Molly Carr, Violist

Molly Carr, Violist

Violist Molly Carr, praised for her “ravishing sound” (The Strad) and her “passionate talent and beautiful poise” (AVS), was a top prizewinner in the 2008 Primrose International Viola Competition.  As winner of the 2010 Juilliard Viola Concerto Competition, Ms. Carr made her New York Concerto debut with the Juilliard Orchestra under Xian Zhang in Alice Tully Hall.  She is the recipient of major prizes and scholarships from the Davidson Institute, ASTA, ARTS, the Virtu Foundation, and the Julliard and Manhattan Schools of Music.  An avid soloist, recitalist, and chamber musician, Ms. Carr has appeared across the U.S., as well as in Canada, Mexico, Europe, Israel and Asia.  She is currently an artist of the Marlboro Music Festival and has performed at Ravinia’s Steans Institute, Music@Menlo, the International Musicians Seminar and Open Chamber Music at Prussia Cove (UK), Malaga Clasica, Bari International Music Festival (Italy), Mozartfest (Wurzburg, Germany), Music from Angel Fire, Yellow Barn Music Festival, YAP Ottowa, and the Perlman Music Program.

Ms. Carr has collaborated with Itzhak Perlman, Carter Brey, Peter Wiley, Ida Kavafian, Donald and Alisa Weilerstein, Pamela Frank, and the Orion and American Quartets, performing at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, Princeton’s McCarter Theatre, Chicago’s Symphony Center, and the Jerusalem Music Center.  She is a member of the Solera Quartet (Quartet-in-Residence at the University of Notre Dame) and a former member of the Serafin Quartet.  Ms. Carr recorded the Viola Sonata and early chamber works of Jennifer Hidgon on NAXOS with the Serafin Quartet; in 2016 she joins pianist Josu De Solaun in a NAXOS recording of Enescu’s Op. 16.  A native of Reno, Nevada, Ms. Carr holds a B.M. and M.M. from the Juilliard School, having studied with Heidi Castleman, Steven Tenenbom, and Pinchas Zukerman.  She is on the Viola Faculties of the Juilliard Precollege Division and the Galamian School in Málaga, Spain.

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Photo credit: Dario Acosta

 

Josu De Solaun, Pianist

As a First Prize winner of the XIII George Enescu International Piano Competition in Bucharest, the XV José Iturbi International Piano Competition and the I European Union Piano Competition, held in Prague, Spanish pianist Josu De Solaun has been invited to perform in distinguished concert series throughout the world, having made notable appearances in Bucharest, Saint Petersburg, Washington, D.C., New York, London, Paris, Leipzig, Taipei, Mexico City, Prague, Rome, and all the major cities of Spain.  His performances have been broadcast on Spanish National Radio, Taiwanese National TV, and Czech National TV, as well as on New York’s WQXR, Princeton’s WPRB, and Chicago’s WFMT.

Highlights of recent seasons include performances as soloist with the Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra of Saint Petersburg, New York’s American Ballet Theatre Orchestra at the Metropolitan Opera; a tour of Spain with the Basque National Orchestra; chamber music performances at the Virginia Arts Festival; solo recitals in Chicago’s Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concerts, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, and Mexico City’s UNAM; and his conducting debut in Spain with the Joven Orquesta de Malaga.  In 2015, the NAXOS label released his recording of Stravinsky’s Les Noces under JoAnn Falletta and members of the Virginia Symphony and Chorus, and in 2016, the NAXOS label will release his 3-CD Box Set of the complete works for piano of George Enescu.

Josu De Solaun is a graduate of the Manhattan School of Music, where his two primary teachers and main musical influences were Nina Svetlanova and Horacio Gutierrez. In Spain, where he studied until the age of 17, his main teachers were Ricardo Roca, Ana Guijarro, and Maria Teresa Naranjo. Throughout his almost 16 years of study in the USA, he has also benefited from the valuable advice and mentorship of Albert and Miyoko Lotto, Joaquin Achucarro, Matti Raekallio, Edna Golandsky, and Jerome Lowenthal.

josudesolaun.com

 

Photo Credit: David A. Beloff

Jacob Fowler, Cellist

Cellist Jacob Fowler holds degrees from the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, NY and the Shepherd School of Music in Houston, TX.  His principal teachers include Alan Harris, Norman Fischer, Brinton Smith, and Desmond Hoebig.  As a chamber musician, Mr. Fowler has participated in several chamber music festivals including Charlie Castleman’s acclaimed Quartet Program and the Thy Masterclass festival in northern Denmark.  Mr. Fowler has performed on numerous occasions for the Masterworks Series at BargeMusic in Brooklyn, NY, collaborating with violinist Mark Peskanov.  Since moving to Virginia, Mr. Fowler has worked many times with Norfolk Chamber Consort, and is a faculty member of the Hampton Roads Chamber Players.

As a soloist, Mr. Fowler performed with the Shepherd School of Music Percussion Ensemble performing Tan Dun’s “Elegy: Snow in June.”  In November 2014, Mr. Fowler collaborated with Todd Rosenlieb Dance Company to perform the Suite for Solo Cello by Gaspar Cassadó with choreography by Ricardo Melendez, opening with great success and critical acclaim.  His performance was praised by M.D. Ridge of Norfolk’s WHRO as “the pièce de résistance.  [Mr. Fowler] sang sweetly…and the result was spectacular.”  In the summer of 2015, Mr. Fowler helped found, and is now director of, the OBX Chamber Music Series, hosted by the Don and Catharine Bryan Cultural Series on the beautiful Outer Banks of North Carolina.  The first festival of its kind in the area, the Series hosted five musicians, including Mr. Fowler, from all over the east coast and was received with great enthusiasm.

As an orchestral musician, Mr. Fowler has received fellowships from the Tanglewood Music Center (2008-09) and the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival (2011).  He served as principal cellist under Christoph Eschenbach performing in Istanbul, Spain, Austria, and throughout Germany. Mr. Fowler has been invited on several international tours, including the Houston Symphony’s tour of the U.K. in 2010.  As a principal cellist of the Manhattan Symphonie, he has performed on many political and cultural tours of China, performing in every major city in the country, and performed in the orchestra’s Carnegie Hall debut in 2013 in a program honoring relations between the U.S. and Japan.  Since joining the Virginia Symphony in 2010, Mr. Fowler has also performed regularly with the Williamsburg Symphonia and Richmond Symphony.

Photo credit: David A. Beloff

Francisco Fullana, Violinist

Acclaimed for his performances in both Europe and the U.S., Spanish violinist Francisco Fullana is enjoying a diverse international career of concerto and recital appearances, as well as a wide array of collaborations as a chamber musician.  Recent appearances include his debut under Gustavo Dudamel performing Brahms’s Violin Concerto in Venezuela’s Simon Bolivar Hall, as well as debuts with Maryland Symphony, Madrid State Orchestra and St. Petersburg State Capella.  Solo performances include engagements at Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall, Spain’s National Hall and Hakuju Hall in Tokyo.

First Prize winner at the 2015 Angel Munetsugu International Violin Competition in Nagoya, Japan, Mr. Fullana also obtained all four special prizes, including Audience Prize, and the loan of the 1697 “Rainville” Stradivarius.  Other recent successes include First Prize at the Pro Musicis International Awards in New York, First Prize at the 2014 Johannes Brahms International Violin Competition in Austria, and multiple top prizes at the 2014 Henri Marteau Competition in Germany.  Mr. Fullana was named Artist-in-Residence of the Balearic Islands Symphony Orchestra in Spain last season, a three-year project that brings him back to his home country for multiple concerto performances each season.  Since 2013, he has been part of the prestigious Marlboro Music Festival, and will be part of two Musicians from Marlboro tours in 2016, performing at Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall, Washington D.C.’s Library of Congress and Philadelphia’s Kimmel Center.  Mr. Fullana is also the concertmaster of the Chamber Orchestra of San Antonio, TX.

A graduate of the Juilliard School, Mr. Fullana obtained his Bachelor and Master’s degrees with Donald Weilerstein and Masao Kawasaki.  He is currently pursuing his Artist Diploma with his mentor Midori Goto at the University of Southern California.  Mr. Fullana has been a recipient of the Stradivari Society of Chicago since 2013.

franciscofullana.com
Photo credit: Sophie Zhai

 

Vivian Fung, Composer

Vivian Fung, Composer

Juno Award-winning composer Vivian Fung has a talent for combining idiosyncratic textures and styles into large-scale works, often including influences such as non- Western folk music, Tibetan chant, and Brazilian rhythms. Recent works include Aqua, commissioned by the Chicago Sinfonietta and inspired by Chicago’s iconic Aqua Tower; Violin Concerto No. 2, commissioned and premiered by the Toronto Symphony Orchestra with Jonathan Crow, violin; and Biennale Snapshots, a 25-minute work for the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, premiered in the VSO’s 2015 – 2016 season opening concerts this past September. Among her upcoming commissions are a new work for the Daedalus Quartet and clarinetist Romie de Guise-Langlois, co-commissioned by Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, and Chamber Music Northwest; Humanoid for cello and electronics, for a consortium of cellists in Canada and the U.S.; Baroque Melting for the San José Chamber Orchestra; and a new orchestral work commissioned by the National Arts Centre Orchestra in Ottawa.

Ms. Fung has received numerous awards and grants, including a Simon Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship, New York Foundation for the Arts’ Gregory Millard Fellowship, ASCAP, BMI, American Music Center, MAP Fund, Music Alive! and the League of American Orchestras, American Composers’ Forum, and the Canada Council for the Arts. She is an associate composer of the Canadian Music Centre. Born in Edmonton, Canada, Ms. Fung began her composition studies with composer Violet Archer and received her doctorate from the Juilliard School in New York, where her mentors included David Diamond and Robert Beaser. She was a faculty member at Juilliard from 2002 – 2010, and currently lives in California with her husband Charles Boudreau, their son Julian, and their Shiba Inu, Mulan.

vivianfung.net
Photo credit: Charles Boudreau

 

Photo Credit: Lisa-Marie Mazzucco

Caroline Goulding, Violinist

Named “precociously gifted” by Gramophone, violinist Caroline Goulding has appeared as a soloist with many of the world’s premier orchestras, including the Cleveland Orchestra, Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, Toronto Symphony, Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra, National Symphony, Nashville Symphony, Milwaukee Symphony, Colorado Symphony, Dallas Symphony, Houston Symphony, Detroit Symphony, Deutsche Radio Philharmonie, Berlin’s ensemble mini, and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s.  She has appeared in recital at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, the Kennedy Center, Beijing’s Forbidden City Concert Hall, the Tonhalle-Zurich, the Louvre Museum, and the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum.  The 2015 – 2016 season brings forth engagements in Asia, Europe, and North America with the Hong Kong Philharmonic, Dortmunder Philharmoniker, Houston Symphony, Fort Worth Symphony, Omaha Symphony, Hartford Symphony, Tacoma Symphony, and New West Symphony.

Ms. Goulding is the recipient of an Avery Fisher Career Grant, as well as a Grammy nomination for her debut album on the Telarc label.  She has appeared on NBC’s TodayMARTHA hosted by Martha Stewart, Germany’s Stars von Morgen hosted by Rolando Villazón, and can be heard on NPR’s Performance Today and SiriusXM Satellite Radio.  Currently studying with Christian Tetzlaff at the Kronberg Academy, Ms. Goulding splits her time between Kronberg, Germany, and Boston, Massachusetts.  Other musical mentors have included Donald Weilerstein, Paul Kantor, Joel Smirnoff and Julia Kurtyka.

A past member of the Stradivari Society, Caroline currently plays the General Kyd Stradivarius (c. 1720), courtesy of Jonathan Moulds.

carolinegoulding.com
Photo credit: Lisa-Marie Mazzucco

 

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Katie Hyun, Violinist

Praised for her “sensitivity and top-shelf artistry” (Cleveland.com), violinist Katie Hyun has performed as a soloist with the Houston Symphony, the Dallas Chamber Orchestra, Concerto Soloists Orchestra in Philadelphia, the Philadelphia Orchestra, and the Columbia Festival Orchestra, among others. Other highlights include concerto performances with the Busan Sinfonietta and Incheon Philharmonic in South Korea, the world premiere of Wei-Chieh Lin’s Concerto for Violin and Cello with cellist Michael Katz and the New York Classical Players, and recitals with pianist Roman Rabinovich as the Maxwell Shepherd Fund’s Artist-in-Residence. Festival appearances include ChamberFest in Cleveland, Chelsea Music Festival in New York, Habitat4Music in Vermont, Bravo! Vail in Colorado, Chamber Music Northwest Winter Festival in Portland, Bright Sheng’s “Intimacy of Creativity” in Hong Kong, and “New York in Chuncheon” and the Busan Chamber Music Festival, both in South Korea.

Ms. Hyun is the founder and director of Quodlibet Ensemble, a small chamber orchestra that made its debut in 2008 to great acclaim and has since performed at the Shepherd Music Series in Collinsville, CT, the Yale British Arts Center, and Drew University in Madison, NJ.  Quodlibet Ensemble released its debut album in the spring of 2014.  Ms. Hyun is also a member of the award winning Amphion String Quartet, which is under Concert Artists Guild Management and is in residence at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s CMS Two Program. Ms. Hyun received her Artist Diploma at the Yale School of Music, studying with Ani Kavafian, and her Masters Degree at the State University of New York in Stony Brook, where she studied with Pamela Frank, Ani Kavafian, and Philip Setzer.  Ms. Hyun studied with Aaron Rosand and Pamela Frank at the Curtis Institute of Music, where she received her Bachelor degree.

Photo credit: Sophie Zhai

 

Milena Pajaro-van de Stadt, Violist

Milena Pajaro-van de Stadt, Violist

Praised by The Strad as having “lyricism that stood out…a silky tone and beautiful, supple lines,” violist Milena Pajaro-van de Stadt has already established herself as one of the most sought-after violists of her generation. In addition to appearances as soloist with the Tokyo Philharmonic, the Jacksonville Symphony, and the Sphinx Chamber Orchestra, she has performed in recitals and chamber music concerts throughout the United States, Latin America, and Europe, including an acclaimed 2011 debut recital at London’s Wigmore Hall. Festival appearances include the Marlboro Music School and Festival, Chamber Music Northwest, Bravo!Vail, SummerFest at LaJolla, the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, and the Perlman Music Program.

Ms. Pajaro-van de Stadt is the founding violist of the Dover Quartet, recipient of the Cleveland Quartet award and First Prize winner and sweeper of every special award at the Banff International String Quartet Competition 2013 and winner of the Gold Medal and Grand Prize in the 2010 Fischoff Chamber Music Competition. Her numerous awards also include First Prize at the Lionel Tertis International Viola Competition and top prizes at the Tokyo International Viola Competition and the Sphinx Competition.

Ms. Pajaro-van de Stadt graduated from the Curtis Institute of Music, where she studied with Roberto Diaz, Michael Tree, Misha Amory, and Joseph de Pasquale. She then received her Master’s Degree in String Quartet with the Dover Quartet at Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music as a student of James Dunham. She and the Dover Quartet currently serve on the faculty of Northwestern University’s Bienen School of Music.

Photo credit: Lisa-Marie Mazzucco

 

Anna

Anna Petrova, Pianist

Bulgarian pianist Anna Petrova has been praised for her “hallmark performances” of “excellent technical mastery and powerful control of timbre.” – Levante, Spain. Prizewinner of numerous international competitions, including the José Roca (Valencia), Val Tidone (Italy) and Maria Yudina (St. Petersburg), Anna was a semifinalist at the prestigious Queen Elizabeth International Piano Competition in Belgium, 2010, where she performed as soloist with the Royal Chamber Orchestra of Wallonia under Paul Goodwin. At her North-American orchestral debut with conductor Philippe Entremont, which was shortly followed by a second invitation, Anna was praised for her “ultra-smooth playing style”- New York Fine Arts Examiner.

Other conductors with whom she has performed include Bruno Aprea, JoAnn Falletta, Ramón Tébar, and Francisco Valero-Terribas. Highlights of recent seasons include concerto performances with the Plovdiv Symphony Orchestra, the Monterey Symphony Orchestra of California, and the Virginia Beach Symphony Orchestra, as well as solo recitals in halls such as Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, Brussels’ Conservatoire Royal, and Carnegie’s Weil Recital Hall.  Future performances include a solo tour of China and concerto performances with the Monterey Symphony Orchestra and the Port Angeles Symphony Orchestra.

Recent chamber music engagements include residencies at Málaga Clásica Festival in Spain, Virginia Arts Festival in Virginia; Mozartfest in Würzburg, Germany; and Music@Menlo Festival in California with members of New York’s Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. Her recording of Stravinsky’s Les Noces with members of the Virginia Symphony Orchestra and Choir under conductor JoAnn Falletta will be released on Naxos in 2016.  In May 2016, Ms. Petrova was awarded her Doctor of Musical Arts degree from New York’s Manhattan School of Music, where her main teachers were Horacio Gutiérrez and André-Michel Schub. She now divides her time between New York and Houston, Texas, where she has recently joined the piano faculty at Sam Houston State University. Her performances have been broadcast on National Public Radio, New York’s WQXR, Chicago’s WFMT, and Bulgarian National Radio and Television.