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CONNIE SHIH, PIANO The Canadian pianist, Connie Shih, is repeatedly considered to be one of Canada’s most outstanding artists. In 1993 she was awarded the Sylva Gelber Award for most outstanding classical artist under age 30. At the age of nine, she made her orchestral debut with Mendelssohn's first Piano Concerto with the Seattle Symphony Orchestra. At the age of 12, she was the youngest ever protégé of Gyorgy Sebok, and then continued her studies at the Curtis Institute in Philadelphia with Claude Frank, himself a protégé of Arthur Schnabel. Later studies were undertaken with Fou Tsong in Europe. As soloist, she has appeared extensively with orchestras throughout Canada, the U.S.A. and Europe. In a solo recital setting, she has made countless appearances in Canada, the U.S., Iceland, England, Spain, Italy, Germany, Japan and China. Connie has given chamber music performances with many world-renowned musicians. To critical acclaim, she appears regularly in recital with cellist Steven Isserlis. Including chamber music appearances at the Wigmore and Carnegie Halls, she performs at the prestigious Bath Music Festival, Aldeburgh, Cheltenham, Weill Hall (N.Y.), and at the Kronberg Festival. Her collaborations have included Maxim Vengerov, Tabea Zimmerman, and Isabelle Faust. Connie regularly tours North America and Europe with Steven Isserlis, and includes a tour of Asia with Joshua Bell. In addition she appears at concert venues across Germany with the cellist Manuel Fischer-Dieskau with whom she recorded the first-ever CD of the Sonatas for piano and cello by Carl Reinecke and the complete Beethoven sonatas. Her CD with Steven Isserlis on the BIS label was recently released. Connie's performances are frequently broadcast via television and radio on CBC (Canada), BBC (U.K.), SWR, NDR, and WDR (Germany) as well as on other various television and radio stations in North America and Europe. She is on faculty at the Casalmaggiore Festival in Italy.

March 19, 2023 – Rachel Naomi Kudo, piano JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH (1685-1750) French Suite No. 2 in C minor, BWV 813 March 19, 2023 – Rachel Naomi Kudo, piano As demand increased for his keyboard teaching, Bach realized that he needed instructive materials other than the virtuoso works of his early years—not only for students who sought him out, but for his own children who were beginning to show considerable musical talents. Thus between 1717 and 1725 he composed a large number of works of varying degrees of difficulty as teaching tools. Heinrich Nikolaus Gerber, who studied with Bach from 1724 to 1727, left an account of his teaching methods, which included starting a student on the two-part Inventions, followed by the three-part Sinfonias, moving on to the so-called French Suites, then the English Suites, and finally to the great “48,” the preludes and fugues of the Well-tempered Clavier. Bach’s own son, Carl Philipp Emanuel, reported the same course of study. The title “French” that became attached to these Suites in the years following Bach’s death is somewhat mystifying. Though he gave the title in French—Suites de clavecin—the Suites contain as many German and Italian characteristics as they do French. Similarly, the “English” Suites, whose original title was also given in French, do not seem particularly English. In Bach’s lifetime the French Suites were called the “Little” Suites to distinguish them from the more extensive English Suites. Bach first began collecting the so-called French Suites, composed c. 1722–25, in a notebook he was compiling for his second wife, Anna Magdalena. It is clear that these pieces were, to a certain extent, works in progress, because Bach returned to them several times to make revisions, perhaps with different students in mind. He also left his own copy relatively free of ornamentation, possibly to encourage his students to develop improvisational skills in that regard. What is now Suite No. 6 does not appear in that notebook, having been added to the other five around 1725; there also exist two other similar suites that Bach might have considered including at one time. In all of these “French” suites he decided to omit the prelude that opens his other suites, even going so far as to remove one he had already composed to make it fit the group. Bach based his suites on a standard series of Baroque dance movements, which by this time were no longer meant for actual dancing—Allemande, Courante, Sarabande, and Gigue. All the movements employ binary form (two sections, each repeated). A variety of additional dance movements could be inserted between the Sarabande and Gigue, the typical place for any slightly more “modern” dance forms. Because the French Suites contain no preludes, the opening Allemandes take on that function and even contain gestures and figuration similar to that of Bach’s preludes. Suite No. 2 in C minor is one for which several variants exist in the sources, particularly in the Allemande and Courante. The Courante exhibits the “running” style of the Italian corrente in a two-voice texture. For his inserted dances Bach chose an Air, also in two voices, and one or two minuets, depending on the version one follows. The delightful Gigue employs the upbeats, dotted rhythms, and strong-beat accents of the French dance known as the canarie. Bach’s imitative entries add another level of allure. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 30, 2022 AT 4 PM EMERSON STRING QUARTET VALEDICTORY CONCERT BUY TICKETS DAVID FINCKEL, CELLO “His playing has great warmth and expressiveness coupled with a noble, aristocratic restraint.” — Strings Magazine GUILLERMO FIGUEROA, VIOLA EMERSON STRING QUARTET “With musicians like this there must be some hope for humanity.” — The Times (London) FEATURING ABOUT THE PERFORMANCE BUY TICKETS The Emerson String Quartet has maintained its status as one of the world’s most illustrious chamber ensembles for more than 45 years. In honor of their final season, this special valedictory concert will bring back two Emersonian laureates — the quartet’s original violist, Guillermo Figueroa, and longtime cellist, David Finckel — for a musical reunion that will conclude with Johannes Brahms’s radiant String Sextet No. 2 in G major. Don’t miss this unforgettable event! PROGRAM Joseph Haydn String Quartet in G, Op. 33, No. 5 Program Notes Dmitri Shostakovich String Quartet No. 12 in D-flat, Op. 133 Program Notes Johannes Brahms String Sextet No. 2 in G, Op. 36 Program Notes Watch the Emerson String Quartet perform Shostakovich’s 8th String Quartet at Parlance Chamber Concerts:

ANDRÉS DÍAZ, CELLO Since winning the First Prize in the 1986 Naumburg International Cello Competition, Mr. Díaz has exhilarated both critics and audiences with his intense and charismatic performances. He has earned exceptional reviews for
his “strongly personal interpretive vision” (The New York Times) and his “bold and imaginative” playing (TheBoston Globe) and was awarded the prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant as well as a generous grant from the
 Susan W. Rose Fund for Music in 1998. Andrés Díaz’s numerous orchestral appearances have included return engagements with the Atlanta Symphony under the late conductor Robert Shaw; performances with the American Symphony at Carnegie Hall, the symphony orchestras of Milwaukee, Seattle, Rochester under Christopher Seaman, the Boston Pops and Esplanade Orchestras, the Chicago Symphony at the Ravinia Festival with Edo de Waart conducting, and the NationalSymphony Orchestra. Among the highlights of Mr. Díaz’s recent seasons are tours of Taiwan, Hong Kong,Korea, Japan, Hawaii, and Canada performing in recital and with orchestra; appearances in Chile, Venezuela, Argentina, the Dominican Republic; a series of concerts in the Soviet Union where he performed as soloist with Russia’s Saratov Symphony in the cities of Saratov and Moscow; and a tour of the major cities in New Zealand with the New Zealand Chamber Orchestra. The young virtuoso is a sought-after recitalist and made his Alice Tully Hall debut in 1987 after winning the Naumburg International Cello Competition. He received critical praise for his second appearance at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall in 1989 when The New York Times remarked that his musical views “always seemed deeply considered rather than superficial or manufactured.” His recital appearances have included the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., Jordan Hall and the Gardner Museum in Boston, the Ambassador Auditorium in Pasadena, and the highly regarded San Francisco Performances Series. Andrés Díaz frequently performed with the late pianist Samuel Sanders. The Díaz/Sanders Duo performed at Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall, Merkin Hall in New York, the Philadelphia Arts Museum, Atlanta’s Spivey Hall and other venues across the U.S. and abroad. They appeared in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Colorado Springs, Detroit, and Japan, where they appeared at Tokyo’s Suntory Hall. Among other renowned pianists
 with whom Mr. Díaz has collaborated are Judith Gordon, Margo Garrett, Richard Goode, Mischa Dichter, and Anne-Marie McDermott. During the summer of 2001, Mr. Díaz gave the world premiere of Gunther Schuller’s Concerto for Cello 
and Orchestra at the Brevard Music Center with the Brevard Festival Orchestra. In February 2001, Mr. Díaz performed the American premiere of Frank Bridge’s Oration for cello and orchestra at Boston University. Mr.Díaz has also premiered Thomas Oboe Lee’s Cello Concerto (written expressly for Díaz) with the Boston Civic Symphony, and he gave the Boston and Washington, D.C. premieres of Leon Kirchner’s Music for Cello and Orchestra. In that Boston performance, the composer conducted the work. Díaz later performed the piece with the National Symphony Orchestra, James Paul conducting, where it received the First Prize Friedham Award. Andrés Díaz’s debut solo recording on MusicMasters of works by Manuel de Falla and Robert Schumann with pianist Samuel Sanders was acclaimed by The Boston Globe as “strong and subtle; everything Díaz does has
personality and, better than that, character.” On the Dorian label, the two artists have also released Brahms’s Sonatas for Piano and Cello; Russian Romantics, a compilation of short Russian works; and most recently
American Visions, featuring works of Barber, Bernstein and Foote. Mr. Díaz’s current orchestral solo release (also on the Dorian label) features the Villas-Lobos Cello Concerto No. 2 with the Simon Bolivar Symphony Orchestra and conductor Enrique Diemecke. This recording won a 1996 Allegro Music Award for Best Orchestral Release. His latest recording, in memory of his collaborator pianist Samuel Sanders — featuring the works of Martinu, Lutoslawski, and Rachmaninoff– won The Classical Recording Foundation 2003 Award. Mr. Diaz also recorded the six Bach Suites at the end of 2004. Mr. Díaz’s summer festival appearances (including frequent return engagements) include the Santa Fe, La Jolla, Marlboro, Ravinia, Bravo! Colorado, Spoleto, Saratoga and Tanglewood festivals. His appearances at Tanglewood earned him the Pierre Mayer Memorial Award for Outstanding String Player. He has toured nationally with the Santa Fe and Spoleto festivals. Other festival appearances include the Victoria (B.C.), Steamboat (Steamboat Springs, CO), Musicorda (MA), Rockport (MA) and Cape & Islands festivals. Andrés Díaz is very active with the Díaz String Trio, featuring violinist Andres Cardenes and violist Roberto Díaz. At Carnegie Hall in April 2003, the trio performed the world premiere of a string trio written for them by Gunther Schuller. The trio has performed in the cities of Pittsburgh, Washington, Boston, Los Angeles, Miami; at the Kuhmo Festival in Finland and the International Festival of St. Cypriene in France; and they
have toured extensively in South America, Mexico and Canada. The trio was invited by Isaac Stern to play at Carnegie Hall’s Centennial Celebration, and from 1994-96 it served as Trio in Residence at the Florida International University. They released its first recording featuring the music of Paganini on the Dorian label. A second recording is due for release in 2003 featuring music by Penderecki, Dohnayi, Beethoven. Andrés Díaz was born in Santiago, Chile in 1964, and began studying the cello at the age of five. Three years later he moved to Atlanta, Georgia and studied at the Georgia Academy of Music with Martha Gerchefski. Mr. Díaz graduated from the New England Conservatory where he worked with Laurence Lesser and Colin Carr, and currently plays an active role in chamber music performances with the Conservatory’s faculty. He
served for five years as Associate Professor of Cello at the Boston University and Co-Director of the Boston University Tanglewood Institute Quartet Program, resigning in September 2001. Mr. Díaz now lives in Dallas, Texas with his wife, Julie, and sons Peter Manuel and Gabriel Andrés. He plays a 1698 Matteo Goffriller Cello and a bow made by his father, Manuel Díaz.

MARK HOLLOWAY, VIOLA Violist Mark Holloway is a chamber musician sought after in the United States and abroad. He has appeared at prestigious festivals such as Marlboro, Music@Menlo, Ravinia, Caramoor, Banff, Cartagena, Taos, Music from Angel Fire, Mainly Mozart, Music at Plush, and the Boston Chamber Music Society. Performances have taken him to far-flung places such as Chile and Greenland, and he plays regularly at chamber music festivals in France and Switzerland, and at the International Musicians Seminar in Prussia Cove, England. Around New York City, he frequently appears as a guest with the New York Philharmonic and Orpheus. Mr. Holloway has been principal violist at Tanglewood and of the New York String Orchestra, and has played as guest principal of the American Symphony, the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia, Camerata Bern, and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra. He has performed at Bargemusic, the 92nd Street Y, the Casals Festival in Puerto Rico, and on radio and television throughout North and South America, and in Europe, most recently a Live From Lincoln Center broadcast. Hailed as an “outstanding violist” by American Record Guide, and praised by Zürich’s Neue Zürcher Zeitung for his “warmth and intimacy,” he has recorded for the Marlboro Recording Society, CMS Live, Music@Menlo LIVE, Naxos, and Albany labels. An artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Mr. Holloway was a student of Michael Tree at The Curtis Institute of Music and received his bachelor’s degree from Boston University.

CHEE-YUN, VIOLIN Chee-Yun has performed with many of the world's foremost orchestras and conductors. Orchestral highlights include her tours of the United States with the San Francisco Symphony under Michael Tilson Thomas and Japan with the NHK Symphony, a concert with the Seoul Philharmonic conducted by Myung-Whun Chung that was broadcast on national television, and a benefit for UNESCO with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s at Avery Fisher Hall. Chee-Yun has performed with such distinguished conductors as Michael Tilson Thomas, Jaap van Zweden, Manfred Honeck, Hans Graf, James DePriest, Jesus Lopez-Cobos, Krzysztof Penderecki, Neeme Järvi, Pinchas Zukerman, Giancarlo Guerrero, José Luis Gomez, Miguel Harth-Bedoya, and Carlos Kalmar. She has appeared with the Toronto, Pittsburgh, Dallas, Atlanta, and National symphony orchestras, as well as with the Saint Paul and Los Angeles Chamber Orchestras. Other orchestral engagements include performances with the Orquesta Sinfonia Nacional and the Mobile and Pasadena Symphonies, in addition to appearances with the National Philharmonic, Colorado and Pacific Symphonies, and the Tucson, Detroit, and Pensacola symphony orchestras. A champion of contemporary music, Chee-Yun has performed Christopher Theofanidis’ Violin Concerto conducted by David Alan Miller as part of the Albany Symphony's American Festival, in addition to performing Kevin Puts’ Violin Concerto with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra. As a recitalist, Chee-Yun has performed in many major U.S. cities, including New York, Chicago, Washington, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Atlanta. Career highlights include appearances at the Kennedy Center's "Salute to Slava" gala honoring Mstislav Rostropovich and with the Mostly Mozart Festival on tour in Japan, as well as a performance with Michael Tilson Thomas in the inaugural season of Carnegie Hall's Zankel Hall and the U.S. premiere of Penderecki’s Sonata No. 2 with pianist Barry Douglas. In 2016, Chee-Yun performed as a guest artist for the Secretary General at the United Nations in celebration of Korea's National Foundation Day and the 25th anniversary of South Korea joining the UN. Other career highlights include recitals in St. Paul, Buffalo, Omaha, Scottsdale, and Washington, D.C., duo recitals with cellist Alisa Weilerstein, a recital tour with pianist Alessio Bax, and a performance at American Ballet Theatre's fall gala. Firmly committed to chamber music, Chee-Yun has toured with Music from Marlboro and appears frequently with Spoleto USA, a project she has been associated with since its inception. Additional chamber music appearances include performances at the Ravinia, Aspen, Bravo! Vail Valley, La Jolla, Caramoor, Green Music, Santa Fe, Orcas Island, Hawaii Performing Arts, and Bridgehampton festivals in the U.S.; the Great Mountains Music Festival in South Korea; the Clandeboye Festival with Camerata Ireland in Northern Ireland; the Opera Theatre and Music Festival in Lucca, Italy; the Colmar Festival in France; the Beethoven and Penderecki festivals in Poland; and the Kirishima Festival in Japan. Chee-Yun has received exceptional acclaim as a recording artist since the release of her debut album of virtuoso encore pieces in 1993. Her recent recording of the Penderecki Violin Concerto No. 2 on Naxos was acclaimed as "an engrossing, masterly performance" (The Strad) and "a performance of staggering virtuosity and musicality" (American Record Guide). Her releases on the Denon label include Mendelssohn's E-minor Violin Concerto, Vieuxtemps' Violin Concerto No. 5, Lalo's Symphonie Espagnole and Saint-Saëns' Violin Concerto No. 3 with the London Philharmonic under the direction of Maestro Lopez-Cobos, and violin sonatas from Debussy, Fauré, Franck, Saint-Saëns, Szymanowski, Brahms and Strauss. Two compilation discs, Vocalise d'amour and The Very Best of Chee-Yun, feature highlights of Chee-Yun's earlier recordings. In 2007, Chee-Yun recorded the Beethoven Triple Concerto with Camerata Ireland, pianist Barry Douglas, and cellist Andrés Diaz for Satirino Records. In 2008, Decca/Korea released Serenata Notturno, an album of light classics that went platinum within six months of its release. Chee-Yun has performed frequently on National Public Radio's Performance Today and on WQXR and WNYC radio in New York City. She has been featured on KTV,a children's program on the cable network CNBC, A Prairie Home Companion, Public Radio International, and numerous syndicated and local radio programs across the world. She has appeared on PBS as a special guest on Victor Borge's Then and Now 3, in a live broadcast at Atlanta’s Spivey Hall concurrent with the Olympic Games, and on ESPN performing the theme for the X Games. In 2009, she also appeared in an episode of HBO's hit series Curb Your Enthusiasm. A short documentary film about Chee-Yun, “Chee-Yun: Seasons on the Road,” premiered in 2017 and is available on YouTube . Chee-Yun's first public performance at age eight took place in her native Seoul after she won the Grand Prize of the Korean Times Competition. At 13, she came to the United States and was invited to perform Vieuxtemps’ Concerto No. 5 in a Young People's Concert with the New York Philharmonic. Two years later, she appeared as soloist with the New York String Orchestra under Alexander Schneider at Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center. In 1989, she won the Young Concert Artists International Auditions, and a year later she became the recipient of the prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant. In Korea, Chee-Yun studied with Nam Yun Kim. In the United States, she has worked with Dorothy DeLay, Hyo Kang, Daniel Phillips, and Felix Galimir (chamber music) at The Juilliard School. In addition to her active performance and recording schedule, Chee-Yun is a dedicated and enthusiastic educator. She gives master classes around the world and has held several teaching posts at notable music schools and universities. Her past faculty positions have included serving as the resident Starling Soloist and Adjunct Professor of Violin at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music and as Visiting Professor of Music (Violin) at the Indiana University School of Music. From 2007 to 2017, she served as Artist-in-Residence and Professor of Violin at Southern Methodist University in Dallas.

ANNA POLONSKY, PIANO Anna Polonsky is widely in demand as a soloist and chamber musician. She has appeared with the Moscow Virtuosi, the Buffalo Philharmonic, the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, the Columbus Symphony Orchestra, the Memphis Symphony, the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia, the St. Luke’s Chamber Ensemble, and many others. Ms. Polonsky has collaborated with the Guarneri, Orion, Daedalus, and Shanghai Quartets, and with such musicians as Mitsuko Uchida, Yo-Yo Ma, David Shifrin, Richard Goode, Emanuel Ax, Arnold Steinhardt, Peter Wiley, and Jaime Laredo. She has performed chamber music at festivals such as Marlboro, Chamber Music Northwest, Seattle, Music@Menlo, Cartagena, Bard, and Caramoor, as well as at Bargemusic in New York City. Ms. Polonsky has given concerts in the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, the Vienna Konzerthaus, the Alice Tully Hall, and Carnegie Hall’s Stern, Weill, and Zankel Halls, and has toured extensively throughout the United States, Europe, and Asia. A frequent guest at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, she was a member of the Chamber Music Society Two during 2002-2004. In 2006 she took a part in the European Broadcasting Union’s project to record and broadcast all of Mozart’s keyboard sonatas, and in the spring of 2007 she performed a solo recital at Carnegie Hall’s Stern Auditorium to inaugurate the Emerson Quartet’s Perspectives Series. She is a recipient of a Borletti-Buitoni Trust Fellowship and the Andrew Wolf Chamber Music Award. Anna Polonsky made her solo piano debut at the age of seven at the Special Central Music School in Moscow, Russia. She emigrated to the United States in 1990, and attended high school at the Interlochen Arts Academy in Michigan. She received her Bachelor of Music diploma from The Curtis Institute of Music under the tutelage of the renowned pianist Peter Serkin, and continued her studies with Jerome Lowenthal, earning her Master’s Degree from the Juilliard School. In addition to performing, she serves on the piano faculty of Vassar College, and in the summer at the Marlboro and Kneisel Hall chamber music festivals. Beginning in 2018, Polonsky performs in a trio with clarinetist David Shifrin and cellist Peter Wiley. Ms. Polonsky is a Steinway Artist.

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BRUNO EICHER, VIOLIN Violinist Bruno Eicher is Assistant Concertmaster of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, which he joined in 2001, after serving for four years as Associate Concertmaster of the Atlanta Symphony and the previous four years as Assistant Concertmaster of the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra. His wide-ranging orchestral experience includes performing with the Vienna Philharmonic and State Opera orchestras, the New York Philharmonic, the Baltimore Symphony, and the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, under the avid chamber musician, Mr. Eicher has performed extensively throughout Europe and the U.S., as well as South Korea. In New York, as a member of the MET Chamber Ensemble from 2002 to 2014, he performed regularly at Carnegie Hall. A native of Burgundy, France, Mr. Eicher is a graduate of the Paris Conservatoire where he studied with Pierre Amoyal and Jean Hubeau. In the United States, he was a student of Dorothy DeLay and Hyo Kang at the Juilliard School, from which he holds both bachelor’s and master’s degrees. In 1992, he was the 2nd prize winner of the Yehudi Menuhin International Violin Competition. He lives in Manhattan, with his wife, MET Orchestra cellist Kari Docter, and their two children. Mr Eicher plays an instrument made in 2011 by Christophe Landon, a copy of the “Circle” Stradivari.

ERIKA BAIKOFF, SOPRANO Russian American Soprano, Erika Baikoff, is a recent graduate of the Metropolitan Opera Lindemann Young Artist Development Program. As a Lindemann Young Artist, she sang the roles of Xenia in Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov and Barbarina in Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro . At Maestro Nézet-Séguin's invitation, she joined the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra's tour of Das Rheingold and was featured as the soprano soloist in Mahler's 4th Symphony with Maestro Rustioni and the Ulster Orchestra. Equally passionate about chamber music, she made her debuts with Schubertíada and the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, both of which she will return to in future seasons. The 2023/2024 season includes debuts with the Houston Grand Opera, London Symphony Orchestra, and Ciclo de Lied. From 2018 to 2020, Erika was a member of the Opéra National de Lyon Studio, where her roles included Le Feu/ Princesse/ Rossignol in Ravel’s L’Enfant et les Sortilèges , Juliet in Boris Blacher’s Romeo and Juliet , Anna in Verdi’s Nabucco, and the soprano solo in Mahler's 4th Symphony. Erika is the first prize winner of the 2019 Helmut Deutsch Liedwettbewerb and the 10th Concours international de chant-piano Nadia et Lili Boulanger with her duo partner, Gary Beecher. Other awards include the 6th Prize, Oratorio-Lied Prize, and Schubert Prize at the Tenor Viñas Contest, George London Award, Sullivan Foundation Career Development Grant, 2020 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions Semi-finalist, Career Bridges Grant, Mondavi Young Artist Founders’ Prize, and the Bouchaine Young Artist Scholarship. Erika is an alumni of the Atelier Lyrique at the Verbier Festival, where she sang Musetta in Puccini’s La Bohème, and the Académie Vocal Residency of the Festival d'Aix-en-Provence. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in French Studies from Princeton University and a Master of Music from The Guildhall School of Music and Drama.

2017-2018 ARTIST ROSTER ALESSIO BAX, PIANO CHIARA STRING QUARTET MARK HOLLOWAY, VIOLA MIHAI MARICA, CELLO CLARA NEUBAUER, VIOLIN PETER SERKIN, PIANO DANBI UM, VIOLIN RAFAEL FIGUEROA, CELLO BENJAMIN BEILMAN, VIOLIN 2017 LUCILLE CHUNG, PIANO SEAN LEE, VIOLIN ANNE-MARIE McDERMOTT, PIANO OLIVER NEUBAUER, VIOLIN EMILY DAGGETT SMITH, VIOLIN ORION WEISS, PIANO MICHAEL BROWN, PIANO GILAD COHEN, COMPOSER LOS ANGELES GUITAR QUARTET KERRY McDERMOTT, violin PAUL NEUBAUER, VIOLA ARNAUD SUSSMANN, VIOLIN THE DANISH STRING QUARTET

ZLATOMIR FUNG, CELLO The first American in four decades and youngest musician ever to win First Prize at the International Tchaikovsky Competition Cello Division, Zlatomir Fung is poised to become one of the preeminent cellists of our time. Astounding audiences with his boundless virtuosity and exquisite sensitivity, the 23-year-old has already proven himself to be a star among the next generation of world-class musicians. A recipient of the Borletti-Buitoni Trust Fellowship 2022 and a 2020 Avery Fisher Career Grant, Fung’s impeccable technique demonstrates mastery of the canon and exceptional insight into the depths of contemporary repertoire. In the 2022-2023 season, Fung performs with orchestras and gives recitals in all corners of the world. Orchestral engagements include the BBC and Rochester Philharmonics, Milwaukee, Reading, Lincoln, Ridgefield and Sante Fe Symphonies, Baltimore Chamber Orchestra, Sarasota Orchestra, and APEX Ensemble. He gives the world premiere of a new cello concerto by Katherine Balch with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra. He plays recitals throughout North America with pianists Benjamin Hochman, Dina Vainshtein, and Janice Carissa, including stops in New York City, Chicago, IL, San Diego and Berkeley, CA, Los Alamos, NM, Rockville, MD, Melbourne, FL, Vancouver and Sechelt, BC, Northampton, MA, Province, RI, Burlington, VT, and Waterford, VA. Tours of Europe and Asia include a recital at Wigmore Hall and two performances at Cello Biënnale Amsterdam. Recent summer festival appearances include Aspen Music Festival, Bravo! Vail with the New York Philharmonic and Leonard Slatkin, ChamberFest Cleveland, Chamber Music Northwest, La Jolla Chamber Music Society, Rockport Chamber Music Festival, and Verbier. As a soloist, Fung has appeared with the Detroit, Kansas City, Seattle, Utah, Greensboro, Ann Arbor, and Asheville Symphonies, among many others. Past recital highlights include his Carnegie Hall Weill Recital Hall debut with pianist Mishka Rushdie Momen and multiple tours throughout North America, Europe, and Asia. As a chamber musician, he has been presented by the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, Philharmonic Society of Orange County, IMS Prussia Cove, Syrinx Concerts in Toronto, The Embassy Series & The Phillips Collection in Washington DC, and Salon de Virtuosi and Bulgarian Concert Evenings in New York City. A winner of the 2017 Young Concert Artists International Auditions and the 2017 Astral National Auditions, Fung has taken the top prizes at the 2018 Alice & Eleonore Schoenfeld International String Competition, 2016 George Enescu International Cello Competition, 2015 Johansen International Competition for Young String Players, 2014 Stulberg International String Competition, and 2014 Irving Klein International Competition. He was selected as a 2016 U.S. Presidential Scholar for the Arts and was awarded the 2016 Landgrave von Hesse Prize at the Kronberg Academy Cello Masterclasses. Of Bulgarian-Chinese heritage, Zlatomir Fung began playing cello at age three. Fung studied at The Juilliard School under the tutelage of Richard Aaron and Timothy Eddy. Fung has been featured on NPR’s Performance Today and has appeared on From the Top six times. In addition to music, he enjoys cinema, reading, and blitz chess.