Violinist Dayna Anderson, former Concertmaster of the Delaware Symphony Orchestra, is currently a member of the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia and is the Associate Concertmaster of the Grant Park Orchestra in Chicago, IL.  In addition, she is also a member of the orchestra for the Opera Company of Philadelphia and Symphony in C (formerly Haddonfield Symphony).  Ms Anderson began her studies in Chicago, IL with Suzuki teacher Betty Haag, followed by Desiree Ruhstrat at the Music Institute of Chicago.  In 2005, she was accepted into The Curtis Institute of Music, studying with Yumi Ninomiya Scott.  Ms. Anderson has performed as a soloist at the Kennedy Center as winner of the Viva Vivaldi competition, and also with the Harper Symphony, the Young Steinway Series, was a member of the Disney Young Artist Orchestra, and others.  She has performed throughout the Chicago area, appearing on broadcasts for WFMT and NPR's From the Top.  During the summers of 2008 and 2009, she was a member of the Verbier Festival Orchestra in Verbier, Switzerland, working with renowned conductors such as Charles Dutoit, Kurt Masur, Yuri Temirkanov, and Valery Gergiev.  An avid chamber musician, Ms. Anderson has twice participated in Music From Angel Fire's Young Artist Program, and has also collaborated with artists such as Ida Kavafian, Steve Tenenbom, Jeremy Denk, and Roberto Diaz.

top

Doyle Armbrust is one of three siblings, all of whom play the viola professionally.  To answer the inevitable questions:  (1) the violin slots at Wheaton College Suzuki Program were completely full and (2) there was and is no competitiveness between them...inexplicably.  As the Spektral Quartet's resident wordsmith, Doyle bisects Spektral rehearsals interviewing the likes of Mitsuko Uchida and David Lang among others for TimeOut Chicago and the Chicago Classical Review.  Currently the principal violist of the Firebird Chamber Orchestra in Miami, FL, Doyle is also a core member of the Chicago Symphony's MusicNow series, Ensemble Dal Niente and the New Millennium Orchestra.  He's also been seen onstage the Peter Gabriel, Eddie Vedder, The Beach Boys, Glen Hansard, Lupe Fiasco as well as occasionally dodging pyrotechnics with the Trans-Siberian Orchestra.  A frequent guest artist with the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), Doyle has appeared as a guest artist with new music dynamos eighth blackbird and been featured on the University of Chicago Presents and CONTEMPO series.

A full merit scholarship recipient Masters student at the University of Southern California where he studied with Donald McInnes, Doyle went on to a three-year fellowship under Michael Tilson Thomas at the New World Symphony.  Having worked closely and performed with Pierre Boulez, Daniel Barrenboim, Sir Neville Mariner, MTT, Robert Vernon, Charlie Pickler and Roberto Diaz, Doyle ultimately decided to eschew the orchestral path for a life in chamber music.  When he's not busy changing strings after yet another Berio Viola Sequenza practice session, Doyle can be found kayaking amidst the Apostle Islands and cooking in the cast iron with his financee, playwright Laura Schellhardt.

top

Founded in 1999, Quintet Attacca is one of Chicago's most dynamic chamber music ensembles. Grand Prize Winner of the 2002 Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition, the quintet has spent the past three years in residence with the Chicago Chamber Musicians' Professional Development Program. Quintet Attacca is also proud to be in residence at the Music Institute of Chicago and Lake Forest College.
    
Quintet Attacca is one of only two wind quintets in the 35-year history of the Fischoff Competition to have received the Grand Prize. In that same year, the quintet was invited to be a finalist for Chamber Music Society Two at Lincoln Center.  Quintet Attacca is an ensemble dedicated to bringing the unique sound of the wind quintet to all types of audiences: to this end, the quintet has played in venues across the Midwest, with extensive programming in Chicago. Quintet Attacca has reached audiences from Italy (at the 2003 Emilia Romagne Festival) to New York (at the Schneider Concerts Series at the New School) to concert halls all over Chicagoland. Recent performances have included the "First Monday Series" at the Chicago Cultural Center, Northeastern Illinois University's Jewel Box Series, a week-long educational residency with the Fischoff Chamber Music Competition in South Bend, and the quintet's fourth annual "Q&A with QA" at the Music Institute in Evanston.

Quintet Attacca delights in bringing music education to all ages and abilities. The quintet prides itself on its imaginative and engaging outreach programs. In January of 2008, Quintet Attacca collaborated with the Chicago Chamber Musicians to adapt and perform their popular "Quintet Idol!" show on the CCM Family Series at Navy Pier. November of 2009 included a week-long residence with the Fischoff Competition. Virtually every school in South Bend, IN hosted a presentation of "Peter and the Wolf," with the week culminating in a sold-out performance at the DeBartolo Center at Notre Dame. Through various organizations such as the International Music Foundation, Evanston-in-Schools, the Fischoff Competition, and the Chicago Chamber Musicians, Quintet Attacca has reached over a hundred schools and thousands of children! Qa has also given master classes to young performers and composers at Northwestern University, Northeastern Illinois University, and the Merit School of Music.

In recent years, Quintet Attacca has committed itself to inspiring a love of chamber music for young performers. From its "Chamber Winds" program which originated at the Music Institute of Chicago to the recent completion of its 3rd annual Summer Chamber Music Institute at MIC, Quintet Attacca is passionate about supporting chamber music opportunities for young musicians.

Priding itself on its innovative programming, Quintet Attacca enjoys presenting concerts that are both accessible and cutting-edge. Programs have included works by Roberto Sierra, Eric Ewazen, Elliott Carter, Miguel de Aguila, Paquito d'Rivera, John Harbison, and Gyorgy Ligeti. Aditionally, five works have been written for the Quintet: David Smooke's Trompe L'oeil, Collin Anderson's Tangram, Dancas Brasilieras and Portrait by Rami Levin, and Dana McCormick's Two Episodes for Wind Quintet.  New music projects have included a master class of young composers' works and a performance on Northwestern's New Music Marathon and an annual Call for Scores and performance at Lake Forest College. To creat balanced and entertaining programs, Quintet Attacca combines the challenges of today's most intriguing works with gems from the past.

top

“A pianist of exceptionally finished technique and purity of musical impulse”, (Boston Globe) Marta Aznavoorian has performed nationally and abroad. A Chicago native, she has performed in her hometown’s most prestigious venues, and has appeared as a soloist with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Sydney Symphony Orchestra, New World Symphony, Aspen Concert Orchestra, San Angelo Symphony and San Diego Symphony, working with such renowned conductors as the late Sir George Solti, Lukas Foss, Michael Tilson Thomas and Henry Mazer, to name a few. Solo recital credits include the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., Sydney Opera House, Steinway Hall, Weill Hall, Caramoor Festival, Tanglewood Festival, Music in the Loft, Dame Myra Hess Series, and Green Lake music Festival.

Ms. Aznavoorian has collaborated with such artists as the Pacifica Quartet, Julian Rachlin, Robert Chen, Colin Carr, Stefan Milenkovich, and Jennifer Frautschi. She has made a recording of Sonatas for violin and piano by Stravinsky and Ravel under the ARTEC label and is currently working on her next recording with Cedille Records.

Ms. Aznavoorian received her Bachelor of Music degree and Music Performers Certificate from Indiana University, and a Masters of Music degree from New England Conservatory. Past teachers include Lev Vlassenko, Menahem Pressler, Carolyn McCracken, Patricia Zander, Evelyn Brancart, and Emilio del Rosario.

A member of the Lincoln Trio, ensemble-in-residence at the Music Institute of Chicago, Ms. Aznavoorian is also a member of the MIC Faculty.

top

Since completing apprenticeships with the Santa Fe Opera and the Chicago Lyric Opera, mezzo-soprano Julia Bentley has appeared  in leading operatic roles (Carmen, Rosina, Dorbella, Despina, and both Rossini and Massenet Cinderellas) from Anchorage to New York, and has been featured as a soloist with orchestras led by George Manahan, Raymond Leppard, Oliver Knussen, Robert Shaw and Pierre Boulez.  She performs in Chicago with Mostly Music, CUBE, the Contemporary Chamber Players, the Orion Ensemble, Pinotage, the New Budapest Orpheum Society, Ensemble Noamnesia, Fulcrum Point, the Chicago Chamber Musicians, Chicago Opera Theater, Concertante di Chicago, the Newberry Consort, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Chicago Lyric Opera and the MusicNOW series at Symphony Center with conductor Cliff Colnot.  In 2001 she appeared to critical acclaim at Weill Hall with Pierre Boulez as the soloist in Le Marteau Sans Maitre.  She has recorded on the Albany, Cedille and Tintagel labels.  Recent engagements have included performances of La Damnation de Faust with the Eastern Connecticut Symphony Orchestra, Pierrot Lunaire with eighth blackbird, La Cenerentola with Sacramento Opera, Little Women with the Dayton Opera, and the Bach B Minor Mass with the Apollo Chorus as well as chamber music series in Chicago, Philadelphia, New York and the National Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C.  She currently teaches voice at the Music Institute of Chicago.

top

Born in Warsaw, Poland, Joanna Bruzdowicz is considered one of today's most original composers.  After achieving her Master of Arts degree in composition and piano at the Warsaw Academy of Music "Frederic  Chopin," she went to Paris in 1968 with a "Maurice Ravel" State Grant to study with Nadia Boulanger, Olivier Messiaen and Pierre Schaeffer.  Joanna Bruzdowicz, who started to compose at the age of 12, has a wide range of artistic interests.  She has composed four operas:  The Penal Colony after Franz Kafka (F.P. Tours, France, 1972), The Women of Troy after Euripides (F.P. Paris, 1973), The Gates of Paradise after Jerzy Andrzejewski (F.P. Warsaw, 1987) and the opera-musical Tides and Waves with a libretto written by her and her husband, H-J. Tittel (F.P. Paris & Barcelona, 1992).  She has also written ballet music, symphonic and chamber music, and electroacoustic and electronic music.

Her interest in drama has led her to compose for theatre, television and films among others, Sans toi, ni loi ("The Vagabond" - Golden Lion in Venice, 1985) by French director Agnes Varda.  Together with her husband she has written several screenplays and television series, such as the 36-part TV Serial "Stahlkammer Zurich," produced by Bavaria for German TV.

Joanna Bruzdowicz' large output is diverse and her music is performed all over the world.  Though she uses all modern techniques and media, they are never employed for ostentatious effects of radical experiments but are subtly integrated into the fabric of the music.  Apart from composing, she engages in music criticism as well as publicizing and propagating new music.  She also gives courses in composition in several countries.

As well as being a founder of "Jeunesses Musicales of Poland," Joanna Bruzdowicz is the founder and former President of the "F. Chopin and K. Szymanowski Society of Belgium" and actually the President of "International Musical Encounter in Catalonia North - France," where every summer she organized in Ceret an International Music Festival.

She has both French and Polish citizenship and has three sons, Mark, Jan and Jorg.

top

Cellist David Cunliffe began studying at the age of nine in his native England. Three years later he was chosen to receive a scholarship to the Royal College of Music in London. In 1984 Mr. Cunliffe went on to study at the Royal Northern College of Music where he founded the Argyll String Quartet and was the recipient of the Terrance Weill and Leonard Hirsch Quartet prizes and the Lady Barbirolli Chamber Music Award.

His teachers included Margaret Moncreiff, Moray Welsh, William Pleeth, Christopher Bunting and Ralph Kirshbaum. He completed his studies at the International Yehudi Menuhin Music Academy in Switzerland where he studied with Radu Aldulescu and toured throughout Europe with Yehudi Menuhin and the Camerata Lysy.

In 1995 he was asked to join the Balanescu Quartet, touring extensively to Australia, Europe and the United States appearing frequently on radio and TV, including featured performances on NPR and the BBC. He has served as Principal cello with the RNCM Chamber and Symphony Orchestras and for performances with BBC Philharmonic, BBC Scottish and Royal Scottish Symphony Orchestras. Mr. Cunliffe can be heard on various recording labels including Enja, DMD, Albany and Cedille.

A founding member of the Virtuosi Chicago Chamber Orchestra, Mr. Cunliffe is currently on the faculty of the Music Institute of Chicago and is a member of the Lincoln Trio, ensemble-in-residence at the Music Institute of Chicago.

top

Jehanne Dubrow is the author of three poetry collections, most recently Stateside (Northwestern University Press, 2010), which describes her experiences as a "millspouse."  Her first book, The Hardship Post (2009), won the Three Candles Press Open Book Award, and her second collection From the Fever-World, won the Washington Writers' Publishing House Poetry Competition (2009).  Finishing Line Press published her chapbook, The Promised Bride, in 2007.

Her poetry, creative nonfiction, and book reviews have appeared in journals such as The New Republic, Poetry, Ploughshares, The Hudson Review, The New England Review, Barrow Street, Gulf Coast, Blackbird, Shenandoah, Prairie Schooner, as well as Poetry Daily and Verse Daily.  Her work has been featured on NPR's "Fresh Air," on American Life in Poetry, on the PBS News Hours "Art Beat" blog, and on the Academy of American Poets website.

She has been a recipient of an Individual Artist's Award from the Maryland State Arts Council, a Walter E. Dakin Fellowship and Howard Nemerov Poetry Scholarship from the Sewanee Writers' Conference, and a Sosland Foundation Fellowship from the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.

The daughter of American diplomats, Jehanne Dubrow was born in Italy and grew up in Yugoslavia, Zaire, Poland, Belgium, Austria, and the United States.  She is married to an officer in the U.S. Navy and currently lives on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, where she serves an assistant professor in creative writing and literature at Washington College.  In her spare time, she teaches classes at the Writer's Center in Bethesda, MD.

top

The Canadian violinist Renée-Paule Gauthier was mentioned as one of the "best upcoming violinist of the new generation" in Violin Virtuosos, from Paganini to the 21st Century, a book written by the American author Henry Roth. She has won awards in several competitions, including the Canadian Music Competition, the Canadian Music Festival, and the Montréal Symphony Orchestra concerto competition. She has performed as a soloist with several orchestras throughout her native Québec. A sought-after chamber player, she has collaborated with Marc-André Hamelin, Jeffrey Kahane, Ursula Oppens, David Jalbert, Denise Djokic, Yuval Gotlibovich, Jethro Marks, Ricardo Morales, Luis Rossi, and Philippe Cuper, among others.

Mrs. Gauthier obtained a Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Montreal and a Master of Music degree and Performer’s Certificate from the Eastman School of Music. She then pursued her studies at the Hartt School of Music of the University of Hartford, completing a two-year residency under the guidance of the Emerson String Quartet as first violin of the Diabelli String Quartet. Finalist at the Banff International String Quartet Competition 2001, the Diabelli Quartet recorded on the Zephyr and Ongaku labels and was the resident string quartet at the Shaw Festival in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, and at the International Clarinet Connection in Boston, MA, from 2000 to 2003.

Mrs. Gauthier studied privately with Eugene Drucker, Brian Lewis, Jean-Francois Rivest, Phillip Setzer, and Zvi Zeitlin. She worked with masters such as Victor Pikaisen, Pierre Amoyal, Sally Thomas, William Preucil, Jaime Laredo, and Christian Tetzlaff during the summer sessions of the Domaine Forget, Meadowmount School of Music, Music Academy of the West, and at the reputed New York String Seminar. She also studied chamber music performance with members of the renowned Cleveland, Orion, Ying, and Orford Quartets.

In September 2009, Renée-Paule Gauthier joined the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra as Acting Assistant Concertmaster. She performed in the first violin section of the National Arts Center Orchestra from 2004 to 2009. She has been an active soloist and chamber musician for the series of the NAC, Ottawa International Chamber Music Festival, Montreal Chamber Music Festival, and Les Jeunesses Musicales du Canada, and is the Artistic Director of the Rendez-Vous Musical de Laterrière. She was a member of the organizing team of the Ottawa International Chamber Music Festival 2007. She was concertmaster of the New World Symphony in Miami Beach, Florida until January 2004, and previously, the concertmaster of the Orchestre de la Francophonie Canadienne in 2002 and 2003.

In September 2009 she was awarded the exclusive three-year loan of the Taft Stradivari violin through the Canada Council for the Arts’ Musical Instrument Bank Competition.

top

Pianist Matthew Hagle's performances are often noted for their musical understanding, imaginative programming, and beauty of sound. The New York Times has described him as “a sensitive pianist”, Clavier Magazine has praised the “rare clarity and sweetness” of his playing, and the Springfield (MA.) Republican remarked that he “played with unaffected brilliance and profound understanding”. The adventurousness of his programming received favorable commentary on Australian national radio, covering his performances in the Sydney International Piano Competition. His recital appearances often explore the 20th and 21st century repertoire as well as lesser-known older works, finding ways to integrate these hidden treasures into the standard repertoire through thoughtful programming and committed performance

A resident of the Chicago area, Hagle has performed at local venues including the Ravinia Festival’s Martin Theater, Symphony Center, and the Chicago Cultural Center; he has also been heard in concert throughout the United States, including the National Gallery of Art, Symphony Space in New York, and the United States Supreme Court, as well as in concert halls in England, Australia and Japan.  Mr. Hagle performs frequently on radio station WFMT in Chicago, and has also been heard on NPR’s “Performance Today” and Minnesota Public Radio’s “St. Paul Sunday Morning”. He is valued as a collaborator by many artists: for many years, he has been the principal recital partner of violinist Rachel Barton Pine. Their CD American Virtuosa, released on the Cedille label, received many favorable reviews and reached #12 on Billboard magazine’s classical chart. He also frequently performs as a piano duo with his wife Mio Isoda-Hagle. Other chamber music performances have been with the Parker Quartet, the Avalon Quartet, Quintet Attacca, and with members of the Chicago Symphony.

Mr. Hagle is a dedicated teacher of piano, chamber music, music theory, and composition, whose students have won prizes in local and national competitions. He is currently on the faculty of the Music Institute of Chicago, where he is director of the Musicianship program in addition to his teaching duties. He has also taught at the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana, and at the International Institute for Young Musicians at the Universities of Kansas and California at Santa Barbara.  Mr. Hagle is also a sometime composer whose pieces have been performed in Germany and Japan. A comfortable speaker on diverse musical subjects, he likes to use this ability to draw connections between very new and older music, or between music and other art forms. In his spare time he likes to read on a variety of subjects, and to spend time with his two children.

Matthew Hagle is a graduate of the Peabody Conservatory (B.M.) and of Yale University (M.M., M.M.A., D.M.A), receiving faculty prizes in piano, accompanying, and music theory. While at Yale, he also received a Fulbright Scholarship to study piano privately in London.   His teachers have been Claude Frank, Robert Weirich, Donald Currier and Maria Curcio Diamand.

top

Steven Honigberg is a graduate of the Julliard School of Music where he studied with Leonard Rose and Channing Robbins.  Other important cello teachers were Pierre Fournier and Karl Fruh. He is currently a member of the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington, D.C. and is also founder and member of the Potomac String Quartet.  He has given recent cello recitals in Washington, DC on the Dumbarton Concert Series, at the Phillips Collection Series, at the National Gallery of Art, and recitals in New York and throughout the United States. In Chicago he has appeared on radio WFMT,  at the Ravinia Festival, and as soloist with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Ars Viva Orchestra, Lake Forest Symphony  and New Philharmonic Orchestra among others.  He has appeared most recently as soloist with the National Symphony Orchestra in a performance at the Kennedy Center of Eric Wolfgang Korngold's Cello Concerto and he won rave reviews for the 1988 world premiere of David Ott's Concerto for Two Cellos conducted by Mistislav Rostropovich and the National Symphony Orchestra with many repeat performances on  two NSO United States tours.

 Steven was the Director of the Chamber Music Series at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC for ten years where he premiered a number of new works by such composers as Lukas Foss, Benjamin Lees, Robert Starer and David Diamond.
He participated in extensive recordings of concerts held at the museum, including four recordings of music from the music series and CDs of  music by Erick Wolfgang Korngold and  Ernst Toch. He has recorded extensively with the Potomac String Quartet, including the  nine String Quartets of Quincy Porter and the eleven String Quartets of David Diamond which John von Rhein, music critic for the Chicago Tribune, chose as one of his top 20 CD choices for 2003. Steven Honigberg has also recorded the complete works of Beethoven for cello and piano, and the complete works of Chopin for cello and piano with his mother, pianist Carol Honigberg. From 1990-2009 Honigberg was chamber music director of the Edgar M. Bronfman series in Sun Valley, Idaho and  principal cellist of the Sun Valley Summer Symphony where he was featured as soloist in more than 15 cello concerti. He has collaborated in chamber music with such musicians as violinist Hilary Hahn, and pianists Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Jon Nakamatsu, James Tocco and Shai Wosner.

Steven lives in Washington, DC with his wife Jessica and two daughters Lily and Clara. Also an author, Beckham Books in 2010 published his book Leonard Rose: America's Golden Age and Its First Cellist.. Steven Honigberg performs on the “Stuart” Stradivarius cello made in 1732.

top

Adam Levin has been praised by renowned American guitarist, Eliot Fisk, as a “virtuoso guitarist and a true 21st century renaissance man with the élan, intelligence, charm, tenacity and conviction to change the world”.  Mr. Levin has performed across the United States and Europe at renowned venues such as Chicago’s Pick Staiger and Mayne Stage concert halls, at the Palazzo Chigi Saracini in Italy, Boston’s Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and Jordan Hall, the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, the Berlin Universität für Musik und darstellende Künst, the Barcelona Auditorio Axa, and in Madrid at the Palacio de Godoy, BBVA Palacio del Marqués de Salamanca, and Sala Manuel de Falla.

The recipient of numerous top prizes, Adam Levin has been recognized by the Society of American Musicians, the Lake Forest Concerto Competition, Minnesota’s Schubert Competition, Boston GuitarFest, Concurso Internacional de les Corts para Jóvenes Intérpretes in Barcelona, Concurso Internazionale Di Gargnano, and Certamen Internacional Luys Milan de Guitarra in Valencia.

Levin has been guest artist on a variety of music series, including Madrid’s Sociedad Española de Guitarra, Conciertos en Palacios and Festival Clásicos en Verano, Valencia’s Amigos de la Guitarra, Boston GuitarFest, L’Accademia Musicale Chigiana in Siena, and Festival Pro Música e Cultura in St.Moritz. 

An avid chamber musician, Levin has performed with orchestra, string quartet, and various duo combinations.  Adam and Spanish clarinetist, Cristo Barrios, present transcriptions from the traditional repertoire while commissioning new works by prominent Spanish and Latin American composers.  Adam Levin and violinist, William Knuth asDuo Sonidos, bring a fresh interpretation of classical music to wide-ranging audiences across the globe, while expanding the repertoire for violin and guitar through new commissions by composers such as, Eduardo Morales-Caso, Jan Freidlin, Jorge Sastre, Jorge Muñiz, Tal Hurwitz and Jorge Variego.  The duo’s debut CD, Duo Sonidos, released in Fall 2010, features works by Salvador Brotons, Eduardo Morales-Caso, Manuel de Falla, and Astor Piazzolla.  In December 2010, Duo Sonidos was awarded first prize at the Luys Milán International Chamber Music Competition in Valencia, Spain.

Levin’s debut record In the Beginning was lauded as “absolutely thrilling…will dazzle and entertain at every possible opportunity” by Minor 7th Acoustic Guitar Music Reviews.  The record, Music from Out of Time, sponsored by La Communidad de Madrid, boasts world-premiere recordings by contemporary Spanish composers Eduardo Morales-Caso, Leonardo Balada, Mario Gosalvez-Blanco, David Del Puerto, and José María Sánchez Verdú. A fourth recording, Fuego de la luna, showcasing the complete guitar works of Spanish-Cuban composer, Eduardo Morales-Caso, was released on Verso Records in July 2011.  In 2012, production will begin on a two volume recording project and companion publication with Brotons y Mercadal Edicions Musicals, presenting the 30 Spanish works recently commissioned as part of Levin’s residency in Spain.  

As an ambassador of the guitar, Mr. Levin is dedicated to sharing a comprehensive repertoire in underserved areas and unconventional spaces.  In 2005, as part of a fundraising effort for Hurricane Katrina victims, Adam directed the Concert for Gulf-Coast Aid, which raised $10,000 dollars for hurricane relief.  In 2007-08 he was awarded an Albert Schweitzer Fellowship, encompassing 200 hours of innovative community work in Boston area schools, homeless shelters, rehabilitation centers, halfway houses, and prisons. 

In 2008, Levin was honored as a Fulbright Scholar in the field of music performance, researching contemporary Spanish guitar repertoire in Madrid, Spain.  In collaboration with the Spanish and American embassies, Levin has continued outreach performances in Madrid at a number of bilingual school programs, introducing both American and Spanish classical guitar repertoire to students.  In 2009, he was awarded the Program for Cultural Cooperation Fellowship, promoting cultural understanding between Spain and the United States. In May 2010, Levin was awarded the Kate Neal Kinley Fellowship, continuing his research and performance of contemporary Spanish music in Madrid.

A native of Chicago’s North Shore, Adam holds BM and BA degrees from Northwestern University in Music Performance, Psychology, and Pre-Med.  Under the tutelage of Eliot Fisk, Levin completed a MM at New England Conservatory in Boston.  His esteemed teachers have included Oscar Ghiglia, Gabriel Estarellas, Anne Waller, Mark Maxwell, and Paul Henry.  Adam was professor of guitar at Amadeus Escuela de Música in Madrid, Spain and is currently the co-director of the music program, Boston Guitar Immersion, which offers comprehensive guitar instruction to independent schools.

top

Mark Lekas was a full scholarship student at the Eastman School of Music where he studied with Paul Katz of the Cleveland String Quartet.  Other teachers have included Zara Nelsova, Steven Kates, Michael Haber and Leonard Chausow.  Mr. Lekas was a member of the Columbus (Ohio) Symphony Orchestra, the New American Chamber Orchestra, the New World Symphony, and the Salem String Quartet.  He currently enjoys an active musical life in Chicago as Principal Cello with the Indiana Symphony, as a member of the Lake Forest Symphony, and the Grammy-nominated Nashville Chamber Orchestra.  In addition, he is a regular substitute cellist for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra.  Mark frequently performs chamber music with the North Park Chamber Players, the Brass String Chamber Ensemble, the Pilgrim Chamber Players, and the Lekas Trio.  He has performed many times on WFMT’s Live from Studio One series.  He is also an active studio cellist, recording for television and radio jingles, and has just received a gold album certification for his work on Michael W. Smith’s CD Healing Rain. He also plays musicals for Broadway in Chicago, most recently as cellist for the show Wicked.  He is currently on the faculty of North Park University.

top

Michele Lekas received her Bachelor’s and Master’s Degree from the Quebec Conservatory of Music in her native Canada and later studied in the United States with Jaime Laredo, David Cerone and Sally Thomas.  She has performed with Canadian ensembles such as the Orchestre Symphonique de Quebec and Les Violons du Roy, and in Switzerland with the Camerata Lysy Gstaad.  She also performed with the New American Chamber Orchestra on a year-long tour of Europe.  Michele is currently concertmaster of the Northwest Indiana Symphony, the Rockford Symphony, the New Philharmonic Orchestra and the Woodstock Mozart Festival Orchestra, and is a substitute musician with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.  She has performed on WFMT Live from Studio One with both the North Park Chamber Musicians and the Pilgrim Chamber Players, and she has also appeared in recital over the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC).

top

Pianist Sung Hoon Mo is an active recitalist and an avid collaborative artist performing diverse repertoire.  His artistry has been described to show "effortless lyricism...tinged with a knowledge of the tragic" (the East Hampton Star).  Sung Hoon has performed concerts in various venues in major cities across America and abroad.  His performances have taken him to Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, the Museum of Fine Arts in San Angelo, Sewanee Festival in Tennessee as a guest artist, and the Longy School of Music in Cambridge Massachusetts.  He has also toured Central America including Guatemala and Puerto Rico, performing at the San Juan Conservatory and the Ponce Museum.  He has been featured on PBS and has been heard on many radio broadcasts including WQXR in New York City as the winner of Bergen Philharmonic Concerto Competition.  In Germany, he has toured with violinist Victor Tretjakov and violist Yuri Bashmet in an ensemble Villa Musica.  Other Collaborative artists include violinist Charles Castleman, and cellists Pieter Wispelwey, and Emilio Colon, with whom he has recorded on the Klavier and the Enharmonic labels. 

In Chicago, where he currently resides, Sung Hoon frequently performs in the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Chamber Music Series, the New Music DePaul, as well as guest solo recital engagements at DePaul University.  His other concert venues include the University of Chicago, Columbia College, the Preston Bradley Hall with the Classical Symphony Orchestra at the Chicago Cultural Center, St. Charles Art and Music Festival, the Duo Festival in Nichols Hall, and the Ravinia Festival.  Sung Hoon Mo has adjudicated for the St. Charles International Piano Competition and he is currently on the faculty at the Wheaton College Conservatory of Music and the Music Institute of Chicago. 

Sung Hoon was awarded the Performer's Certificate from Indiana University while studying under James Tocco.  He also attended Eastman School of Music and the Peabody Conservatory.  He has worked with notable musicians Emanuel Ax, Jerome Lowenthal, Leon Fleisher, and John Browning.

top

Gerardo Ribeiro has appeared throughout the world as featured soloist with major orchestras including the Philadelphia and Gulbenkian Orchestras, the Montreal, Dallas, Lucerne, Lisbon, Porto, Barcelona, Cali and Porto Alegre Symphony Orchestras, the Zagreb, Antwerp and Lisbon Philharmonics, the Taiwan, Beijing, Belgian and Portuguese National Orchestras, the radio orchestras of Paris (O.R.T.F.), Lisbon, Hilversum (Holland) and North Germany (Hannover), and other leading ensembles.  With acclaimed recitals at New York City’s most prestigious venues - Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall and the Metropolitan Museum - Mr. Ribeiro has also appeared at Washington D.C.’s Kennedy Center, and is well known in major European, South American and Far Eastern concert halls.  Upcoming performances in 2012 include the performance of the Walton Violin Concerto with the National Orchestra of Portugal in Lisbon, and the Qinhuangdao Symphony Orchestra in China.

Also an active chamber musician, he has served as Artistic Director of the International Chamber Music Institute in Munich and has collaborated with distinguished musicians at the Marlboro and Lucerne Music Festivals, as well as with members of the Vermeer Quartet and the Dorian Wind Quintet.  Between 2003 and 2008 he toured as a member of The Meadowmount Trio.

Beginning violin studies at age 4, Mr. Ribeiro went on to earn soloist diplomas with honors at both the Porto and Lucerne Conservatories, later attending The Julliard School where he studied with Ivan Galamian, Paul Makanovitzky and Felix Galimir.  His numerous awards in prestigious international competitions such as the Paganini and Montreal, include first prizes at the Vanna da Motta in Lisbon, and the Maria Canals in Barcelona.

Mr. Ribeiro records for the EMA and RCA labels, having released several concerto CDs; his RCA recordings include the Brahms Violin Concerto and Double Concerto, the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto with the Radio Orchestras of Hannover and Berlin, as well as the violin sonatas of Beethoven and Brahms.

Prior to joining the Northwestern University faculty as Professor of Violin, Mr Ribeiro was Associate Professor of Violin at the Eastman School of Music.  He has served on the faculty of the Meadowmount School of Music since 2004 and is also on the faculties of Midwest Young Artists and the Music Institute of Chicago.  He is currently Co-chair of  Music Performance and Coordinator of Strings at the Bienen School of Music, Northwestern University.  He is a sought after adjudicator for both national and international competitions and gives master classes at conservatories and universities world wide.  In 2001 he was awarded the Presidential Scholars Teacher Recognition Award from the White House Commission.  Mr. Ribeiro has been decorated by the President of Portugal as Commander of the Order of Prince Henry the Navigator.

top

Desirée Ruhstrat made her professional debut at the age of twelve with the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra.  She was the youngest prizewinner ever at Switzerland’s Tibor Varga International Competition and won first prize at the National Young Musicians Debut Competition in Los Angeles.  Numerous engagements have included appearances with the Denver Symphony, Berlin Radio Symphony, the Chicago Civic Orchestra and the Orquestra Sinfonica de Agauscalientes in Mexico.  She has also toured extensively with the Philharmonia De Camera Chamber Orchestra in Germany. 

As a recitalist, Ms. Ruhstrat has appeared in Europe and throughout the United States including at the White House by invitation of President and Mrs. Ronald Reagan. Her distinguished career as a chamber musician includes appearances with the Colorado Chamber Players, on the Chamber Music Series of the Philadelphia Orchestra, at the University of Wisconsin, and at summer festivals such as the Peninsula Music Festival, the Breckenridge Music Festival and the Utah Music Festival where she also served on its faculty.  Ms. Ruhstrat is a graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music and her teachers have included Joseph Gingold, Dorothy Delay, Harold Wipplier and Aaron Rosand. 

She presently is on the music faculty of the Music Institute of Chicago in Winnetka where she is an active performer and teacher. She is a member of the Lincoln Trio, the Music Institute's ensemble-in-residence.

top

Violist Michael Isaac Strauss has performed around the world as a soloist, in chamber music and symphonic settings. He made his solo debut with the Minnesota Orchestra in 1990 and has since appeared as soloist with orchestras across the United States. During his sixteen-year tenure as the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra Principal Violist, Strauss has performed as soloist or collaborator in duo roles nearly every season.

As a member of the distinguished Fine Arts Quartet, Strauss performed at the Schleswig-Holstein, Bayreuth and Montpellier festivals in Europe. In North America he has performed at summer festivals including LaJolla, Caramoor, Banff, Sewanee, Crested Butte, Long Lake, Indiana University Summer Evenings of Music and Eastern Music Festival. Strauss appears on annual chamber music series throughout the United States, making regular appearances on Cincinnati’s Linton Music series, St. Petersburg (FL) Encore Series, University of Indianapolis’s Faculty Artist Series, and on his own Music@Shaarey Tefilla (M@ST) series in Carmel, Indiana.

Strauss’s recordings can be found on the labels of I Virtuosi (debut of Jennifer Higdon’s Viola Sonata), CRI (David Finko’s Viola Concerto and 20th century chamber music works with the Philadelphia-based Orchestra 2001), Lyrinx (Mozart’s complete viola quintets with the Fine Arts Quartet), and Centaur (Stamitz’s works for solo viola with orchestra). He is also the featured recording artist on the official CD for the Suzuki Association of the Americas Viola School Volume 8 and has been re-engaged to record Volume 9.

A sought-out teacher, Strauss was recently named to the faculty of Chicago College of Performing Arts at Roosevelt University. He has also been named Adjunct Faculty at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music for the 2011-2012 academic year. Strauss teaches privately, presents master classes, and coaches advanced students and professionals in orchestral audition preparation. He previously held faculty positions at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, Swarthmore College, DePauw University, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, and Butler University. Strauss serves as President of the Board of Directors of the Indianapolis Suzuki Academy.

Strauss’s work has been honored with the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts Cinnamon Award, First Prize of the WAMSO Competition of the Minnesota Orchestra, Ealing prize at the Tertis International Viola Competition, Artist Fellowship Awards from South Carolina and Indiana, and a Creative Renewal Fellowship Award from the Arts Council of Indianapolis. 

A native of Iowa, Strauss began his viola studies in Iowa City’s public schools. He continued under the tutelage of William Preucil, Sr. John Graham and Karen Tuttle. He received additional training at Mannes College of Music and the Banff Centre for the Arts. Strauss is a graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music and performs on a viola made by Matteo Albani from Bolzano, Italy in 1704.

top