Invited faculty for 2012 season

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 violin

Atis Bankas

Violinist extraordinaire and the man with the vision - founder and Artistic Director of Music Niagara.

Mr. Bankas was first acquainted with the Niagara area as a member of the Niagara Symphony in 1981, upon his arrival in Canada from Lithuania. Niagara's beauty and history left an indelible impression which years later drew him back to create what is now Music Niagara. Known for his creative programing for this international music festival, Atis Bankas has succeeded in merging the best of what Niagara has to offer. Combining the artistic excellence of world class musicians, renowned actors from the Shaw Festival and venues that feature Niagara's history, beauty and vineyards, Music Niagara has become a beacon of light for music, art and culture in the Niagara peninsula.

In addition to his responsibilities as Artistic Director and first violinist of the Gould String Quartet, the ensemble-in-residence at Music Niagara, Atis Bankas shares his musical talents by teaching a large violin studio at the Glenn Gould School of the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto, as a first violinist with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra since 1982, and as Director of Music at the Mount Carmel Spiritual Centre in Niagara Falls, Ontario.

In recognition of his musical contributions to the community, Atis Bankas was inducted into the International Knightly Order of St. George. Most recently for his contribution to the musical culture of Azerbaijan and the development and deepening of cultural relations between Azerbaijan and Canada, Atis Bankas was awarded a title of Honorary Doctor of Arts by the Azerbaijan Ministry of Education and the Academy of Fine Arts.

First-prize winner of the International Violin Competition in Tallin, Estonia, Atis Bankas has performed as a soloist in the former Soviet Union, Europe, the United States, and Canada, and with orchestras under the direction of Nejme Jarvi, Iona Brown, and Andrew Davis, among many others. Mr. Bankas was Assistant Concertmaster of the Lithuanian Philharmonic Orchestra prior to immigrating to Canada. Mr. Bankas is an avid chamber musician, having performed in the New World Trio, the Krieghoff String Quartet, the Toronto Piano Trio, and Trio Rachmaninoff.

His solo and chamber music appearances have been featured on CJRT, CFMX, CBC, and NPR radio networks, as well as on television in Canada and the United States. Mr. Bankas' performances have received high critical acclaim: "A brilliant technique and profound musicianship are combined in the artistry of the Lithuanian born violinist, Atis Bankas"(Estonian Daily). "Atis Bankas excelled in brilliant solo passages, but was first among equals in a seasoned ensemble..." (Kitchener-Waterloo Record). "The mellow tone he elicits from his instrument is responsible for the warmth of the ensemble. Its pitch approaches that of the viola but in capable hands of Mr. Bankas it soars the heights into sweetness. Quite remarkable!" (Financial Post).

Mr. Bankas was also the founder and Artistic Director of the Muskoka Lakes Music Festival and the Windermere Music Festival. He has participated in many summer festivals including the Bowdoin Summer Music Festival, the Weathersfield Music Festival, Shandele Music Festival, and the Silver Bay Summer Music Festival.

Mr. Bankas studied at the School of the Arts for Gifted Children in Kaunas, Lithuania, and the Lithuanian State Conservatory, where he graduated summa cum laude with a Masters degree in solo violin performance, chamber music, pedagogy, and orchestral performance. Mr. Bankas continued his post-graduate work in violin performance at the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory where he studied in David Oistrakh's violin department. His principal teachers were Victor Radovich and Semyon Snitkovsky, both students of David Oistrakh.

Mr. Bankas is highly regarded as a teacher of violin performance. In addition to the the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto, where he has taught since 1982, Mr. Bankas has served on faculties at the University of Toronto, Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York, the Peabody Conservatory at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin, and the Moscow Gnessin Pedagogical Institute in Moscow. Mr. Bankas has adjudicated and offered master classes in Japan, Europe, the United States and Canada.

Many of Mr. Bankas' students have been top prize winners of international and national competitions, such as the Paganini International Violin Competition, Niagara International Music Competition, the Toronto Symphony and Montreal Symphony competitions, Edward Johnson Music Competition, Kiwanis Festivals, and the Canadian Music Competitions. As well, they have gone on to study at prestigious institutions such as Juilliard, the Cleveland Institute, Peabody, the Royal Northern College of Music and have obtained positions with Canada's major symphony orchestras including the Toronto Symphony and the Vancouver Symphony.

James Buswell -violin/viola

James Buswell has performed as a solo violinist with virtually all of the major orchestras in North America, and throughout Europe, Asia, South America, and Australia as well. In this capacity, he has appeared in over one hundred solo works for violin and orchestra.
His regular professional activities also include solo and chamber music recitals, conducting, teaching, lecturing, and writing. In recital, he is noted for adventuresome programming, regularly combining standard masterpieces with works off the beaten path.
Early in his career he was an artist-member of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center in New York. The music of Johann Sebastian Bach has played a large role in Buswell's life. He narrated and performed in a documentary for the PBS network entitled "The Stations of Bach," and also released a recording of the complete solo sonatas and partitas on the Centaur label.
Buswell is well known for championing new music, including neglected masterpieces from the 20th century. On the Naxos label, he recorded award-winning CDs of the Samuel Barber concerto and the concerti of Walter Piston and received a Grammy nomination for his recording of the Samuel Barber violin concerto. World premiere performances include works by Charles Wuorinen, Donald Erb, Ned Rorem, Leon Kirchner, John Harbison, and Yehudi Wyner.
Recent travels for concerts, masterclasses, and international competition adjudications have taken him to to Korea, Taiwan, Japan, Thailand, Argentina, Australia, Spain, Germany, Ukraine, and the Czech Republic.
Buswell's early training was at the Juilliard School where he was a pupil of Ivan Galamian, and he continued his studies at Harvard University where he majored in Renaissance Art.
He and his wife, cellist, Carol Ou, reside in Boston where he is Professor of Violin at New England Conservatory, and gives an annual recital in NEC's Jordan Hall. The unanimous praise for his "sensitive, evocative, compelling playing" continues unabated today.

 Sarita Uranovsky

 A native of Cape Town, South Africa, Sarita Uranovsky began playing the violin at age 7.  She holds Bachelor of Music (with Honors) and Master of Music (with Distinction) degrees from the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama (RSAMD), and an Artist Diploma from Boston University. Her major teachers include Simon Fischer and Bayla Keyes.  Ms. Uranovsky performed in masterclasses for Pinchas Zuckerman, Aaron Rosand, Sylvia Rosenberg, William Preucil, Joseph Silverstein and Leon Spierer, among others.

Since her concert debut at the age of 15, she has appeared as soloist and in recital on both native and international stages with the Boston University, Cape Town, Richmondshire, University of Miami and Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama Symphony orchestras as well as the Cape Town Baroque Ensemble, among others.  She has been concertmaster of the Geminiani de Fallonica (Italy), Boston University, University of Miami and RSAMD Symphony orchestras and Assistant Concertmaster of the Cape Symphony Orchestra.  Ms. Uranovsky is a founding member and violinist of Boston’s music ensemble MONTAGE Music Society.   

Ms. Uranovsky can be heard on Montage Music Society’s “Starry Night Project” released on MSR Classics.  She has recorded and broadcasted for both the BBC and South African Broadcasting Corporation.  She performed regularly for Sir Yehudi Menuhin's "Live Music Now!" Scheme while in the United Kingdom and appeared as first violinist of the RSAMD Quartet in concert for HRH Prince Charles, HRH Princess Anne and at the church of St.-Martin-in-the-Fields.

She was the recipient of numerous awards from South Africa including the Ellie Marx Memorial and Du Toit van Tonder scholarships and was silver medalist and University of Natal Prize Winner at the SASOL Music Competition in 1995.  In 1998, she was awarded an Audrey Macklin Bursary from the Associated Board of Royal Schools of Music and won the prestigious Governors Recital Prize at the RSAMD and the Ian D. Watt and Dunbar Gerber Prizes for violin and piano duo.

An avid teacher, Ms. Uranovsky currently teaches on the applied music faculty at Tufts University, at the MIT Emerson Scholarship Program, and maintains a private teaching studio.  She can be heard performing regularly in groups around Boston including Boston Philharmonic, Boston Musica Viva, the Cantata Singers, Boston Modern Orchestra Project and the Boston Pops.

VIOLA

Zvi Carmeli

A graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music and the former Solo Violist of the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic, Zvi Carmeli performs through out the world as a violist simultaneously engaging in an intensive career as a conductor.
Carmeli has  performed as soloist with orchestras such as the European Community Chamber Orchestra,  Netherlands Radio Philharmonic, Philharmonia Gorzowa Poland, Concerto Soloists of Philadelphia, The Harmonices Mundi Orchetra Linz and the Salzburg Chamber Soloists.
He was the founder of the SoLaRe String Trio - 1st prize winner of the Netherlands Impresaariat Chamber Music competition,  performing extensively through out Europe and the U.S.A. in venues such as the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, the Herkules Hall Munich, the  92nd St. Y New York and the Herbst Theater in San Francisco.
Carmeli has Participated in chamber music festivals such as Festivo-Finland, Rosklide "Schubertiade"-Denmark, Prussia Cove-Engalnd,  Amadeo- Holland,  Ars Musica- Belgium, Moab-U.S.A, Emilia Romagna-Italy and Kfar Blum-Israel. He has collaborated in performance with Violinists Vadim Repin, Benjamin Schmid, Hagai Shaham, Nora Chastain and Rainer Honek, Cellists Robert Cohen, Paul Watkins and Yehuda Hannani, Violists Rivka Golani and Vladimir Mendelssohn, Pianists Homero Francesch , Enrico Pace and Gianluca Cascioli, and ensembles such as the Amsterdam chamber music society,  the Fine Arts Quartet, the Budapest Accademica Quartet, and the Mendelssohn Piano Trio Berlin.
Carmeli has recorded a variety of chamber music for  Divox, Edel Classics, Ottavo, Ars Nova, Kontrapunkt and the KAM Amsterdam Concertgebouw series, along with recordings for Dutch, Spanish, German, American and Israeli Radio and Television productions.
Carmeli is a teacher of  Viola and Chamber Music teacher at the Jerusalem Academy for  Music and Dance, and also holds a position as chamber music teacher and conductor at the Universität der Künste (UDK) - Julius Stern Institute, Berlin. He regularly gives master classes at courses such as the Lenk Sommer Academie - Switzerland,  "Stage" -Spain, "Musica Mundi" - Belgium, "Peter de Groot" - Holland, "Viersener musiksommer" and "Holzhausen musiktagen"- Germany and the Jerusalem Music Center Summer Courses and "Itchak Perlman Project" - Israel

VIOLONCELLO    

Michael Carrera

Cellist Michael Carrera has performed in the halls of New York, Paris, and London, and has been heard in radio performances on Germany’s MDR, France’s Radio 3, and National Public Radio. The latter includes appearances on Performance Toda y, amonge these a live broadcast of a musical and theatrical adventure, Bernardo’s Farewell . Dr. Carrera has performed solos and concerti with the Utah Symphony, Idaho Falls Symphony, East-West Music Festival Orchestra ( Germany), Manhattan Chamber Orchestra, and the Sutter Symphony Orchestra. He is currently the Artistic Director of the Juniper Chamber Music Festival in Utah. Since graduating from the Manhattan School of Music, he has performed over 400 concerts throughout the United States and Europe as a founding member of the Arcata String Quartet. The quartet made its Carnegie debut at the Weill Recital Hall in 2001 after finishing a two year contract with the Community Concerts Series that took them across the U.S. The quartet also played at London’s prestigious Wigmore Hall and received rave reviews for their performances at the Rheingau Music Festival in Wiesbaden, Germany.

Michael has played in numerous music festivals including the Grand Canyon Music Festival, the Bravo! Vail Valley Festival in Colorado, the Aspen Music Festival, the Park City International Music Festival, the Great Music West Festival, and the Flathead Music Festival in Montana. He has collaborated and performed with the Tokyo and Borromeo String Quartets, and members of the Guarneri, American, and Emerson String Quartets. Individual collaborations include Peter Rejto , Pamela Frank, Charles Castleman, Eugenia Zukerman, Gail Niwa, Kenneth Cooper, and Paul Colleti.

In world premiere performances, Michael has presented the works of Paul Chihara, Judith Shatin, David Noon, Nils Vigeland and William Campbell. As a member of the Arcata Quartet, Michael can be heard on a CD of works by Paul Chihara in Forever Escher , an octet with the Amherst Saxophone Quartet. The Arcata also performed the world premiere of Chihara’s Concerto for String Quartet and Orchestra, Kisses Sweeter than Wine, with the Utah Symphony and conductor Keith Lockhart. Other compact discs by the Arcata Quartet (all on the VOX label) include a recording of Borodin’s Quartet in A minor and Cello Quintet in F minor with David Geber. Additional Arcata Quartet releases include a recording of Respighi’s Quartetto Dorico (paired with the Tokyo Quartet’s recording of Il Tromonto with singer Renata Scoto) and a compact disc featuring Brahms’ Sextets with guests Kikuei Ideda and Peter Rejto.

Prior to joining the Ohio University faculty in 2002, Carrera served on the faculty at Utah State University as Artist-in-Residence from 1998-2002.

Michael performs on a cello made in Italy in the early 1720s by an unknown maker.

.Carol Ou

A versatile artist, cellist Carol Ou is known for her “fiery, marvelous” and “meltingly melodic outpourings” (Boston Globe) and her “wonderfully pure cello tone and incisive technique.” (The Strad Magazine)   Numerous solo and chamber music engagements have brought her to prestigious venues such as New York's Merkin Concert Hall, Boston’s Jordan Hall, the Gardner Museum, the National Concert Hall in Taipei, Taiwan’s Presidential Palace and the National Ukrainian Concert Hall in Kiev.  She has collaborated with artists such as Hillary Hahn, Timothy Eddy, Midori, András Schiff, and Malcolm Bilson at the Marlboro Music Festival, Summerfest La Jolla, Australian Festival of Chamber Music and other noted music festivals.  
At ease with the diverse classical musical styles of the last four centuries, Ms. Ou regularly programs traditional European masterworks with more eclectic works in concert.  She has recorded three of the most beloved cello concerti by Haydn, Tchaikovsky and Elgar and premiered several new compositions written for her.  She gave the first performance of Hsiao Tyzen's Cello Concerto in Taipei and premiered several solo cello works by this noted Taiwanese composer.  American composers such as Richard Toensing and the late Daniel Pinkham have also dedicated works to her.  Other unusual works that she has performed include Tan Dun's "Ghost Opera" for string quartet and pipa, and Peter Sculthorpe's string quartet with didjeridu.  
Recent performance highlights included an Argentina concerto debut with the Orchestra of the Teatro Argentino and a solo recital tour of Taiwan.  In 2009, she celebrated Pulitzer Prize composer, Yehudi Wyner's 80th birthday in Boston with a performance of his Prologue and Narrative for Cello and Orchestra.
A graduate of Yale University, Ms. Ou received her BA magna cum laude from Yale College and her master's and doctorate degrees in music performance from the Yale School of Music.  She has taught cello students at Yale and MIT, and was the director of strings, chamber music and orchestral studies at Gordon College.  She is currently on the cello and chamber music faculty at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston.  Since 2007, Ms. Ou has also been the chamber music director and coordinator of the Heifetz International Summer Music Institute in Wolfeboro, New Hampshire.  In addition to her regular teaching duties, Carol Ou has traveled extensively to give cello and chamber music masterclasses in Germany, Spain, Argentina, Ukraine, Australia, Taiwan, Canada, and throughout the US.
Ms. Ou's solo recordings are all issued by the Chi-Mei Foundation in Taiwan.  Her chamber music recordings of 20th century compositions can be found on the Naxos and CRI labels.  Her recording of Walter Piston's Chamber Music, issued by Naxos, won Chamber Music America's Best Chamber Music CD award in 2001.

Benjamin Whitcomb

Benjamin Whitcomb, cellist and music theorist, has earned a national reputation as a performer and teacher of music. An active recitalist and chamber musician, he performs more than thirty concerts a year. He appears regularly on the "Sunday Afternoon Live from the Chazen" concert series broadcast live on Wisconsin Public Radio. He collaborates with pianist Vincent de Vries in frequent recitals around the country and overseas, and he is a member of the Ancora String Quartet and the UW-Whitewater Piano Trio. He performs concertos with local orchestras, and he has also been a member of several orchestras in Texas and Wisconsin, including serving as Associate Principal Cello of the Madison Symphony and the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra. He has produced several CDs of his recordings, including his release of solo cello works by Bach and Gabrielli on the MSR Classics label.

Dr. Whitcomb is a frequent guest clinician and performer at high schools and summer camps, including the National String Workshop, and universities throughout the country. His book, The Advancing Cellist’s Handbook, has received rave reviews from the journals of ASTA and AUSTA. He is a contributing author to Sharpen Your String Technique and Teaching Music through Performance in Orchestra. He has published several articles on cello and on music theory, and has presented papers numerous national and international conferences as well. He is also a reviewer for the American String Teacher journal. He is past president of the Wisconsin Chapter of the American String Teachers’ Association, and currently serves as Secretary for the organization as a whole. Dr. Whitcomb served as chair of the instrumental faculty at the La Musica Lirica music festival in Nova Feltria, Italy, from 2004 to 2006.

Dr. Whitcomb is Associate Professor of Cello and Music Theory at the University of Wisconsin- Whitewater, where he has received recognition for his teaching, research, and service. Also at UW-Whitewater, he initiated and continues to coordinate the Theory/History Colloquium speaker series, the Musical Mosaics Faculty Concert Series, the Chancellor’s Quartet program, and the Summer String Camp. He is a graduate of the University of Texas at Austin and Oklahoma State University, and he has studied with Phyllis Young, George Neikrug, and Evan Tonsing.

PIANO

Sang Woo Kang

Cited by the Los Angeles Times as a “prodigiously talented pianist with great technical virtuosity and interpretive gifts,” pianist Sang Woo Kang has drawn attention as a captivating musician who thrills audiences with interpretive clarity and vision. He successfully balances an active performing career as a soloist and chamber musician with teaching at Providence College, where he is Assistant Professor of Music.

Dr. Kang made his orchestral debut with the Colorado Pueblo Symphony Orchestra at the age of 9, and accolades soon followed. He won top prizes at the Los Angeles Scholarship Competition, CSMTA competition, MTNA competition, and the Mozart Festival Young Artist International Competition, to mention a few. In 1999, Dr. Kang was awarded the Eastman Professional Fellowship, and as a result, was chosen to perform at the Moulin d’Ande Music Festival in France. He later made his solo recital debut at Concert Hall in St. Petersburg Conservatory, Russia.

A devoted teacher and educator, Dr. Kang has taught at Eastman School of Music, Juilliard School, SUNY Fredonia, University of Rochester, Hochstein School of Music in Rochester, NY, New England Music Camp, and Hartwick Summer Music Festival.  In 2005, as a result of his teaching accomplishments in undergraduate piano instruction, Eastman School of Music awarded him with the prize “excellence in teaching.” In 2009-2010, along with his concerts, Dr. Kang will be presenting master classes and workshops in Korea, Japan, Thailand, and Singapore.  He is founder and director of the summer piano institute and seminar at the Atlantic Music Festival, an intensive four week event dedicated to exploring all aspects of piano performance and pedagogy, as well as helping to promote and perform new works by American composers.

An active performer, Dr. Kang’s upcoming international recital performances include Yong Siew Toh Conservatory in Singapore, Sehjong Cultural Center in Korea, multiple venues in Japan, Mahidol Unversity in Thailand, and Moulin D’Ande Festival in Normandy, France. He will also be performing in Weill Hall at Carnegie Hall, Steinway Hall in NY, and at the Frederick Collection in Boston among other venues. As Artist in Residence at DUMBO Space in Brooklyn, New York, Dr. Kang recorded the clarinet sonatas by Brahms at the Curtis Institute. The album, titled “Appassionato e Amabile,” was released on the EMI label in 2007.

Dr. Kang is graduate of Juilliard School and the Eastman School of Music, where he received the Doctor of Music Arts degree. In his free time, Dr. Kang writes articles for Blogcritics.com, some of which featured on news outlets such as the Seattle Intelligenecer. He also mainzains a blog entitled "Music for Time´s Ending", which covers a variety of topics pertaining to music. Read it at http://sangwookang.wordpress.com.

Thomas Rosenkranz

Thomas Rosenkranz has performed on four continents and is in demand nationally and internationally as a soloist, chamber musician, and artist teacher. He is a recipient of the Classical Music Fellowship Award from the American Pianists Association. As a Cultural Ambassador sponsored by the U.S. Department of State, he often travels to North Africa and the Middle East promoting goodwill through his performances both in traditional classical music settings and with his longstanding collaborations with musicians from other cultures. In recent years he has performed in many of the major cities of  Asia, including Bangkok, Beijing, Chengdu, Dalian, Hong Kong, Jakarta, Shanghai and Tokyo. He has appeared as soloist with the Indianapolis Symphony, the National Orchestra of Beirut, and the Northwest Chamber Orchestra of Seattle.   In addition, He enjoys performing in remote regions of the world such as  Inner Mongolia, Tunisia and the islands of Bali and Boreno in Indonesia where classical concerts are rare.

In addition to his position as a member of the piano faculty at the College of Musical Arts at Bowling Green State University, he is in demand as a artist teacher.  He has been presented in master classes and extended residencies at the Shanghai Conservatory, Xinghai Conservatory, Hong Kong Baptist University, Tunghai University of Taiwan, Higher Institute of Musique Tunis, and the Oberlin Conservatory of Music. He  is a member of the summer faculty at the  Soundscape Festival in Italy which celebrates the work of emerging composers through commissions and premiere performances. He was recently a visiting professor of piano at the Sichuan Conservatory of Music in China  where he was presented in a series of masterclasses, lectures, and concerts and was invited to serve as a jury member for the Shanghai Young Artist Competition. 

Dr. Rosenkranz completed an undergraduate degree at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music where he studied with Robert Shannon and earned graduate degrees at the Eastman School of Music (MM, DMA), where he studied with and was a teaching assistant to Nelita True. On behalf of the Presser Foundation of Music, he studied with Yvonne Loriod-Messiaen in Paris as one of her last students.

Elena Rossman

Elena Rossman is a well known and widely respected classical music piano teacher and supporter of extraordinarily gifted classical musicians from around the world. Mrs. Rossman studied piano in the former Soviet Union under the leadership of Viktor Afanasiev- a pupil of Professor Heinrich Neuhaus  of the Moscow Conservatory.

Mrs. Rossman received her instructions at the Alma-Aty and Moscow conservatories and her masters degree from the Alma-Aty conservatory. Mrs. Rossman's students have achieved national and international success and have gone on to win competitions and become successful professional musicians. Her students have attained degrees from the Julliard School (USA), Moscow Conservatory (Russia), Royal Academy of Music (UK), and other leading international music institutions.

Mrs. Rossman has presented master classes throughout the world. She has conducted master classes in the US, Japan, Sweden, Russia and Canada.

Mrs. Rossman supports extraordinarily talented young musicians in her capacity as President of AADGT, www.aadgt.org, (The American Association for Development of the Gifted and Talented Inc.), a New York-based non-profit organization.

She has built a consistent track record of recognizing and working with gifted talented musicians at early musical development stages. Leading classical musicians and educators such as, Martha Argeritch, Evgeny Kissin and Maxim Vengerov, professor Lev Naumov, professor Anna Kantor have praised Elena Rossman's ability and achievement to identify early-on, and support young talented artists.
To date, Mrs. Rossman has worked with several young musicians who have subsequently become or are becoming successful classical music professionals.

Among talented musicians whom Elena Rossman and AADGT have supported from an early stage are

Ilya Itin  (Gold Winner of the Leeds Piano Competition, 1996)), Shohei Sekimoto, (4th Prize of 15th International Chopin Competition, 2005), Nobuyuki Tsujii, (Gold medal Winner of the Van Cliburn Competition, 2009), Aimi Kobayashi, who has just released her first EMI CD at the age of 14, and many others.

Mykola Suk

“An astonishing blend of muscular power, poetry and utter control he will prove to be one of the more formidable talents to have appeared in this country in years”(American Record Guide).  

This statement resonates with truth for the Ukrainian-American pianist, Mykola Suk, who gained international recognition as the winner of the First Prize and Gold Medal at the 1971 International Liszt-Bartok Competition in Budapest, Hungary. His international career has spanned four continents, performing in the most prestigious venues from the Great Hall of Moscow Conservatory to Carnegie Hall in New York. “...enormous digital control... such an impressive technique was so completely subsumed in the task of musical characterization. Suk never used the piano to show off; he made it the servant of Liszt’s expressive ideas”(Toronto Star).
Mr. Suk has appeared as soloist with numerous leading orchestras, from the Russian National Symphony under Mikhail Pletnev to the Beethoven Orchestra Bonn under Roman Kofman. He has collaborated artistically with the world’s outstanding conductors, among them Charles Bruck, Janos Ferencik, Arvid Jansons, Stefan Turchak, James DePreist and Carl St. Clair.  Mr. Suk’s interviews, live performances, and CD recording have been broadcast throughout the United States, Canada, Europe and Asia on prominent radio stations and broadcast systems.
Since his first public appearance at age eight, Mykola Suk has given recitals world-wide in the countries of the former Soviet Union, France, Germany, England, Finland, Egypt, Mexico, United States, Canada, Korea, China, Mongolia and Australia. The European Piano Teacher’s Journal wrote that Mykola Suk is “..surely the most towering and volcanic talent to have come out of Russia since Anton Rubinstein.” Suk’s passion for chamber music has brought him to many distinguished chamber music festivals and collaborations throughout the world, among them, the Kuhmo Chamber Music Festival (Finland), Australian Festival of Chamber Music, Kiev International Music Festival (Ukraine) and International Keyboard Institute and Festival in New York.
Mr. Suk is an avid believer in 20th and 21st century piano literature. He was honored to premiere numerous works, especially by Ukrainian composers such as Valentin Silverstrov, Ivan Karabyts and Myroslav Skoryk. Most of the compositions were composed for, dedicated to, or commissioned by Suk.
Mykola Suk completed his Doctor of Musical Arts Degree in Piano Performance at the Moscow State Conservatory, studying with Lev Vlasenko. He also holds a combined Bachelor/Master of Music Degree in Piano Performance, Pedagogy and Chamber Music from the Moscow State Conservatory. Before coming to the United States he served as professor of Piano at the Kiev State Conservatory and Moscow State Conservatory.
Mykola Suk has given master classes at many festivals and music schools around the world. He has taught as an adjunct faculty member at various music schools such as the New England Conservatory, Manhattan School of Music (NY), Columbia University (NY), and the University of Southern Alabama. In 2001, Mr. Suk settled in Las Vegas, Nevada, taking responsibility for keyboard studies at the Music Department of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
Mr. Suk has recorded to high acclaim for the Melodia (Russia), Russian Disc, Hungaraton, Meldac/Tritan (Japan) and Troppe Note/Cambria, Music & Arts (USA) labels.

  Sylvia Wang

Dr. Wang enjoys a varied career, both in performance and education. In addition to her work with a wide range of solo repertoire, she continues to collaborate with many artists across the U.S. and in Europe, with additional performances in Southeast Asia, Central America, Argentina and Australia. Sample performance venues include the Phillips Collection in Washington, D.C., Teatro Nacional in San Jose, Costa Rica, London’s South Bank , St. Martin-in-the-Fields and St. James’ Palace, and Cleveland’s Reinberger Hall at Severance.

A dedicated teacher and chamber music coach, she currently serves as Associate Professor at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, after 3 years as Assistant Professor at the University of Iowa in Iowa City. Her students have gone on to win prizes and awards at competitions such as the Tokyo International Piano Duo Competition, the New York Concert Artists Guild, the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition, the Shostakovich Piano Competition in St. Petersburg, Russia, the Frina Auerbach International Competition.

Job placements include teaching and accompanying positions at University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA), Cleveland Institute of Music, the Chicago Symphony Chorus and Rice University. Performances of her students have included such venues as Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie in New York City and the Rising Stars series of the Ravinia Steans Institute in Chicago.

She has also served as guest teacher, presenter, adjudicator and panelist under the auspices of institutions and organizations such as the United States Information Service, the Music Teachers National Association and National Conference on Piano Pedagogy in the U.S., Yamaha Music Malaysia, the Centre for Young Musicians in London, the Chautauqua Institution in New York and at Edith Cowan University, Western Australia Music Teachers Association and the Sydney Conservatorium of Music.

 In 2007, she served on the selection jury for the William Kapell International Piano Competition. In 2008, she returned to Western Australia to serve as chief adjudicator for the Western Australia Pianists' Competition.

Ms. Wang’s recording of the piano trios of Aaron Copland, Paul Schoenfield, David Baker and Leon Kirchner may be heard on the Newport Classic label, as a member of the Samaris Piano Trio. Other recordings include music for oboe and piano on Boston Records with oboist Nancy Ambrose King, solo piano music of Debussy on Cadenza Classics, music for piano trio by P.Q. Phan on CRI, and for piano four hands by Kamran Ince on Northeastern. She has also collaborated with Nancy Ambrose King in a release on Block M records for iTunes.

In recognition of “distinction in the field,” the Royal Academy of Music in London awarded Dr. Wang an Honorary Associateship (Hon. A.R.A.M.). She has also received citations in "Who's  Who" in American Education as well as American Women 

HARP

Ina Zdorovetchi

Hailed as "hypnotizing", Ina Zdorovetchi has established a reputation as one of the leading harpists of her generation. While championing major traditional works, she has continually treated her audiences to new and innovative repertoire, using her particular interest in new music to promote awareness about the harp and collaborating with composers on several works written for her, including “... bisbigliando...”, a Harp Concerto by Thomas Oboe Lee and "after Kandinsky", a Double Concerto for Cello and Harp by Geoffrey Gordon.

Highlights include appearances as soloist with the symphony orchestras of Jerusalem, Haifa, Brockton, Boston Modern Orchestra Project, Moldova National Radio Orchestra, Moldova National Philharmonic, the chamber orchestras of Seattle, Boston University, Bucharest University and the Republic of Moldova; chamber music collaborations with members of the New York Philharmonic, Boston Symphony, Israel Philharmonic, Cincinnati Symphony, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Orchestre National de France, Academy of Saint Martin in the Fields, Dawn Upshaw, Osvaldo Golijov, David Krakauer and Nathalie Merchant in Carnegie Hall, Jordan Hall and other venues. Most recently, she was featured in recital at the 2011 World Harp Congress (Vancouver, Canada) and as one of the soloists in the Concerto Gala Concert of the 2010 American Harp Society National Conference, sharing the evening with legendary harpists Jana Bouskova and Alice Giles.

Ina Zdorovetchi is the recipient of a number of awards, including Second Prize (Ist Prize not awarded), Chamber Music Prize and Propes Prize at the 17th International Harp Contest in Israel, First Prize at the Bucharest International Competition, Second Prize at the Paris International Harp Competition, "Outstanding Achievement in Chamber Music" Award from the Fischoff National Competition, "Henry Cabot Award for extraordinary commitment of talent" from the Boston Symphony Orchestra Players’ Committee and other honors.

Her debut solo album "Un Sospiro", released in 2010, demonstrates her interest in both original works and transcriptions and celebrates composers past and contemporary. Additionally, she has recorded solo, chamber music and orchestral repertoire for Sony, Naxos, Albany Records, BMOP/Sound, Boston Symphony, and has sustained live concertos, recitals, interviews and broadcasts on WGBH Radio-Boston, Israel  Broadcasting Authority and Moldova National TV.

Currently, Ina Zdorovetchi is the principal harpist with Boston Lyric Opera, Boston Pops Esplanade Orchestra, Opera Boston, Boston Modern Orchestra Project and is on the faculty at Boston Conservatory, Wellesley College and New England Conservatory Pre-College. Her students have been featured in performances at the World Harp Congress and won several top competition prizes. Other teaching engagements include invitations to Brevard, Vianden and Saarburg International Festivals, masterclasses at Indiana University (South Bend), American Harp Society Chapters in Washington (DC). Syracuse (NY), Los Angeles (CA) and Bolivar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela.

Additionallty, she is the founder and artistic director the Boston Harp Festival, an elected member of Pi Kappa Lambda - The National Music Honor Society, past-president of the American Harp Society Boston Chapter and the bearer of USA's "Alien with Extraordinary Abilities in the Arts" title.

Ina Zdorovetchi holds degrees from New England Conservatory (Performance Diploma), Boston University (Master of Music), The Boston Conservatory (Bachelor of Music, Summa Cum Laude) and is an alumna of the Tanglewood Music Center (2003 and 2004). Prior to moving to the USA, she studied at Bucharest Academy of Music (Romania), and "C. Porumbescu" Lyceum of Music in her native Chisinau, Moldova, completing a double major in piano and harp. Her main harp teachers are Ann Hobson Pilot, Cynthia Price-Glynn, Ion Ivan-Roncea and Ana Mahonina and, for 10 years, she was mentored by piano professor Larisa Jar.

.VOICE  

Roberet Barefield

Baritone Robert Barefield has performed as soloist with organizations throughout the United States and in Europe, including the New Orleans Opera, the Mississippi Symphony, the Arizona Opera, the Dorian Opera Theatre, the Central City Opera, the Ohio Light Opera and Operafestival di Roma in Italy. Operatic roles have included Don Giovanni, Danilo in The Merry Widow, Figaro in Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Sid in Albert Herring, Eisenstein in Die Fledermaus, the title role in Gianni Schicchi and John Proctor in Robert Ward’s The Crucible. As an oratorio soloist, Barefield’s performances have included Carmina Burana, the Fauré Requiem, The Sea Symphony and Dona Nobis Pacem of Vaughan Williams and Handel’s Messiah. An accomplished recitalist, Robert Barefield’s wide-ranging repertoire has encompassed works such as Schubert’s Winterreise and Die Schöne Müllerin,  Vaughan Williams’ Songs of Travel and premiere performances of works by contemporary composers such as Simon Sargon, Lowell Liebermann, Robert Maggio and David Conte. His European recital performances have included venues in Austria, Germany and Spain. In 2008, Barefield performed the role of Bishop Zumarraga in the world premiere of James DeMars' opera, Guadalupe - Our Lady of the Roses. These performances were recorded and released on CD by Canyon Records.  Two Plus One, Barefield’s CD of art song duets (with soprano Carole FitzPatrick and pianist Eckart Sellheim) was recently released by Cavailli Records of Bamberg, Germany.   He has made presentations at national conferences of leading music organizations and his articles on voice-related topics have appeared in The Journal of Singing, The American Music Teacher, and The Music Educator’s Journal. Barefield received the Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, where he was a Corbett Opera Scholar.  He recently joined the voice faculty at the Hartt School in Connecticut after having served on music faculties at Arizona State University, West Chester University and others. His current and former voice students are active as performers and educators throughout the country.

Anne DeLAuney

Anne DeLaunay is a dramatic soprano whose voice has been described as “...exquisite, with perfect control, beautiful lyrical passages and others of tremendous dramatic power.” Dr. De Launay  was soprano soloist in the Verdi Manzoni Requiem with the Longmont Symphony Orchestra in Longmont, Colorado, and performed this work again in 1995 in Kansas City. She performed the premiere of an opera written for her at the 36th Festival of Contemporary Music in Baton Rouge, Louisiana and has presented a concert for the Public Broadcasting System in New Mexico. She performed in recital and concert throughout the United States. Her opera roles included Amelia in Un Ballo in Maschera, Brünnhilde in Siegfried, and Turandot in Turandot. She specialized in recitals, enjoying the intimacy of art song.  In addition to her performing experience, Dr. De Launay has served as director of the opera workshops at Oklahoma State University and New Mexico State University, producing such works as The Music Man, Godspell, La Bohème and The Old Maid and the Thief as well as directing, stage managing and costuming a number of productions. She was administrator of the opera program at the University of Missouri-Kansas City from 1991-93 and served as artistic director of the Civic Opera Theater of Kansas City in 1994, overseeing the productions of The Barber of Seville and Suor Angelica/The Telephone. She has won several awards including the Puccini Foundation Award and the Bagby Foundation Award and was named outstanding Wagnerian singer in 1989 by the Wagner Society of New York. She is listed in the 1996-1997 Who’s Who Among America’s Teachers. In 1994 she was invited to serve as vocal consultant with Ann Summers International Artist Management in Italy and in 1995 she was the recipient of the coveted Excellence in Teaching Award at the UMKC Conservatory.

Since 2000, she has concentrated on teaching.  Her students have won many prestigious competitions and apprenticeships including Merola Young Artist Program, Santa Fe Opera, Sarasota Opera, Central City Opera, and Des Moines Metro Opera,  and have performed in major opera houses throughout the world including the Metropolitan Opera, New York City Opera, and San Francisco Opera as well as opera companies in Switzerland, Austria, Germany, France, Spain, the former Yugoslavia and at La Scala in Milan, Italy and in 2012 the Dresden Young Artist Program and in 2012 Opéra de Lile in  Lile, France  De Launay earned her doctor of musical arts degree in 1983 and has maintained a private professional studio in New York City since 1986. Currently, she is an associate professor at UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance.

Daniel Ebbers

An Assistant Professor of Voice, Mr. Ebbers joined the faculty of the University of the Pacific in fall 0f 2004.  He holds the B.M. from University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point the M.M. from University of Southern California.  In the Conservatory of Music, Professor Ebbers teaches vocal performance and is Managing Director and Instructor at the Pacific Opera Institute

Daniel Ebbers appeared last season with Sacramento Opera as Cassio in Verdi’s Otello.  Other recent engagements include Count Almaviva in The Barber of Seville, and Fenton in Nicolai’s The Merry Wives of Windsor.  In concert Mr. Ebbers has appeared with the prestigious Music in the Vineyards Festival, the Stockton Chorale in Mendelssohn’s Elijah, the Napa Valley Chorale singing Dvorak’s Mass in D, in addition to Mozart’s C minor Mass.  In research and performance, Mr. Ebbers is regarded as expert in the music of Benjamin Britten.  He recently appeared in the title role of St. Nicholas in Britten’s tour de force cantata for tenor, orchestra and choir, in addition to performing the great masterpiece Serenade for Tenor Horn and Strings with the Bear Valley Music Festival.  He will reprise the Serenade with the St. John’s Chamber orchestra in 2010.

Highlights of Daniel Ebbers' performances include a critically acclaimed appearance as Sir Bedivere with baritone, Thomas Hampson at the Washington National Cathedral, in Elinor Remick Warren's The Legend of King Arthur.  As an artist in residence with the Los Angeles Opera, Mr. Ebbers has performed as Gastone in La Traviata, and covered leading roles including Don Ottavio, Albert Herring, Lysander in A Midsummer Night's Dream, Ernesto, and Lindoro in L'Italiana in Algeri.  An accomplished concert artist, he has appeared with Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony performing Stravinsky's Mass, and has appeared twice at both Carnegie Hall and Avery Fisher Hall.  Mr. Ebbers has performed at both Chicago's new Orchestra Hall and the Chicago Lyric Opera in Handel's Messiah.  A distinguished Mozart interpreter, he has appeared as Don Ottavio with Opera Theater of Connecticut, Belmonte in San Diego Comic Opera's production of Abduction from the Seraglio, as tenor soloist in Mozart's Requiem, at the Ruldophinum in Prague.  Other mainstay roles have been the Duke of Mantua in Anchorage Opera's production of Rigoletto, Cassio in Otello, with Greensboro Opera, and with the San Diego Comic Opera as Prince Edwin in their production of The Gypsy Princess.

In addition to his resident program with LA Opera, Mr. Ebbers has been an apprentice with Utah Festival Opera Young Artist Program, Glimmerglass Opera Young American Artists Program, Britten-Pears School for Advanced Musical Studies, and two summers with the Music Academy of the West.  Among his regional engagements, he has appeared as a principal artist with San Luis Obispo Mozart Festival, Utah Festival Opera, Glimmerglass Opera, Fairbanks Symphony, and the Sanibel Music Festival. Mr. Ebbers toured the United States as tenor soloist in Richard Einhorn's oratorio Voices of Light-The Passion of Joan of Arc.  During this tour he appeared as guest soloist with the National Symphony Orchestra at Wolftrap, the Los Angles Mozart Orchestra, the Charleston Concert Association and the Brooklyn Academy of Music.

Carol FitzPatrick

Carole FitzPatrick is an Assistant Professor of Voice at Arizona State University’s Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts School of Music.  She began her professional opera career with engagements in  Dortmund and Osnabrück, Germany, and then joined the ensemble of the State Theater in Nuremberg. Her extensive opera repertoire during her 17 years in Germany included Mozart, Verdi, Puccini, Strauss and Wagner, having sung over 60 major roles in German opera houses, including Hannover, Mannheim, Duesseldorf, Essen and Berlin. Her concert work has been extensive as well, including concert tours in France and Spain, and performances in Finland, Austria, Holland, the Czech Republic, Luxemburg, and Russia.  At its inception, Ms. FitzPatrick was a vocal advisor for the Nuremberg State Theater’s Opera Studio for Young Singers, giving both master classes and private voice lessons to the participants. She was selected by the City of Osnabrück as “Citizen of the Year” and was named by the professional magazine OpernWelt as one of its “Singer of the Year” candidates. In 2005 she participated in the premiere performance of Wagner’s Ring des Nibelungen in Beijing, and in 2006 sang “Donna Anna” in Don Giovanni in Hong Kong.  Recent performances include appearances with the Chicago Chamber Musicians, Arizona State Lyric Opera Theater and Symphony Orchestra, Prager Sinfoniker, the Austin Chamber Music Society, and the Berliner Cappella. In 2008, she created the role of “La Malinche” in the world premiere of James DeMars’ opera Guadalupe, Our Lady of the Roses, which was recorded and released by Canyon Records.  Ms. FitzPatrick can also be heard on the just-released CD “Two Plus One,” a collection of art song duets with colleagues Robert Barefield and Eckart Sellheim.  She received her bachelor’s degree from the University of Texas at Austin, and two master’s degrees from the Yale University School of Music.

Dorothy Stone

Dorothy Stone is one of the leading performing artist/teachers in the world today.

Ms. Stone has taught and performed in opera, operetta, musical theatre and recital throughout the United States, Europe and South America.  In demand as both active performer and master teacher, she combines her unique and holistic style of teaching with a broad knowledge of vocal repertoire, encompassing a large variety of musical styles.

Her passion for encouraging and facilitating the artistic growth of others focuses on the individual, developing the connections between functional vocal technique, repertoire interpretation and traditional stagecraft.  She has traveled extensively to coach singers throughout the United States, France, Switzerland, Canada, England, Hungary, Bulgaria, Russia, Germany, Greece, Chile, Uruguay and Argentina.

As an adjunct professor at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, where she taught for eight years, she authored and developed two specialized curriculums; “Singing for the Actor” and “Acting for the Singer”.   In addition, she developed the studio program course curriculum “Singing for the Actor” at the American Musical and Dramatic Academy (AMDA) in New York City, where she was on the faculty for nine years.

In 2003 Ms. Stone founded the CAMPO DORO VOCAL INSTITUTE in North Eastern Pennsylvania. The Campo Doro program is designed to give singers an opportunity to immerse themselves in intense vocal and repertoire study in a supportive, non-competitive environment.  Ms. Stone has taken the core curriculum of Campo Doro and offered courses to singers in Paris, Budapest, Toronto, Frankfurt and Geneva.  Campo Doro Alumni, as well as numerous private students of Ms. Stone have gone on to careers performing both principal and ensemble roles in Opera and Concert, on Broadway and National Tours and International Productions of Broadway shows.

As a performer, Ms. Stone has earned critical acclaim on three continents for her interpretations of the leading roles in Verdi’s “Aida”, “Il Trovatore” “Otello” and “Un Ballo in Maschera,” as well as the soprano solo in his “Requiem”, both in the US and with the Bulgarian National Radio Orchestra.  In addition to singing the major Verdi Heroines, she has also performed leading roles in “La Boheme”, “Carmen”, “Norma”, “The Dialogues of the Carmelites”, “The Rape of Lucretia”, “The Merry Widow”, “Die Fledermaus”, “The Marriage of Figaro”, “The Magic Flute” and “Hansel & Gretel”.  Her musical theatre roles have included the Mother Abbess in “The Sound of Music”, Queen Aggravain in “Once Upon a Mattress”, Katisha in “The Mikado” and Ruth in “The Pirates of Penzance”.  While living in Paris, Ms. Stone was the American representative to the International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, Russia and was awarded special commendation in Foreign Language.She was also the only artist to be awarded the AROP Foundation Career Grant from the Paris Opera two years in a row, and under their auspices, studied the lyric repertoire with legendary Soprano, Regine Crespin.  She has performed more than 30 solo recitals, including appearances at Los Angeles’ Steinway Hall, Moscow’s Tchaikovsky Hall, New York’s Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall and at the Museo Fernando Blanco in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

She studied voice and vocal pedagogy for 24 years with the late Bel Canto Master Cornelius L. Reid, and is currently developing a comprehensive synthesis of their combined pedagogy for interactive media productions. In addition, Ms. Stone studied orchestral conducting with Maestro Vincent LaSelva at the Juilliard School in New York City.  Ms. Stone divides her time between New York City, where she maintains a very successful private voice studio,  Campo Doro in Pennsylvania and Europe.

  FLUTE

Bradley Garner

Bradley Garner is an active soloist, teacher and recording artist in the Cincinnati and New York City areas. He has frequently played with the New York Philharmonic and the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra and was Principal Flutist with the Atlantic Sinfonietta, the New York Virtuosi and the Virtuosi Quintet. He was the first flutist to receive a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from The Julliard School. where he studied with Julius Baker. He has performed as soloist in Carnegie Hall with Julius Baker and Jean-Pierre Rampal and was recently the first American flutist to be invited by the Russian Government to perform in Moscow's Tschaikovsky Hall. He has performed and given masterclasses in Korea, Japan, Taiwan. Thailand, Russia, Europe, Canada and throughout the United States.

Dr. Garner is on the faculties of the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, The Julliard School and Queens College. Renowned as a superb teacher, his students have won prizes in many international  competitions including the Jena-Pierre Rampal Concours, Flute Talk Competition, Myrna Brown Competition, the International DeLorenzo Competition in Italy and National Flute Association High School, Orchestral, Piccolo, Young Artist and Master Class competitions.

A Yamaha performing artist and clinician, he has recorded for the Yamaha, Koch International, Capstone, EMI, Golden Crest, Newport Classics, Vienna Modern Masters and Collins Classics labels. His other passion is golf.

 OBOE

Dwight  Parry

Dwight Parry is in his fourth season as the principal oboist of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra.  In 2006-2007, he held the same position with the San Diego Symphony and before that he was a fellow in the New World Symphony under the direction of Michael Tilson Thomas.  He has performed as guest principal oboist with the New York Philharmonic, the Atlanta Symphony, the Los Angeles Opera, and the Deutsche Symphonie of Berlin.  Originally from Ventura, CA, he found a passion for music studying piano, voice, and jazz saxophone, but it was not until his sophomore year of high school that he started playing the oboe.  Mr. Parry got his Bachelor’s degree at the University of Southern California, studying with Allan Vogel and his Masters degree from the Cleveland Institute of Music, studying with John Mack.

Though passionate about the symphony orchestra, Mr. Parry especially enjoys performing as a soloist, both with orchestra and in recital.  Concerto appearances have included the works of Mozart, Strauss, Haydn, Bach, Albinoni, Barber, Marcello and Vaughn-Williams.  As an advocate of contemporary music, he has participated in numerous premieres including those of six new works featuring the oboe, all of which were written expressly for him by different composers. He is currently a member of the ground-breaking, Cincinnati-based chamber group Concert:Nova and is a founding member of the Entheon Quartet, which is dedicated to exploring and expanding the repertoire for oboe and string trio.  Mr. Parry serves as adjunct faculty at the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music and Northern Kentucky University and also maintains a private teaching studio.

CLARINET

 Caroline Hartig

 An acclaimed clarinet soloist and recording artist, CAROLINE HARTIG has performed throughout the United States, Europe, and Asia and has appeared with orchestras and contemporary-music ensembles in major concert halls in New York City, including Carnegie Hall, Weill Recital Hall (where she made her solo debut), Merkin Concert Hall, and the Fritz Reiner Center for Contemporary Music and Symphony Hall (Boston). She has performed as a guest artist for the International Clarinet Association and has been heard on National Public Radio’s Morning Edition. She may be heard on the compact disc Clarinet Brilliante (Centaur Records 2572) honored as a “Critics’ Choice” by the American Record Guide stating; “Hartig dazzles with numbing, blazing fluidity and rich, luxuriant fervor…coiled virtuosity.” In an   Overview of Woodwind Recordings, ARG cited Clarinet Brilliante as one of the “best of the best” for the performance of clarinet recital literature: “For some sweet-sounding barnburners, Caroline Hartig weaves a spellbinding recital.” Also selected as “Editor’s Choice” by Clarinet & Saxophone Magazine of Great Britain, Hartig’s artistry is described as “positively breathtaking in its scope and performance.” Her compact disc Clarinet Brilliante II (Centaur 2808) was praised by American Record Guide noting, “The playing is mastery itself…

         Widely recognized and sought after for numerous new-music collaborations, Hartig has premiered and performed solo clarinet works by leading contemporary composers including Pulitzer-Prize winners William Bolcom and Donald Martino. She can be heard on the compact disc Dancing Solo (Innova 512) featuring the solo and chamber clarinet works of composer Libby Larsen. “It is in Dancing Solo that Ms. Hartig really demonstrates her musicality and prodigious technique…simply virtuosic”(The Clarinet). Additional collaborations with Larsen include the world premiere of “Bally Deux”; a jazz/classical hybrid double concerto composed for Hartig and renowned jazz clarinetist Eddie Daniels for the International ClarinetFest premiered in New Orleans.  Recent residencies include a recording residency at the Banff Centre for the Arts, in Banff, Alberta, Canada where Hartig recorded her newest compact disc, Chalumeau (Centaur 2965). Scheduled for release in 2009, Chalumeau is comprised of benchmark contemporary unaccompanied solo clarinet works including Bolcom’s “Chalumeau” commissioned and premiered by Hartig in Tokyo, Japan.

         In demand as a master teacher and clinician Hartig has served as a juror for performance competitions including the International Clarinet Association Young Artist Competition, has been a guest clinician at the International Midwest Band and Orchestra Conference and is on the clarinet faculty for Interlochen Center for the Arts, All-State Orchestra. Hartig is currently Professor of Clarinet at Michigan State University and a faculty leader for clarinet master classes at the Centro Studi Carlo della Giacoma in Todi, Italy. Major teachers and career mentors have included the late Harold Wright, Principal clarinet, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Charles Neidich, renowned international soloist and professor at Juilliard and Manhattan, Michele Zukovsky, Principal Los Angeles Philharmonic and Robert Marcellus . Hartig is a Buffet Crampon artist and performs on the Buffet Festival clarinet. For more information visit www.CarolineHartig.com

BASSOON

Michael Burns

Michael Burns is Professor of bassoon at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, and is a Yamaha Performing Artist. He has recorded for the Centaur, CAP, Telarc, EMI, Klavier, and Mark labels and his solo CD Primavera: Music for Bassoon and Piano by Bassoonists was recently released to critical acclaim on the Mark Masters label. He currently is an active performer as a soloist, in chamber groups, and orchestrally with numerous recent performances at International Double Reed Society conventions, recitals and masterclasses throughout North America, Germany, China and the South Pacific. He serves as principal bassoon with the Asheville Symphony, the Opera Company of North Carolina, and the Carolina Ballet and as bassoonist in the EastWind Ensemble, the Blue Mountain Ensemble, and Forecast Music. He also performs regularly with the North Carolina, and Greensboro Symphonies and as a guest with the Ciompi Quartet and Mallarme Chamber Players. In summers, Burns has been associated with the Eastern Music Festival and the Bands of America Summer Symposium.

Prior to his current positions, Burns performed in numerous professional orchestras including the Cincinnati and New Zealand Symphony Orchestras, the Indianapolis Chamber Orchestra, and he held Principal positions with the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra under Keith Lockhart, and the Midland/Odessa, Richmond and Abilene Symphonies.  He has taught at the Cincinnati College-Conservatory, Indiana State University, Midland College, and a variety of summer festivals and schools. Burns holds the B.M. degree from the Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand, the M.M. from the New England Conservatory, and the D.M.A. from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music.

Burns is also an active composer with many of his pieces being published by TrevCo Music and Potenza Music and frequently performed throughout the country and internationally. He has published articles and reviews in the Double Reed (the journal of the International Double Reed Society), the Texas Bandmasters’ Association Journal, the NC Music Educator for which he served as Woodwind Notes Editor, 1995-2007, Notes and on the Yamaha Educator Series online. His mentors include William Winstead, Sherman Walt, Leonard Sharrow, Sidney Rosenberg, and Colin Hemmingsen. He is archivist for the International Double Reed Society. For more information please visit: www.michaelburnsbassoon.com

 Francine Peterson

Francine Peterson, bassoonist, enjoys a varied career as performer, educator and adjudicator around the Puget Sound area.  Francine is principal bassoonist of the Northwest Sinforietta and the Bellevue Philharmonic and she regularly performs with the Pacific Northwest Ballet Orchestra, the Auburn symphony, Seattle Symphony and the Fifht Avenue Theater.  She maintains a large private studio in addition to serving on the faculties of Pacific Lutheran University, Western Washington University and Seattle Pacific University.  Ms. Peterson is a member of the faculty wind quintet, Camus, at Pacific Lutheran University.  Committed to education at all age levels, Ms. Peterson has been on the Seattle Youth Symphony Marrowstone summer music since 1990, as well as a coach for the Seattle Junior and Youth Symphony as well as the Cascade Youth Symphony.

FRENCH HORN

Thomas Bacon

Thomas Bacon's work in the United States, Europe, South America and Asia has placed him in the highest echelon of brass players worldwide today. He has held principal horn positions with the Syracuse Symphony, Detroit Symphony, Houston Symphony and the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestras. He has also performed in guest principal positions with the Berlin Philharmonic, Berlin Opera, Pittsburgh Symphony, Milwaukee Symphony, Chicago Symphony, Phoenix Symphony, Fort Worth Symphony, and many other orchestras.
As soloist he has performed in Europe, Africa, Asia, North and South America, and been soloist on international tours with the Amati Ensemble, the Berlin Radio Orchestra, and Mikhail Baryshnikov's White Oak Dance Project. He has performed concertos with over a hundred orchestras and bands across the United States, and been guest artist at major music festivals throughout the world.
Thomas Bacon is a subject in the book "Twentieth Century Brass Soloists" by Michael Meckna, (Greenwood Press, 1994). The book profiles ninety-nine of the world's most outstanding soloists on all brass instruments in the Twentieth Century, from trombonist Arthur Pryor (1870-1942) to trumpeter Wynton Marsalis (b. 1961), along with other greats: Doc Severinsen, Glenn Miller, Louis Armstrong, Maurice André, Barry Tuckwell, Dennis Brain, and Philip Farkas.
Mr. Bacon records and concertizes in recital, chamber and orchestral engagements, with over one hundred performances annually. Recent tours have taken him to Japan, Hong Kong, France, Germany, Sweden, Switzerland, Italy, Mexico, Canada and across the U.S. He is a founding member and vice president of Summit Brass, America's Premier Large Brass Ensemble, and is also a member of the St. Louis Brass Quintet, The Golden Horn, and Opus 90.
Over sixty new pieces have been written for him by different composers, from dramatic theater pieces and children's pieces, to avant garde chamber works, and pieces for horn ensembles. Reaching out to music lovers of all ages, his audiences are enchanted with drama, humor, virtuosity, musicianship and a stage presence that captivates. Thomas Bacon is in the vanguard of artists who are changing the face of classical music, successfully appealing to a broader audience.
Bacon has made eleven solo recordings, and dozens of other discs for Pro Arte, London, RCA, Motown, Telarc, Crystal, Centaur, CBS, Gasparo, Vanguard, A & M, New World, and Summit Records. He is also editor of The Complete Hornist for Southern Music Co., a series of music for horn.
Prof. Bacon has served on the faculties of Arizona State University, Rice University, Syracuse University, and Oakland University; and he has given master classes and clinics at hundreds of universities and colleges around the world.
Thomas Bacon is a Yamaha Performing Artist.

 Simon Pettite

Simon Pettite was born in  Great Britain. After studying at Cambridge University for a degree in Music, he went on to advanced training as a conductor and repetiteur at the International Opera School at the Royal College of Music in London.

Following these studies he was offered the highly sought-after position of Trainee Repetiteur at the English National Opera, and subsequently, a long-standing collaboration with the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden developed, where he was a regular member of the music staff.

As a guest Conductor and Chorus Director he appeared regularly at Opera North, Leeds; the Icelandic Opera, Reykjavik and the Royal Flemish Opera, Antwerp.

After conducting at the Herrnsheimer Schlossfestspiele in 1994, Simon Pettite’s first regular position in Germany was as Associate Chorus Director at Oper Frankfurt. In 2000 he moved to the municipal theatre at Freiburg im Breisgau, where, as Kapellmeister he conducted the first German performances of Bendetto Marcello’s opera Arianna, performances that received widespread critical acclaim in the international music press. Concurrently, the quality of the Freiburg Opera Chorus reached higher standards in performance under his leadership as Chorus Director.

From among the numerous freelance engagements that he has subsequently undertaken the most notable are his preparation of the SWR-Vokalensemble of Te Deum (Bruckner) in collaboration with Sir Roger Norrington; the preparation of the WDR-Radio-Choir for St François d’Assise (Messiaen) as well as recordings of choral music by Benjamin Britten with the same group.

Currently, Simon Pettite is Dozent at the Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst in Frankfurt am Main and Associate Director of the Katharinenkantorei , also in Frankfurt am Main.

 Semyon Rozin

 Semyon Rozin´s international conducting engagements have included appearances with Rheinisches Kammerorchester, West Germany Radio Orchestra and Chorus of Cologne, the Dutch Radio Chorus (Hilversum), the Israeli Chamber Choir, Flamish Radio Chorus, Belgian Radio Chorus (BRTN)

In the United States he conducted the Bloomington Symphony Orchestra and the St.Paul Civic Orchestra. He also directed the Chamber Orchestra and the Chamber Chorus of Minsk (Belorussia).

 In the field of opera he served as Assistant Artistic Director at the Goldovsky Opera Institute, Assistant Music Director at Opera St.Paul, Chorus Master at the Reiseoper Enschede (Netherlands), as a coach at the University of Minnesota, at Twin Cities Opera Guild, at St.Catherine College (St.Paul), Cincinnati Opera, Wiesbaden Opera (Germany), Netherlands Opera (Amsterdam), AIMS in Graz (Austria), Bel Canto Fstival Dordrecht (Netherlands). From 1994 until 2001 he has successfully presented “Opera in concert” series at the northern German island Sylt.

 Since 1984 Semyon Rozin has held the position of Assistant Professor at the Opera Studio at the Musikhochschule in Cologne (Germany). From 1995 until 2003 he was also on the faculty of Musikhochschule Frankfurt/Main.

 From 1988 until 1992 he served as a personal coach of Scottish soprano Margaret Marshall (Covent Garden, La Scala, Vienna Opera, Salzburg, Frankfurt, Berlin, Cologne). Among the artists with whom Semyon Rozin had an intensive artistic collaboration are: Delores Ziegler, Lela Cuberli, John Tomlinson, Lado Ataneli, Christiane Oelze, Christopher Ventris.

 His superb talents were honed under such masters as Ferdinand Leitner, Boris Goldovsky and Neville Marriner.

He studied at Mozarteum in Slazburg, Austria, and was awarded an Aspen Music School Scholarship, a Baron de Hirsh Scholarship, a Goldovsky Opera Institute Fellowship and a Rochefeller Grant.

 STAGE DIRECTOR

Nicholas Muni

As a freelance stage director, he has directed over two hundred productions with companies in North America, Europe, and Australia. His fruitful relationship with the Houston Grand Opera and Seattle Opera has resulted in two acclaimed co-productions: Il Trovatore, which has been seen in Seattle, Houston, Tulsa, Melbourne, at the Canadian Opera Company in Toronto and at the San Francisco Opera, and Norma, which has been presented in Seattle, Houston, Cincinnati and Los Angeles.

Additional work with Houston Grand Opera includes the world premiere of Jackie O, an opera based on the life of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis that was also presented at Banff Center for the Arts in Alberta, Canada.

His work at the Canadian Opera Company includes ‘Lulu’ (three act version), Rigoletto, which has also been presented in Edmonton, Tulsa, Ottawa, and Minnesota, Jenůfa, which was presented in the autumn of 1996 in Vancouver and at Cincinnati Opera in 1998 and Pelléas et Mélisande, also presented at Cincinnati Opera and due for a revival at COC in 2007. For the Opera Theatre of St. Louis, he has created productions of La Finta Giardiniera, Ariadne auf Naxos, and Iphigènie en Tauride. The Minnesota Opera is another company which fostered his early work, where he has directed Rusalka, Don Giovanni, Rigoletto, and two world premieres: Libby Larsen's Frankenstein, The Modern Prometheus, and Robert Moran's From the Towers of the Moon.

The 1993-94 season marked his European debut at Stadttheater Gießen with La Fille du Régiment. Its success led to subsequent engagements at that same theater for productions of Idomeneo, Die Zauberflöte, and The Rake's Progress. The 1993 season also marked debuts with Boston Lyric Opera with the American premiere of the Neopolitan version of Bellini's I Puritani, and La Bohème at the Tiroler Landestheater in Innsbruck, Austria. In what is considered one of his most interesting projects, he directed a unique chamber version of Berg's Wozzeck in a co-production of the Banff Center for the Arts and Montreal Nouvelle Ensemble Moderne as well as The Rape of Lucretia at the Eastman School of Music, Jenůfa at Vancouver Opera.

He has served as Artistic Director for two companies, Tulsa Opera (1987-93) and Cincinnati Opera (1996-200 His directing debut with the Cincinnati Opera was the summer of 1998, with productions of Jenůfa and Samson et Delila. In the 1999 summer season at Cincinnati he created new productions of Don Giovanni, Faust and The Turn of the Screw. Other productions include Pelléas et Mélisande at Canadian Opera and Cincinnati Opera; Salome, ‘Elektra’ and Nabucco at Cincinnati Opera; Der Fliegende Holländer at Opera Ireland; The Crucible—University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music; Beyond Innocence/Out-o-sense —Cincinnati Ballet; a revival of Jenůfa—Canadian Opera Company; a revival of ll Trovatore—San Francisco Opera and Triple-Bill: La Voix Humaine/The Seven Deadly Sins/Medusa (world stage premiere) at Cincinnati Opera; Street Scene—International Kurt Weill Festival in Dessau; Der Kaiser von Atlantis/The Maids (North American premiere)—Cincinnati Opera and the world premiere of La Conquista by Lorenzo Ferrero at the National Theater in Prague.

His revival of Jenůfa at the Canadian Opera Company in winter 2003 received the DORA award for best theater production of the year.

Recently completed projects include Macbeth—Canadian Opera Company in Toronto (nominated for a DORA award for best production of 2006), Show Boat (in the world premiere of his own version, based on the 1927 original production)—Stadttheater Bern; Tosca—Theater Erfurt; Albert Herring, Une Éducation Manquée and Le pauvre Matelot, Werther, Assassins, Cosi fan tutte, The Coronation of Poppea —Cincinnati Conservatory of Music; Faust—Vancouver Opera, Portland Opera and Canadian Opera (nominated for a DORA award for best production of 2007), Madama Butterfly, The Love for Three Oranges —Indiana University Opera Theater, The Turn of the Screw—Portland Opera, Pelléas et Mélisande at Canadian Opera (nominated for a DORA award for best production of 2008) and the US premiere of Wagner’s Das Liebesverbot at Glimmerglass Opera.

Upcoming projects include Postcard from Morocco and Of Mice and Men—Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, Carmen—Boston Lyric Opera, Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda/Trouble in Tahiti—Portland Opera.

CHAMBER MUSIC

Andrew Campbell

Andrew Campbell has established himself as one of the most versatile collaborative pianists in the United States with a performing career that has taken him to four continents. He has performed in duo recitals with such artists as violinist Chee-Yun, flutist Thomas Robertello, composer Bright Sheng, and tenor Anthony Dean Griffey, with whom he has also collaborated on several operatic productions. He has served as opera rehearsal pianist for such distinguished conductors as André Previn and Plácido Domingo, and has worked closely with the composer Carlisle Floyd on several productions of his operas. Chamber music performances have taken him to distinguished venues including Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, where The Strad and Strings magazines both hailed his performance as "excellent." His partnership with violinist Katherine McLin in the McLin/Campbell Duo and McLin and clarinetist RobertSpring in Trio del Sol has led to performances on numerous recital series throughout the United States and Europe. He has recorded several CDs on the Summit and Centaur labels, and his performance of the Rachmaninoff cello sonata with bassist Catalin Rotaru was cited for special praise by Bass World and XBass, two leading international journals. As an orchestral pianist, he has performed with many ensembles including the Phoenix Symphony, the Columbus Pro Musica Chamber Orchestra, and the San Diego Symphony, working with notable conductors including Keith Lockhart, David Effron, and Michael Christie. He has appeared as collaborative pianist at numerous international conferences, including the International Double Reed Society, National Flute Association Convention, MTNA and the Society for American Music.

Dr. Campbell graduated Phi Beta Kappa and Pi Kappa Lambda in History and Piano from Oberlin College and Conservatory and earned his MM in Piano Performance from Indiana University. He received the Doctorate in Piano Chamber Music and Accompanying from the University of Michigan where he studied with the renowned collaborative artist Martin Katz. While at Michigan he served as Opera Coach/Continuo performer for the Opera Theater. Dr. Campbell spent several summers at the Aspen Music Festival as a fellowship pianist for the Vocal Concert Studies program and staff pianist for the violin studio of Paul Kantor. He was a national prizewinner in the MTNA Wurlitzer Collegiate Artists solo piano competition.

In Milan, Luisa Mauro Partridge (Mezzosoprano) obtained her diploma in lyrical singing and the specialisation in Mélodie and Lied. In Paris, she perfectioned her technique with Mireille Alcantara and the Baroque Repertoire with Gloria Banditelli and René Clemencic. Helmut Deutsch and Christa Ludwig instructed her in the German Lied repertoire and Michel Sénéchal in the French repertoire.

She has collaborated with conductors such as G. Neuhold, P.Fournillier, Y.David, A. Ceccato, R. Gandolfi, M. De Bernard and M. Laus, and performed in Falstaff, Nabucco, Traviata, I Promessi sposi (Ponchielli), Carmen, Mme Butterfly, Die Zauberflöte, Il matrimonio segreto, Il Re (Giordano) and Les  Diables de Loudon (Penderecki).

She has showcased her extensive concert repertoire at major festivals around Europe as well as in Asia and has sung Ravel´s Schéhérazade on a tour through Israel.

In the context of the Gershwin-Year, she sang some of the finest songs of the American composer during a live broadcast by the Italian radiostation R.A.I. She was invited by Stéphane Goldet and Radio France to « L´atelier des chanteurs » where she performed, together with the pianist Jeff Cohen, the works of Schumann, Berg and Partridge.

For the record label Stradivarius she recorded the Beethoven´s  Missa Solemnis.

Luisa Mauro Partridge teaches phonetics and diction for French repertoire at the Conservatorio Giuseppe Verdi in Milan. She has also hosted workshops for singers in Italian language at the music faculty of the University of Toronto (Canada). In 2007 and 2008, she worked as a voice teacher at the Summer programme (C.O.S.I.) for advanced and developing singers, pianists and instrumentalists organised in Sulmona (Italy) by the Faculty of music of the University of Toronto.

She taught at the “Laboratory for singers and collaborative pianists” in collaboration with Umberto Finazzi for the International course for advanced musical training in Bobbio-Italy

As the artistic director of “Nei Stëmmen” in Luxembourg, she organizes summer masterclasses for singers and collaborative pianists.

 %Monica Sproß - German

Monica Sproß is a certified educator for singing and  breathing techniques. She studied at the University of Music at Saarbrücken with Prof. Herbert Schachtschneider and completed with a diploma. Thereafter she studied opera at the Mozarteum in Salzburg with KS Wilma Lipp and completed  Masterclass of Prof. Paul Schilhawsky in “Romantic Art Song"( Kunstlied) as well as the course of breathing technique for singers and wind instrumentalists by Dr. Julius Parow.

After the graduation she attended  master classes of  KS Gottfried Hornik, Sena Jurinac, Norman Shetler, Kurt Widmer, Edith Mathis and others. and continued visiting seminars, congresses and further training in vocal pedagogy.

. For more than ten years she is a member of the BDG Bundesverband deutscher Gesangspädagogen (German National Association of Vocal Teachers).

Monica Sproß works as a Tutor for classical singing at the Public Music School of Trier and is the Head of a private singing class. Additionally she coaches choirs of neighbouring countries in vocal formation, one of them being   INECC Luxembourg.

She performs regularly as a lyrical soprano with regional choirs in ecclesiastical concerts. The repertoire includes the Mozart Requiem, Brahms Requiem, the Christmas Oratorio of J.S. Bach, Elijah by Mendelssohn-Bartholdy among others.

She tours extensively European countries as a member of different classical ensembles. Her programs cover diverse repertoire,  such as  adaptations of classical Spanish and South American composers as well as Vienna operetta. The focal point of her recitals is romantic Art song (Kunstlied) .

Faculty subject to change