured from Brattleboro, VT to Sedona, AZ, while other exciting collaborations include Tan Dun’s Ghost Opera with Cho-Liang Lin, performances with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Chamber Music Northwest, and Music Mountain (with the Shanghai Quartet), among many other presenters across the country. She is a frequent guest at many leading festivals around the country including Caramoor, Chamber Music Northwest, Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival, Music from Angel Fire, the Bard Festival, and Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, and was a member of Chamber Music Society Two, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s program for emerging young artists.

Ms. Shao’s recordings include Andre Previn’s Reflections for Cello and English Horn and Orchestra on EMI Classics, Richard Wilson’s Diablerie and Brash Attacks and Barbara White’s My Barn Having Burned to the Ground, I Can Now See the Moon on Albany Records, Howard Shore’s original score for the movie The Betrayal on Howe Records, and the music of George Tsontakis on Koch Records.

A native of Houston, Texas, Ms. Shao began playing the cello at age six, and was a student of Shirley Trepel, former principal cellist of the Houston Symphony. At age thirteen she enrolled at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, studying cello with David Soyer. After graduating from the Curtis Institute, she continued her cello studies with Aldo Parisot at Yale University, receiving a B.A. in Religious Studies from Yale College and an M.M. from the Yale School of Music, where she was enrolled as a Paul and Daisy Soros Fellow. She is on the faculty of Vassar College and the Bard Conservatory of Music and plays on a cello made by Honore Derazey from 1855 once owned by Pablo Casals.

Sivan Magen, Harp

Praised by the press as “a magician” (New York’s WQXR), whose “virtuoso playing conjures an astonishing range of colour and dynamic” (The Daily Telegraph), Sivan Magen transforms the harp into an expressive, colorful and virtuosic instrument, moving it to center stage through the exploration of the standard repertoire, the commissioning of today’s composers and his new adaptations to the harp of some of the greatest music of the last three centuries.

The only Israeli to have ever won the International Harp Contest in Israel, Magen is a winner of the Pro Musicis International Award and in 2012 was chosen by a committee headed by Dame Mitsuko Uchida as the winner of the Borletti-Buitoni Trust Award. He appeared as a soloist across the US, South America, Europe and Israel, in venues such as Carnegie Hall, Wigmore Hall, the Sydney Opera House and the Vienna Konzerthaus, and with orchestras such as the Israel Philharmonic, the Strasbourg Philharmonic, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, the Jerusalem Symphony, the Sydney Symphony and the Vienna Chamber Orchestra. In fall 2014 he had been invited by Carnegie Hall to return for a recital in celebration of the American release of his first solo CD for Linn records, Fantasien, a recital which also included the world premiere of the Carnegie Hall commissioned Fantasy for solo harp by American composer Sean Shepherd.

Aside from his activity as a soloist, Mr Magen is an avid chamber musician and has appeared in Paris (Salle Gaveau), NY (Allice Tully Hall, the Metropolitan Museum, Bargemusic), with Musicians from Marlboro, and at the Marlboro, Kuhmo , Giverny, and Jerusalem International Chamber Music festivals, collaborating with artists such as Nobuko Imai, Shmuel Ashkenazi, Gary Hoffman, Michel Letiec, Charles Neidich, Carol Wincenc, Emmanuel Pahud, tenor Nicholas Phan, soprano Susanna Phillips and members of the Guarneri and Juilliard Quartets.

He is a founding member of trio Tre Voci with flutist Marina Piccinini and violist Kim Kashkashian, with whom he has toured extensively in Europe and the US, and has released this past season to great critical acclaim a new CD for ECM of music by Debussy, Gubaidulina and Takemitsu.

Since January 2007 Mr Magen is also a founding member of the Israeli Chamber Project, a group which performs in both outreach venues and major concert halls in Israel and the US, including Enav Center in Tel Aviv, the Embassy Series in Washington D.C. and Carnegie’s Weill Hall, Town Hall, Merkin Hall, Symphony Space, the Morgan Library and Bargemusic in New York City. The ICP is the winner of the 2011 Israeli Ministry of Culture Outstanding Ensemble Award

In past seasons were released to great critical acclaim a CD with the Israeli Chamber Project for Azica Records as well as an all-Britten CD Still Falls the Rain with tenor Nicholas Phan for Avie (listed in the NY Times’ “Best recordings of 2012″). This Fall was released his second solo CD for Linn: French Reflections. His performance of Ravel’s Introduction and Allegro is featured on the Marlboro festival’s 60th Anniversary CD.

Mr Magen is also gaining a reputation as a sought-after teacher, presenting masterclasses in the US (The Juilliard School, The Curtis Institute, The Peabody Institute, The New England Conservatory, Duquesne University, University of Texas), Colombia, Taiwan and Israel, the Paris Conservatory, the Utrecht Conservatory, London’s Guildhall School and Trinity College, the summer Academy in Nice, the Kuhmo Festival Academy in Finland, and the Jerusalem Music Academy’s International “Music in the Valley” seminar for strings. In addition, he has been invited to serve as member of the jury of the International Harp Contest in Israel, the first Netherlands International Harp Competition, the Lyon & Healy Awards and the 2011 Vera Dulova International Harp Competition in Moscow, and served as Head of the Jury of the 2007 National Harp Contest in Taiwan. He is currently a faculty member at the Brooklyn College Conservatory of Music.

Born in Jerusalem, Sivan Magen studied the piano with Benjamin Oren and Talma Cohen and the harp with Irena Kaganovsky-Kessler at the Jerusalem Academy for Music and Dance. After completing his military service as an “Outstanding Musician” in 2001, he continued his studies with Germaine Lorenzini in France and then joined Isabelle Moretti’s harp class at the Paris Conservatory (CNSMDP) from which he graduated with a “Premier Prix”. He has then completed a Master of Music degree as a student of Nancy Allen at the Juilliard School. He currently resided in New York City.

Carmit Zori, Violin

Violinist Carmit Zori came to the United States from her native Israel at the age of fifteen to study with Ivan Galamian, Jaime Laredo and Arnold Steinhardt at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia.

Ms. Zori is the recipient of a Levintritt Foundation Award, a Pro Musicis International Award, and the top prize in the Walter W. Naumburg International Violin Competition. She has appeared as a soloist with the New York Philharmonic, the Rochester Philharmonic, and the Philadelphia Orchestra, and has given solo recitals at Lincoln Center, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Isabella Stewart Gardener Museum in Boston, the Phillips Collection in Washington D.C., the Tel Aviv Museum and the Jerusalem Center for the Performing Arts.

In addition to her appearances with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Ms. Zori has been a guest at the Chamber Music at the “Y” series in New York City, Festival Casals in Puerto Rico, the Bridgehampton Chamber Music festival, the Bard Music festival, Chamber Music Northwest, the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, the Seattle Chamber Music Festival, and the Cape Cod Chamber Music Festival. Carmit Zori is a regular participant at the Marlboro Music Festival in Vermont. Ms. Zori founded the Brooklyn Chamber Music Society in 2002. She is a member artist of The Israeli Chamber Project.

Ms. Zori recorded on the Arabesque, Koch International, and Elektra-Nonesuch labels. She is a professor of violin at Rutgers University and at SUNY Purchase, where she also serves on the chamber music faculty.

Fred Sherry, Cello

Fred Sherry has introduced audiences on five continents and all fifty United States to the music of our time for over five decades.

Elliott Carter, Mario Davidovsky, Steve Mackey, David Rakowski, Somei Satoh, Charles Wuorinen and John Zorn have written concertos for Sherry which he has performed with the San Francisco Symphony, Municipal Orchestra of Buenos Aires, BBC Symphony Orchestra, New York City Ballet, Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra, New World Symphony, and RAI Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale. He has premiered solo and chamber works dedicated to him by Milton Babbitt, Derek Bermel, Jason Eckardt, Lukas Foss, Oliver Knussen, Peter Lieberson, Donald Martino and Toru Takemitsu among others, and has appeared at Festivals including Aldeburgh, Casals, Tanglewood, Spoleto, Toru Takemitsu’s Music Today, Chamber Music Northwest, OK Mozart, Ravinia, and Mostly Mozart.

Mr. Sherry was a founding member of TASHI and Speculum Musicae, Artistic Director of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, a member of the Group for Contemporary Music, Berio’s Juilliard Ensemble and the Galimir String Quartet, and a close collaborator with jazz pianist and composer Chick Corea.

He has recorded on RCA, Columbia, Vanguard, CRI, Albany, Bridge, ECM, New World, Arabesque, Delos, Vox, Koch and Naxos. The Fred Sherry String Quartet recordings of the Schoenberg String Quartet Concerto and the String Quartets Nos. 3 and 4 were both nominated for a Grammy.

His book 25 Bach Duets from the Cantatas was published by Boosey & Hawkes in 2011.

He is a member of the cello faculty of the Juilliard School, the Mannes College of Music and the Manhattan School of Music.

Aaron Boyd, Violin

Violinist Aaron Boyd has established a versatile career as soloist, chamber musician, orchestral leader, recording artist, lecturer and teacher. Since making his New York recital debut in 1998, he has concertized throughout the United States, Europe, Russia and Asia.

Boyd appears regularly as an artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and has participated in the Marlboro, Music@Menlo, La Jolla, Bridgehampton, and Prussia Cove festivals. A prize winner of the Ecoles D’art Americaines de Fontainebleau, the Tuesday Musical Society and the Pittsburgh Concert Society competitions, Boyd was also awarded a Proclamation by the City of Pittsburgh for his musical accomplishments.

A passionate advocate for new music, Boyd has worked directly with such legendary composers as Milton Babbitt, Elliott Carter and Charles Wuorinen and was founder of the Zukofsky Quartet (Quartet-in-Residence, Bargemusic); the only ensemble to have played all of Milton Babbitt’s notoriously difficult string quartets.

As a recording artist, Boyd can be heard on the BIS, Music@Menlo Live, Naxos, Tzadik, North/South and Innova labels. Boyd has been broadcast in concert by NPR, WQXR, and WQED, and was profiled by Arizona Public Television.

Born in Pittsburgh, Boyd began his studies with Samuel LaRocca and Eugene Phillips and graduated from The Juilliard School where he studied with Sally Thomas and coached extensively with Paul Zukofsky and the legendary cellist Harvey Shapiro.

Formerly on the violin faculties of Columbia University and the University of Arizona, Boyd now lives in Dallas where he serves as Director of Chamber Music and Professor of Violin at Southern Methodist University.

Tara Helen O’Connor, Flute

Tara Helen O’Connor is a charismatic performer noted for her artistic depth, brilliant technique and colorful tone spanning every musical era.

Recipient of an Avery Fisher Career Grant and a two-time Grammy nominee, she is now a Season Artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. A Wm. S. Haynes flute artist, Tara regularly participates in the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Music@Menlo, Chamber Music Festival of the Bluegrass, Spoleto Festival USA, Chamber Music Northwest, Mainly Mozart Festival, Music from Angel Fire, the Banff Centre, the Great Mountains Music Festival, Chesapeake Music Festival and the Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival.

Tara is a member of the woodwind quintet Windscape, the legendary Bach Aria Group and is a founding member of the Naumburg Award-winning New Millennium Ensemble. She has premiered hundreds of new works and has collaborated with the Orion String Quartet, St. Lawrence Quartet and Emerson Quartet.

Tara has appeared on A&E’s Breakfast for the Arts, Live from Lincoln Center and has recorded for Deutsche Grammophon, EMI Classics, Koch International, CMS Studio Recordings with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and Bridge Records.

Tara is Associate Professor of Flute, Head of the Woodwinds Department and the Coordinator of Classical Music Studies at Purchase College School of the Arts Conservatory of Music. Additionally, Tara is on the faculty of Bard College Conservatory of Music, the Contemporary Performance Program at Manhattan School of Music and is a visiting artist, teacher and coach at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto.

She lives with her husband, violinist Daniel Phillips on the Upper West Side of Manhattan.

Gloria Chien, Piano

Taiwanese-born pianist Gloria Chien has one of the most diverse musical lives as a noted performer, concert presenter, and educator. She was selected by the Boston Globe as one of its Superior Pianists of the year, “… who appears to excel in everything.”

She made her orchestral debut at the age of 16 with the Boston Symphony Orchestra with Thomas Dausgaard, and performed again with the BSO with Keith Lockhart. In recent seasons she has performed as a recitalist and chamber musician at Alice Tully Hall, the Library of Congress, the Phillips Collection, the Kissingen Sommer festival, the Dresden Chamber Music Festival, and the National Concert Hall in Taiwan.

A former member of CMS Two, she performs frequently with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.

In 2009 she launched String Theory, a chamber music series at the Hunter Museum of American Art in downtown Chattanooga, that has become one of Tennessee’s premier classical music presenters. The following year she was appointed Director of the Chamber Music Institute at the Music@Menlo festival by Artistic Directors David Finckel and Wu Han.

In 2017, she joined her husband, violinist Soovin Kim, as Co-Artistic Director of the Lake Champlain Chamber Music Festival in Burlington, Vermont.

Ms. Chien received her B.M., M.M., and D.M.A. degrees from the New England Conservatory of Music as a student of Russell Sherman and Wha-Kyung Byun. She holds the position of artist-in-residence at Lee University in Cleveland, Tennessee. She is a Steinway Artist.

One of only two wind players to have been awarded the Avery Fisher Prize since the award’s inception in 1974, David Shifrin is in constant demand as an orchestral soloist, recitalist and chamber music collaborator.

Mr. Shifrin has appeared with the Philadelphia and Minnesota orchestras and the Dallas, Seattle, Houston, Milwaukee, Detroit and Phoenix symphonies among many others in the US, and internationally with orchestras in Italy, Switzerland, Germany, Japan, Korea and Taiwan. In addition, he has served as principal clarinetist with the Cleveland Orchestra, American Symphony Orchestra (under Stokowski), the Honolulu and Dallas symphonies, the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra and New York Chamber Symphony.

An artist member of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center since 1989, David Shifrin served as its artistic director from 1992 to 2004. He has been the Artistic Director of Chamber Music Northwest in Portland, Oregon since 1981 and is also the Artistic Director of the Phoenix Chamber Music Festival. David Shifrin joined the faculty at the Yale School of Music in 1987. He has also served on the faculties of The Juilliard School, University of Southern California, University of Michigan, Cleveland Institute of Music and the University of Hawaii.

In 2007 he was awarded an honorary professorship at China’s Central Conservatory in Beijing. Mr. Shifrin’s recordings on Delos, DGG, Angel/EMI, Arabesque, BMG, SONY, and CRI have consistently garnered praise and awards.

Mr. Shifrin performs on a MoBA cocobolo wood clarinet made by Morrie Backun in Vancouver, Canada and makes his home in Connecticut.

The McDermott Trio

Hailed for their ‘dazzling virtuosity and beautifully integrated ensemble,’ the McDermott Trio has been recognized as one of the most exciting trios of their generation.

Since their Carnegie Recital Hall debut, they have appeared in recitals throughout North America, Central America and Europe. Highlights of recent seasons include debuts at Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall, the 92nd Street Y´s Kaufman Hall, at the Ravinia Festival and their first visit to Mexico as a trio with the Mainly Mozart Festival.

The McDermott Trio’s radio and television credits include numerous appearances on the NBC and PBS Television Networks, CBS Sunday Morning with Charles Karault, New York´s WQXR, WNYC and Performance Today. In addition, they were featured musicians in the MGM motion picture ‘FAME.’

Kerry McDermott

Violinist Kerry McDermott has been recognized as one of the most versatile and exciting artists of her generation. A first violinist with the New York Philharmonic, Ms. McDermott joined as its youngest member at the age of twenty-one, and has since appeared as soloist with them throughout North America.

She has garnered prizes and awards in major competitions including the Montreal International Violin Competition and the International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow – where she also received a special award for “Best Artistic Interpretation”. At age seventeen, Ms. McDermott became the youngest winner in the history of Artists International Auditions which resulted in her New York recital debut.

She has performed on tour throughout Holland with Reizend Muziek, as well as North American tours with The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and the Muir String Quartet. Ms. McDermott has also appeared at Summerfest La Jolla, Angel Fire, Music in the Vineyards, Chamber Music Northwest, Bravo! Colorado, Caramour, Marlboro, Tanglewood, Wolftrap, Mostly Mozart, OK Mozart, Newport, Fredericksburg, Ravinia and on three continents with the New York Philharmonic Ensembles.

She has recorded for Cala, New World Records and Melodia, and her media appearances include a PBS/ABC/BBC Documentary, the motion picture FAME and an AT&T commercial for National Network Television.

She is a member of The McDermott trio with her sisters, pianist, Anne-Marie and cellist, Maureen, and a Master Artist and National Reviewer for the National YoungArts Foundation. Ms. McDermott is an alumna of the Manhattan School of Music and Yale College.

Maureen McDermott

Hailed by the press as “a musician of commitment and energy… with brilliance of technique and masterful interpretations,” Maureen McDermott sustains an active career as soloist, chamber musician, recording artist and teacher.

A native of New York, she has performed in France, Taiwan, Brazil, China, Germany, Mexico, St. Bartholemy, Curacao and throughout the U.S. and Canada. Concerts in the U.S. have included performances at Carnegie Hall, Avery Fisher Hall’s “Great Performers Series”, Barge Music, Alice Tully Hall, Merkin Hall, the Kennedy Center and the Van Cliburn Foundation in Texas.

An active chamber music performer, Ms. McDermott is a member of the McDermott Trio and a former founding member of the cello quartet “CELLO”.

Ms. McDermott is a founding member of the Lighthouse Chamber Players, a group that performs throughout Cape Cod every summer. The highlight of several summers was an annual collaboration with Bernard Greenhouse.

Media appearances include the movie “FAME,” CBS Sunday Morning, an AT&T commercial (broadcast internationally) and in TIME and W magazines. She has recorded on the SONY Classical, Angel, d’Note classics, BMG and Pro Arte labels.

Ms. McDermott also performs regularly as a substitute with the New York Philharmonic and records for movie sound tracks and television commercials.

Ms. McDermott is on the cello faculty at the Mannes School of Music, the School for Strings and Third Street Music School Settlement in New York City. She has given master classes across the U.S., in Taiwan and Sao Paolo, Brazil.

Anne-Marie McDermott

Pianist Anne-Marie McDermott is a consummate artist who balances a versatile career as a soloist and collaborator. She recently premiered a concerto written for her by Poul Ruders as well as a solo piano sonata by Charles Wuorinen. She has performed with the Philadelphia, Minnesota, Los Angeles Chamber and Australian Chamber orchestras, the New York and Hong Kong philharmonics as well as the Dallas, National, Houston, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Atlanta, New Jersey and Baltimore symphonies.

Ms. McDermott has recorded the complete Prokofiev Piano Sonatas, Bach English Suites and Partitas (which was named Gramophone Magazine’s Editor’s Choice), and most recently, Gershwin Complete Works for Piano and Orchestra with the Dallas Symphony and Justin Brown.

Ms. McDermott is the Artistic Director of the famed Vail Valley Music Festival in Colorado, which hosts the New York Philharmonic, the Philadelphia Orchestra and the Dallas Symphony in addition to numerous chamber music concerts.

She was named an artist member of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center in 1995 and continues a long standing collaboration with the highly acclaimed violinist, Nadja Salerno Sonnenberg.

She continues to perform each season with her sisters, Maureen McDermott and Kerry McDermott in the McDermott Trio. She has also released an all Schumann CD with violist, Paul Neubauer, as well as the Complete Chamber Music of Debussy with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.

Ms. McDermott studied at the Manhattan School of Music with Dalmo Carra, Constance Keene and John Browning. She was a winner of the Young Concert Artists auditions and was awarded an Avery Fisher Career Grant.

Anton Nel, Piano

Anton Nel

Winner of the 1987 Naumburg International Piano Competition at Carnegie Hall, Anton Nel continues to tour internationally as recitalist, concerto soloist, chamber musician and teacher.

Highlights in the U.S. include performances with the Cleveland Orchestra, and the Chicago, San Francisco, Dallas, Seattle, and Detroit Symphonies to name a few, as well as coast to coast recitals in major venues. Overseas he has appeared, among many others, at the Wigmore Hall in London, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Suntory Hall in Tokyo and undertakes regular tours to South Africa.

Last year he traveled to China for the first time to teach and perform at the Sichuan International Piano Festival in Chengdu. Much sought after as a chamber musician he regularly appears with some of the world’s finest instrumentalists and singers at festivals on four continents.

He holds the Joe R. and Teresa Lozano Long Endowed Chair at the University of Texas at Austin where he heads the Division of Keyboard Studies; he is currently also a Visiting Professor at the Manhattan School of Music. During the summers he is on the artist-faculties at the Aspen Music Festival and School and at the Steans Institute at the Ravinia Festival.

The Johannesburg-born Mr. Nel, also an avid harpsichordist and fortepianist, is a graduate of the University of the Witwatersrand, where he studied with Adolph Hallis, and the University of Cincinnati where he worked with Bela Siki and Frank Weinstock.

Nicholas Canellakis, Cello

Hailed by the The New Yorker as a “superb young soloist,” Nicholas Canellakis has become one of the most sought-after and innovative cellists of his generation. In The New York Times his playing was praised as “impassioned” and “soulful,” with “the audience seduced by Mr. Canellakis’s rich, alluring tone.”

Mr. Canellakis recently made his Carnegie Hall concerto debut, performing with the American Symphony Orchestra in Isaac Stern Auditorium. Recent and upcoming season highlights also include concerto appearances with the Albany Symphony, New Haven Symphony, Greenwich Symphony, Erie Philharmonic, and Pan-European Philharmonia in Greece; he will also embark on a U.S. recital tour of American cello/piano works with his regular collaborator, pianist Michael Brown, culminating in a performance at Lincoln Center in New York City.

Mr. Canellakis is an artist of The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, with which he performs regularly in Alice Tully Hall and on tour, and was a winner of the CMS Two international auditions. He is also a regular guest artist at many of the world’s leading music festivals, including Santa Fe, Ravinia, Music@Menlo, La Jolla, Bridgehampton, Hong Kong, Moab, and Saratoga Springs. Filmmaking and acting are special interests of Mr. Canellakis.

He has produced, directed, and starred in several short films and music videos, many of which can be found on his website at www.nicholascanellakis.com.

Romie de Guise-Langlois, Clarinet

Praised as “…extraordinary…” and “…a formidable clarinetist…” by the New York Times, Romie de Guise-Langlois has appeared as soloist and chamber musician on major concert stages throughout the United States, Canada, Europe, and Asia. Ms. de Guise-Langlois performed as soloist with the Houston Symphony, Ensemble ACJW, the Burlington Chamber Orchestra, the Yale Philharmonia, McGill University Symphony Orchestra, at Music@Menlo and at Banff Center for the Arts.

She is a winner of the Astral Artists’ National Audition and was awarded the First Prize in the Houston Symphony Ima Hogg Competition; she was additionally a First Prize winner of the Woolsey Hall Competition at Yale University, the McGill University Classical Concerto Competition, the Canadian Music Competition, and was the recipient of the Canadian Broadcasting Company award.

An avid chamber musician, Ms. de Guise-Langlois joined the roster of Chamber Music Society Two in 2012 and has toured with Musicians from Marlboro. She has appeared at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Philadelphia and Boston Chamber Music Societies, the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Salt Bay Chamber Fest and Chamber Music Northwest, among others. She has performed as principal clarinetist for the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, the Orchestra of St. Luke’s, NOVUS NY, the New Haven and Stamford Symphony Orchestras and The Knights Chamber Orchestra.

A native of Montreal, Ms. de Guise-Langlois earned degrees from McGill University and the Yale School of Music. She is an alumnus of Ensemble Connect and she presently serves on faculties at UMass, Amherst and at Montclair State University.

The Shanghai Quartet

Renowned for its passionate musicality, impressive technique and multicultural innovations, the Shanghai Quartet has become one of the world’s foremost chamber ensembles.

Its elegant style melds Eastern music with Western repertoire, traversing musical genres from folk music to great masterpieces, to cutting-edge contemporary works. Formed in 1983, the Quartet regularly tours the major music centers of Europe, North America and Asia, from the International Music Festivals of Seoul and Beijing to the Festival Pablo Casals in France, and the Beethoven Festival in Poland.

The Quartet has appeared at Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center. They have collaborated with the Tokyo, Juilliard and Guarneri Quartets, cellists Yo-Yo Ma and Lynn Harrell, pianists Menahem Pressler, Yuja Wang, Peter Serkin and Jean-Yves Thibaudet, and pipa virtuoso Wu Man.

The Quartet has a history of championing new music. Its 30th Anniversary season brought new works from David Del Tredici, Carl Vine, Jeajoon Ryu, Lei Liang and Robert Aldridge. The Shanghai Quartet has an extensive discography of more than 30 recordings including Chinasong – a collection of Chinese folk songs arranged by Yi-Wen Jiang. The complete Beethoven String Quartets can be heard on Camerata, released in 2009. Media projects range from an on-screen appearance in Woody Allen’s Melinda and Melinda to PBS television’s Great Performances. Weigang Li appeared in the documentary From Mao to Mozart: Isaac Stern in China, and the family of Nicholas Tzavaras was the subject of the film, Music of the Heart.

The Quartet is the subject of a documentary film, Behind the Strings, currently in production.

The Shanghai Quartet is Quartet-in-Residence at Montclair State University, Ensemble-in-Residence with the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, and visiting guest professors of the Shanghai Conservatory and the Central Conservatory in Beijing, and sponsored by Thomastik-Infeld Strings.

Weigang Li, violin
Born into a family of well-known musicians in Shanghai, Weigang Li began studying the violin with his parents when he was 5 and went on to attend the Shanghai Conservatory at age 14. In 1985, upon graduating from the Shanghai Conservatory, Weigang Li left China to continue his studies at Northern Illinois University and later studied and taught at the Juilliard School as teaching assistant to the Juilliard Quartet. His teachers have included Shmuel Ashkenasi, Isadore Tinkleman, and Tan Shu-Chen. Mr. Li was featured in the 1980 Oscar winning documentary film From Mao to Mozart: Isaac Stern in China. He made his solo debut at 17 with the BBC Symphony Orchestra and has appeared as soloist with Shanghai Symphony, China Philharmonic, BBC Scottish Symphony, Asian Youth Orchestra. Weigang Li is a founding member and first violinist of the Shanghai Quartet since 1983. In its 31th season, the Shanghai Quartet has performed well over 2000 concerts in 30 countries; recorded 34 CD albums, including 7-discs cycle of complete Beethoven string quartets on Camerata label. Weigang Li is a violin professor at Montclair State University in New Jersey and Bard College Conservatory of Music in New York. He also holds the title of guest concert-master of Shanghai Symphony Orchestra and guest professor at Shanghai Conservatory and Central Conservatory in Beijing. Mr. Li plays on the 1600 Giovanni Paolo Maggini violin (ex-Burmester), which is on a generous loan from Mr. Rin Kei Mei.

Yi-Wen Jiang, violin
Violinist Yi-Wen Jiang was born into a musical family in Beijing where both parents were professional musicians. Beginning his violin studies with his father at age six, Jiang made his concerto debut at the age of 17 with the Central Opera House Orchestra in Beijing where he played the Prokofiev D Major Concerto Opus 19. In 1985, after receiving a full scholarship from McDonnell-Douglas, Jiang came to the U.S. to study with Taras Gabora and Michael Tree. In 1990, with the support of the Ken Boxley Foundation, he went to Rutgers University to work with Arnold Steinhardt of the Guarneri Quartet. Other teachers included Gérard Poulet and Pinchas Zuckerman. As a prizewinner at the Montreal International Competitions, he appeared as a soloist with the Victoria Symphony and Montreal Symphony. Jiang has recorded for the Record Corporation of China. As a composer, Jiang has arranged over 50 pieces for string quartet and other instruments, many pieces composed with Eastern repertoire and Western influence. In addition to his extensive touring and recordings schedule, Jiang maintains a close relationships with his students. Jiang teaches at Montclair State University and the Bard College Conservatory of Music. He is also guest professor at the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing and the Shanghai Conservatory. When not performing, composing or teaching, Jiang enjoys photography, and food & wine.

Honggang Li, viola
Honggang Li is the founding member Shanghai Quartet, now in it’s 30th season, has performed over two thousand concerts in 30 countries and can be heard on more than 30 CD albums. Mr. Li began studying the violin with his parents at age seven. When the Central Conservatory of music in Beijing reopened in 1977 after the Cultural Revolution, Mr. Li was selected to attend from a group of over five hundred applicants. He continued his training at the Shanghai Conservatory and co- founded the Shanghai Quartet with his brother Weigang while in his senior year in the conservatory. The quartet soon became the first Chinese quartet to win a major international chamber music competition (the London International) and came to the US in 1985. He received MM of North Illinois University and served as a teaching assistant at the Juilliard School in New York. In 1987, he won the special prize ( a 1757 DeCable violin) given by Elisa Pegreffi of Quartetto Italiano at the First Paolo Borciani International Competition in Italy. Mr. Li is currently also an artist-in-residence and faculty at Montclair State University and held the same title at University of Richmond in Virginia from 1989 to 2003. He has been the guest professor of both conservatories of Shanghai and Beijing. Mr. Li is also the guest principle violist of the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra since 2009.

Nicholas Tzavaras, cello
A Native of Spanish Harlem in New York City, cellist Nicholas Tzavaras has toured the globe as a chamber musician, soloist and educator for the past two decades. Since 2000, Mr. Tzavaras has been the cellist of the internationally renowned Shanghai Quartet. Formerly on the faculty of the University of Richmond, Mr. Tzavaras is currently the coordinator of the String Department and artist in residence at Montclair State University’s John J. Cali School of Music. He is also guest professor at the Shanghai and Central Conservatories of China. In the fall of 2016 Tzavaras joined the faculty of the Longy School of Music in Boston. Mr. Tzavaras began the violin at age 2 with his mother, Roberta Guaspari and moved to the cello when he was 6. A graduate of the Bronx High School of Science, he went on to receive degrees from the New England Conservatory and the State University of New York at Stonybrook where his cello teachers were Laurence Lesser and Timothy Eddy. Mr. Tzavaras can be seen in the Academy Award nominated documentary “Small Wonders,” the motion picture “Music of the Heart” starring Meryl Streep and with the Shanghai Quartet in Woody Allen’s “Melinda Melinda.” When he is not with his cello, Mr. Tzavaras is an avid cyclist, occasional triathlete, enthusiastic but unfortunately average chess player and, perhaps most importantly, a challenged father of three children all under the age of ten.

Kevin Rivard

Known for his “delicious quality of tone” Kevin Rivard is the Co-Principal Horn of the San Francisco Opera Orchestra, and Principal Horn of the San Francisco Ballet Orchestra.

As a soloist and chamber musician, he has performed with the New Century Chamber Orchestra, Music@Menlo, the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra and the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. Winner of numerous solo competitions, he was awarded Grand Prize at the 2008 Concours International d’Interpretation Musicale in Paris, the 2007 International Horn Competition of America, the 2003 Farkas Solo Horn competition, and in 2001 was a Presidential Scholar in the Arts.

Mr. Rivard has served as guest Principal Horn with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Philadelphia Orchestra and has performed with the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra. He was also a featured soloist with the Houston Symphony. Previous positions include the Colorado Symphony and Florida Orchestra. A Juilliard graduate, Mr. Rivard spends his summers performing with the Aspen Music festival and Music@Menlo, and previously has appeared with the Santa Fe Opera and Verbier Music Festival.

As one of the horn professors at San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Mr. Rivard loves teaching and inspiring the next generation of horn players. Every year he volunteers at local schools performing for youth, hoping to give as many children as possible the opportunity to enjoy live music.