2012 NCMF Musicians
Theodore Kuchar (Artistic Director and Viola)
The 2012-13 season is Theodore Kuchar’s tenth as Music Director and Conductor of the Reno Chamber Orchestra, and his ninth as Artistic Director of the Nevada Chamber Music Festival. He also currently holds the positions of Music Director and Conductor of the Fresno Philharmonic, Principal Conductor of the Janacék Philharmonic (of Ostrava, Czech Republic), Artistic Director and Principal Conductor of the Orquesta Sinfonica de Venezuela, and Resident Conductor at the Kent Blossom Music Festival, the educational institution and summer home of The Cleveland Orchestra. Maestro Kuchar served as Artistic Director and Principal Conductor of the National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine from 1992 through the beginning of 2000; upon completion of that contract, he was awarded the title of Conductor Laureate for Life. For sixteen years he served as Artistic Director of The Australian Festival of Chamber Music, regarded as the pre-eminent chamber music festival of the Southern Hemisphere. He also served for ten years as Music Director of the Boulder Philharmonic.
During the past several seasons, guest conducting engagements have taken him to major musical centers including Amsterdam, Berlin, Chicago, Helsinki, Hong Kong, London, Madrid, Prague, Seoul, Sydney and Winnipeg. Soloists with whom Kuchar has collaborated include James Galway, Jessye Norman, Lynn Harrell, Itzhak Perlman, Yo-Yo Ma, Sarah Chang, Mstislav Rostropovich and Frederica von Stade. Kuchar is one of the most prolifically recorded conductors of the past decade, appearing on almost 100 compact discs on the Naxos, Marco Polo, Brilliant Classics, and Ondine labels. His recordings include the complete symphonies of Kalinnikov, Lyatoshynsky, Martinu and Prokofiev, as well as ballet music and major orchestral works by Smetana, Dvorak, Glazunov, Moussorgsky, Mozart, Shchedrin, Shostakovich and Tchaikovsky. His recording of Lyatoshynsky’s Symphonies Nos. 2 and 3 was awarded the ABC’s “Best International Recording of the Year” in 1994, and his Naxos recording with violinist James Buswell of the complete works for violin and orchestra by Walter Piston was hailed by Gramophone as a “Record of the Year” for 1999.
Mr. Kuchar’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from Jill Winter.
Dmitri Atapine (Cello)
Dmitri Atapine has been described as “a splendid, elegant cellist” (Mundo Clasico), with “brilliant technical chops” (Gramophone), whose playing is “highly impressive throughout” (The Strad). As a soloist and recitalist, he has appeared on some of the world’s foremost stages, including Zankel and Weill halls at Carnegie Hall, Chicago Cultural Center, and the National Auditorium of Spain. His frequent festival appearances have included Music@Menlo, Cactus Pear, Nevada Chamber Music, Miguel Bernal Jiménez, with performances broadcast on radio and television in Spain, Italy, the United States, Canada, Mexico, and South Korea.
Dr. Atapine’s multiple awards include top prizes at the Carlos Prieto, the Florian Ocampo, and the Llanes cello competitions, as well as the Plowman, New England, and the Premio Vittorio Gui chamber competitions. His recent engagements include collaborations with the Parker and St. Lawrence String Quartets, as well as Wu Han, Ani and Ida Kavafian, David Shifrin, and Richard O’Neill. In collaboration with pianist Adela Hyeyeon Park, Dr. Atapine recently released a world premiere recording of Lowell Liebermann’s complete works for cello and piano on the Blue Griffin label. Other recordings can be found on the Naxos, Albany, Urtext Digital, and Bridge record labels. Dr. Atapine obtained his bachelors and masters degrees at Michigan State University with Prof. Suren Bagratuni. He holds a Doctorate and Artist Diploma from Yale School of Music, where he was a student of Aldo Parisot. The artistic director of Ribadesella Festival, and Argenta Concert Series, Dr. Atapine is the cello professor at the University of Nevada, Reno, and a member of the Argenta Trio.
Mr. Atapine’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from Ingrid and George Ryst.
Dustin Budish (Viola)
Dustin Budish is the Acting Principal Violist of the Reno Chamber Orchestra and Principal Violist of the Reno Philharmonic. A native of Reno, after graduating from the Washoe County School District, he went on to study at Oberlin College and the Cleveland Institute with Jeffrey Irvine for which he received his Bachelor of Music degree in viola performance and then received his MM with honors at the New England Conservatory with Martha Katz. While in school, Mr. Budish was a founding member of the Mephisto Quartet, which worked with and performed alongside members of the Cavani, Tokyo, Vermeer, and Cleveland Quartets, and received the Russell Award at the Coleman Chamber Music Competition in 2001.
As a Chamber musician, he has performed at the Ravinia and Norfolk Festivals, and in 2005 was invited to Israel to perform with Maxim Vengerov’s Mozart Project with the Verbier Festival Chamber Orchestra. He has also performed at the Cactus Pear Music Festival. As a member of the New World Symphony, Mr. Budish was featured as soloist with the orchestra as a winner of the annual concerto competition. He is a member of the Sun Valley Summer Symphony, and is also a regular substitute with the San Francisco Symphony. Mr. Budish is the Personnel Manager and Librarian of the RCO.
Mr. Budish’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from Sue and Dieter von Hennig.
James Buswell (Violin)
Active as a concerto soloist, chamber musician, recitalist, conductor and educator, James Buswell is one of the most versatile musicians performing today. He has appeared with virtually all of the major orchestras in the United States and Canada, as well as with orchestras in Europe, Asia, Australia and South America, and has collaborated with such distinguished conductors as Leonard Bernstein, Pierre Boulez, Zubin Mehta, André Previn, George Szell and Michael Tilson Thomas. James Buswell is as closely associated with new music as he has been with the standard repertoire. World premiere performances include works by Donald Erb, Charles Wuorinen, Gian Carlo Menotti, Ned Rorem, Leon Kirchner, John Harbison, Gunther Schuller, William Bolcom, Ellen Taaffe Zwilich and Yehudi Wyner. Recording credits include the violin concerti and chamber music of Walter Piston and a 2003 Grammy nomination for a recording of the Samuel Barber Violin Concerto.
For many years a member of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and the Bach Aria Group, Mr. Buswell continues to appear as guest artist with many chamber music organizations. While pursuing an active concert career, James Buswell received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Harvard University with a major in early Renaissance painting and sculpture. Currently a faculty member at the New England Conservatory of Music, he resides in Boston with his wife, cellist Carol Ou.
Mr. Buswell’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from William Douglass.
Molly Carr (Viola)
Praised for “ravishing sound” (The Strad) and “passionate talent and beautiful poise… all in one package” (AVS), Reno native Molly Carr is a former violist of the Serafin String Quartet. Ms. Carr was a winner of the 2010 Juilliard Viola Concerto Competition, making her New York solo debut with the Juilliard Orchestra at Lincoln Center in April 2010. She has won several other major honors, including a top prize in the 2008 Primrose International Viola Competition; first prize in the National Solo Competition of the American String Teacher’s Association; a scholarship endowment from the Davidson Institute for Talent Development; and the Reno Chamber Orchestra’s 2010 College Concerto Competition.
Recent performances have included a Leon Fleisher Young Artists Concert at Carnegie Hall; and an Insight Series concert with the New York Philharmonic at Lincoln Center. Ms. Carr appeared on PBS’s Live From Lincoln Center and CBS’s Kennedy Center Honors Program with Itzhak Perlman, Pinchas Zukerman and fellow students of the Perlman Music Program. As a chamber musician, she has collaborated with renowned artists Itzhak Perlman, Carter Brey, Peter Wiley, Ida Kavafian, and many more. Ms. Carr received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees from The Juilliard School. She has studied under Heidi Castleman, Virginia Blakeman Lenz, and Steven Tenenbom.
Ms. Carr’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from anonymous friends.
Martin Chalifour (Violin)
Martin Chalifour has held the prestigious post of Principal Concertmaster of the Los Angeles Philharmonic since 1995. He also is currently a professor at the University of Southern California’s Thornton School of Music. The recipient of various grants and awards in his native Canada, he graduated with honors from the Montreal Conservatory at the age of 18, and then moved to Philadelphia to pursue studies at the Curtis Institute of Music. In 1986, Mr. Chalifour received a Certificate of Honor at the Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow and was a laureate of the Montreal International Competition the following year. Since then he has concertized extensively, playing hundreds of concerto performances in a repertoire of more than fifty works under conductors such as Pierre Boulez, Charles Dutoit and Christoph Eschenbach. Mr. Chalifour is a frequent guest at other music festivals, including the Mainly Mozart Festival in San Diego, the Sarasota Music Festival, and the Ottawa International Music Festival.
Mr. Chalifour began his orchestral career as Associate Concertmaster of the Atlanta Symphony in 1984. Subsequently he occupied the same position for five years in The Cleveland Orchestra where he also served as Acting Concertmaster.
Mr. Chalifour’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from Lillian and Steve Frank.
Ya-Fei Chuang (Piano)
Ya-Fei Chuang has appeared at numerous international festivals, among them the Beethoven Festival in Warsaw with Christoph Eschenbach, the Taipei International Music Festival, the European Music Festival (Stuttgart), the Bach Festival (Leipzig) Schleswig-Holstein, Ravinia, Sarasota, Gilmore, Tanglewood, and the Oregon Bach Festival. She has performed at venues such as the Berlin Philharmonic Hall, the Schauspielhaus Berlin, the Gewandhaus Leipzig, and Symphony Hall in Boston. Ms. Chuang has performed as duo partner with James Buswell, Steven Isserlis, Kim Kashkashian, Robert Levin. The Ruhr Piano Festival has released two CDs of her performances there—her May 2007 solo recital, which was also distributed as a premium by the music magazine ‘Fono Forum’; and the Mendelssohn G-minor piano concerto. Fanfare Magazine hailed her “delicacy and fluidity of touch. She seems ideally suited to Mendelssohn’s demands…this version now sits at the top of the pile of Mendelssohn Firsts, alongside Perahia, Serkin, and John Ogdon.”
Her recent engagements include concerts and recordings in the Berlin Philharmonic Hall, with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, the Malaysian Philharmonic, appearances on national TV in Tel Aviv, at the National Concert Hall Taipei, in Hong-Kong, England, Germany, Austria, South America and throughout the US. She has recorded solo, concerto and chamber music works for Naxos, Harmonia Mundi, ECM, and New York Philomusica Records. Her recording of Hindemith’s chamber music works with Spectrum Berlin was awarded a special prize by the International Record Review 2009.
Ms. Chuang’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from Ursula and Richard Tracy.
Franklin Cohen (Clarinet)
Principal clarinet of The Cleveland Orchestra since 1976, Franklin Cohen has distinguished himself as one of the great clarinetists of his generation. At age 22, he became the first clarinetist awarded first prize at the International Munich competition. Mr. Cohen has appeared as soloist with The Cleveland Orchestra in nearly 200 performances, appearing with Lorin Maazel, Christoph von Doh?anyi, Franz Welser-Möst, and others. He recorded Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto with the Orchestra and Christoph von Dohnanyi, and is also the soloist in Debussy’s First Rhapsody recording with the Orchestra and Pierre Boulez, which won two Grammy Awards in 1996. Mr. Cohen has recorded the Brahms clarinet sonatas with Vladimir Ashkenazy.
Mr. Cohen studied at the Juilliard School, and began his professional career when Stokowski chose him as principal clarinet for the American Symphony Orchestra. Mr. Cohen has also been principal clarinet of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and the Casals Festival Orchestra. He has participated in the Aspen, Marlboro, and Santa Fe music festivals. He has performed with many leading string quartets, including the Emerson, Guarneri, and Takács. Mr. Cohen has collaborated as a chamber musician with leading artists including Emanuel Ax, Pinchas Zukerman, Mitsuko Uchida, Richard Goode, and Jessye Norman. Mr. Cohen has chaired the Cleveland Institute of Music clarinet department since 1976, and many of his former students hold important positions throughout the music world. Mr. Cohen has two children, both of whom graduated from the Cleveland Institute of Music. Diana is a concert violinist and Alexander is a professional timpanist.
Mr. Cohen’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from Kris and Patrick Ellingsworth.
Bella Hristova (Violin)
Bella Hristova has appeared as soloist with Jaime Laredo and the NY String Orchestra at Carnegie Hall, and made solo appearances with orchestras across the United States. She has performed with the Chamber Music Society Two, and made return engagements to the Marlboro and Santa Fe Chamber Music Festivals. First Prize Winner in the 2008-09 Young Concert Artists International Auditions, Ms. Hristova made her Young Concert Artists Series debut during the 2009-10 season at Merkin Concert Hall in New York, and at the Kennedy Center in Washington DC. At these auditions, she was the first recipient of the Helen Armstrong Violin Fellowship. As Winner of First Prize in the 2007 Michael Hill International Competition (New Zealand), Ms. Hristova made a concert tour of the country and recorded a CD for Naxos. Her recently released CD, “Bella: Unaccompanied” was recorded in Reno in July 2012 for the A.W. Tonegold Label.
Born in Pleven, Bulgaria in 1985, Ms. Hristova began violin studies at the age of six. At 12, she participated in master classes with Ruggiero Ricci at the Salzburg Mozarteum. In 2003, she entered The Curtis Institute, where she worked with Ida Kavafian and Steven Tenenbom. She received her Artist Diploma with Jaime Laredo at Indiana University in 2010. Ms. Hristova has appeared numerous times on A Prairie Home Companion on National Public Radio.
Ms. Hristova’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from Cecilia Lee, Ltd.
Mark Kosower (Cello)
Avery Fisher Career Grant-winner Mark Kosower is the Principal Cello of the Cleveland Orchestra. He has appeared as guest soloist with orchestras worldwide including the Orchestre de Paris, the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra, Hong Kong Philharmonic, and the China National Symphony. In the U.S., he has soloed with the orchestras of Cleveland, St. Paul, Seattle, Minnesota, and the Ravinia Festival, among many others. He has appeared in recital at Lincoln Center, the Kennedy Center, Aspen Music Festival, and in other major cities around the world. Mr. Kosower has recorded extensively for the Ambitus, Delos, Naxos, and VAI labels.
In addition to his activities as a soloist, Mark Kosower was named Teacher of Cello at the Cleveland Institute of Music, in 2009. His previous posts include Solo Cellist of the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra in Germany from 2006-10, and Professor of Cello and Chamber Music at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music from 2005-07. Mark Kosower began his cello studies with his father at the age of 1 ½ and later studied with Janos Starker at Indiana University and Joel Krosnick at the Juilliard School.
Mr. Kosower’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from Cecile and Gordon Peters.
Ruth Lenz (Violin)
Ruth Lenz is concertmaster of the Reno Chamber Orchestra, the Reno Philharmonic, and Nevada Opera. She performs as recitalist, chamber musician, soloist and concertmaster in venues throughout the western United States. She has shared the stage with such notable performers as Itzhak Perlman, Edgar Meyer, Luciano Pavarotti and Natalie Cole. Ruth has been a violinist with the Telluride Chamber Music Festival in Colorado and with the Nevada Chamber Music Festival. She has also played in the Barth (Germany), La Musica (Florida), Sunriver (Oregon), and Spoleto (South Carolina) Festivals.
Ruth began her violin studies with her mother at age 2, earned her Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from the University of Nevada, Reno studying with Phillip Ruder, and her Doctorate from the University of Illinois at Champaign/Urbana where she studied with Sherban Lupu and Danwen Jiang. In addition to performing, Dr. Lenz has a passion for teaching and maintains a large studio of violin and chamber music students. In her free time, she is an avid equestrian and outdoor enthusiast. Ruth Lenz plays a Simone Fernando Sacconi violin.
Ms. Lenz’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from Heidemarie Rochlin.
Robert Levin (Piano)
As an accomplished period pianist, Robert Levin’s solo engagements include the orchestras of Atlanta, Berlin, Birmingham, Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, Los Angeles, Montreal, Utah and Vienna with such conductors as James Conlon, Bernard Haitink, Sir Neville Marriner, Seiji Ozawa, Sir Simon Rattle and Joseph Silverstein. Levin also is renowned for his improvised embellishments and cadenzas in classical period repertoire. He has made recordings for most of the world’s major labels. These include a Mozart concerto cycle for Decca/London with Christopher Hogwood and the Academy of Ancient Music; a Beethoven concerto cycle for DG Archiv with John Eliot Gardiner and the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique; and the complete Bach harpsichord concertos with Helmuth Rilling; as well as the six English Suites (on piano) and both books of the Well-Tempered Clavier as part of Hänssler’s 172-CD Edition Bachakademie. He is equally devoted to contemporary music, having recorded a great deal of this repertoire, including the complete piano works of Dutilleux on the ECM label. Levin’s active career as a chamber musician includes long associations with the violist Kim Kashkashian, frequent collaborations with his wife, and NCMF artist, Ya-Fei Chuang, as well as performances with many other artists of the Nevada Chamber Music Festival.
In addition to his performing activities, Levin is a noted theorist and Mozart scholar. His completion of the Mozart C-minor Mass, commissioned by Carnegie Hall, premiered in January 2005 and has since been recorded and widely performed. Levin is president of the International Johann Sebastian Bach Competition (Leipzig, Germany), a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and Dwight P. Robinson, Jr. Professor of the Humanities at Harvard University.
Mr. Levin’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from Nancy and Jack Rose.
Carol Ou (Cello)
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). As the cellist of the Carpe Diem String Quartet, she frequently tours all over the US performing an eclectic mix of classical string quartet repertoire with many crossover genres of music. Solo and chamber music engagements have taken her to prestigious venues in New York, Boston, Taipei, and Kiev. She has collaborated with artists such as Hilary Hahn, Timothy Eddy, Midori, András Schiff, and Malcolm Bilson. Ms. Ou’s recordings, issued by the Naxos and CRI labels and Taiwan’s Chi-Mei Foundation, include beloved concerti by Haydn, Tchaikovsky and Elgar. She has recorded extensively. Her Naxos recording of Walter Piston’s Chamber Music won Chamber Music America’s Best Chamber Music CD award in 2001.
A graduate of Yale University, Ms. Ou received her BA magna cum laude from Yale College and her master’s and doctorate degrees from the Yale School of Music. She has taught students at Yale, MIT and Harvard University and was the director of strings, chamber music and orchestral studies at Gordon College. She is on the faculty at the New England Conservatory of Music, and serves as chamber music director of the Heifetz International Summer Music Institute in New Hampshire. Ms. Ou has given cello and chamber music master classes around the world.
Ms. Ou’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from Karen Penner-Johnson and Marc Johnson.
Pascal and Ami Rogé (Piano)
Pascal Rogé is one of the great interpreters of French piano music–his name is simply synonymous with the best playing of French repertoire in the world today. For several years, Pascal has enjoyed playing recitals for four-hands/two-pianos with his partner in life and in music Ami Rogé. Together, they have traveled the world appearing at prestigious festivals and concert halls. The have appeared in New York Carnegie Hall, Hong Kong Joy of Music Festival, the Australian Festival of Chamber Music, the Beijing International Piano Festival, on tour in New Zealand, at Incontri in Terra di Sienna in Tuscany, at the Salisbury international Festival, the Thaxted Festival, Music for Galway, The Sage Gateshead, Nottingham’s Lakeside Arts Centre, London’s Chopin Society, Petworth Festival, Lille Piano(s) Festival, and Kings Place in London.
Additionally they have made a growing number of orchestral appearances together playing two-piano concertos by Poulenc Mendelssohn, Saint-Saens, and Mozart, including the Shanghai Symphony, the Hong Kong Sinfonietta, the Poznan Philharmonic, the Metropolitan Orchestra of Lisbon, the Jyväskylä Symphony Orchestra in Finland, Het Gelders Orkest in Arnhem, North Carolina Symphony in Raleigh, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, and l’Orchestre National de France in Paris. In 2011, they premiered a concerto “Two of Us” written for them by an Australian composer Matthew Hindson, with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra conducted by Vladimir Ashkenazy.
Pascal and Ami have released a CD set of French repertoire for four hands and two-pianos called “Wedding Cake,” which included “Ami Suite,” a work written for them by Japanese-American composer Paul Chihara. Ami is also featured in Volume 5 of Pascal Rogé Complete Debussy collection, which was released this past year to commemorate Debussy’s 150th anniversary. Their next CD will be released very shortly, and will include their own two-piano version of Debussy’s “La Mer.” All the recordings are released under Onyx Label “Rogé Edition.”
“I have always said that my ambition was to play the music I love with the people I love; this has never been more true than today, since I have met Ami. With her I have been able to continue my search of sounds and colours throughout the French repertoire but now with four hands and two hearts. I believe that the love we share every day in our life together is our inspiration for interpreting the music and the emotions that transforms a double black and white piano recital into a single colourful dream.” (Pascal Rogé)
Mr. Rogé’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from Bobbi and Dale Lazzarone.
Stephanie Sant’Ambrogio (Violin)
Praised as an “expressive and passionate chamber musician” by the San Antonio Express-News, Stephanie Sant’Ambrogio has enjoyed a varied performing and recording career as a soloist, chamber musician and orchestral leader. Assistant Professor of Violin and Viola at the University of Nevada, Reno (www.unr.edu) and member of the Argenta Trio, she is also Artistic Director of Cactus Pear Music Festival (www.cpmf.us), which she founded in 1997 while serving as Concertmaster of the San Antonio Symphony, and she is in her third season as Concertmaster of the Fresno Philharmonic Orchestra. Former First Assistant Principal Second Violin of The Cleveland Orchestra under Christoph von Dohnanyi, she toured and recorded internationally with this ensemble for eight seasons. Ms. Sant’Ambrogio has performed as a soloist and chamber musician throughout the U.S. as well as in Canada, Estonia, Sweden, Ghana, Italy, Peru, Chile and Mexico.
With a discography of over seventy-five orchestral and chamber music CDs, her recent releases include Late Dates with Mozart and Going Solo: Unaccompanied Works for Violin & Viola on the MSR Classics label, and Argenta Trio: The Piano Trios of Felix Mendelssohn on Bridge Records. Ms. Sant’Ambrogio studied with and was the graduate assistant to Donald Weilerstein at The Eastman School of Music, where she received her Master of Music degree. Previously she received her Bachelor of Music degree with distinction from Indiana University as a scholarship student of Laurence Shapiro and James Oliver Buswell. Ms. Sant’Ambrogio plays a violin crafted in 1757 by J.B. Guadagnini of Milan.
Ms. Sant’Ambrogio’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from Marsha and Les Cohen.
Robert Vernon (Viola)
A violist of international reputation, Robert Vernon is in his thirty-fifth season as principal violist of the Cleveland Orchestra. He has performed with orchestras in St. Louis, Denver, Detroit, Berlin, and the New World Symphony, and appeared as soloist with the Cleveland Orchestra in over 100 concerts both in Cleveland and on tour in the U.S., Canada and Europe. He has collaborated with most of the great conductors of our time including Lorin Maazel, Kurt Masur, Pierre Boulez, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Seiji Ozawa, and Sir George Solti. An active chamber musician, he has performed with artists such as Vladimir Ashkenazy, Lorin Maazel, Lynn Harrell, Elmar Oliveira, and Robert Levin, and is a regular participant in numerous North American music festivals.
Mr. Vernon chairs the viola department of the Cleveland Institute of Music, and is professor of viola at the Juilliard School. His students hold major positions as chamber musicians and teachers and have won positions with virtually every major orchestra in this country. He has recorded works by Berlioz, Mozart, and Strauss with the Cleveland Orchestra, and recorded the Schoenfield Viola Concerto with the Berlin Radio Orchestra. He has made numerous chamber music recordings for Telarc, Decca/London and Innova.
Mr. Vernon’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from Jannet Vreeland.
Orion Weiss (Piano)
One of the most sought-after soloists of his generation, pianist Orion Weiss has performed with orchestras, including the Chicago Symphony, Boston Symphony, Philadelphia Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, and New York Philharmonic. He performed the Scriabin Piano Concerto with the Reno Chamber Orchestra in 2011, and made his recital debut at the Kennedy Center later that year. In 2005, he toured Israel with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Itzhak Perlman.
Mr. Weiss performs regularly with his wife, pianist Anna Polonsky. As a recitalist and chamber musician, he has appeared at venues and festivals including Lincoln Center, the Ravinia Festival, and Chamber Music Northwest. In 2005 he made his New York recital debut at Alice Tully Hall, as well as his European debut in a recital at the Musée du Louvre in Paris. He was a member of the Chamber Music Society Two program of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center from 2002-2004. Mr. Weiss released a recital album of Dvorak, Prokofiev, and Bartok in spring 2012, and also spearheaded a recording project of the complete Gershwin works for piano and orchestra with the Buffalo Philharmonic and JoAnn Falletta. He was named the Classical Recording Foundation’s Young Artist of the Year in September 2010. An Avery Fisher Career Grant recipient, as well as winner of the Gina Bachauer Scholarship, Mr. Weiss studied at Juilliard and the Cleveland Institute of Music with teachers including Paul Schenly, Daniel Shapiro, Sergei Babayan, Kathryn Brown, and Edith Reed and Emanuel Ax.
Mr. Weiss’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from Trudy Larson and Ron Luschar.
Peter Wiley (Cello)
Cellist Peter Wiley enjoys a prolific career as a performer and teacher. He is a member of the piano quartet, Opus One, a group he co-founded in 1998 with pianist Anne-Marie McDermott, violinist Ida Kavafian and violist Steven Tenenbom. Mr. Wiley attended the Curtis Institute of Music as a student of David Soyer. He joined the Pittsburgh Symphony in 1974. The following year he was appointed Principal cellist of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, a position he held for eight years. From 1987 through 1998, Mr. Wiley was cellist of the Beaux Arts Trio. In 2001 he succeeded his mentor, David Soyer, as cellist of the Guarneri Quartet. The quartet retired from the concert stage in 2009.
He has been awarded an Avery Fischer Career Grant, nominated for a Grammy Award in 1998 with the Beaux Arts Trio and in 2009 with the Guarneri Quartet. Mr. Wiley participates at leading festivals including Music from Angel Fire, Chamber Music Nothwest, OK Mozart, Santa Fe, Bravo! and Bridgehampton. He continues his long association with the Marlboro Music Festival, dating back to 1971. Mr. Wiley teaches at the Curtis Institute of Music and Bard College Conservatory of Music.
Mr. Wiley’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from Christine and John Worthington.
James Winn (Piano)
James Winn, piano and composition professor at the University of Nevada, Reno since 1997, has performed widely in North America, Europe, and Japan. With his duo-piano partner, Cameron Grant, he was a recipient of the top prize given in the two-piano category of the 1980 Munich Competition. Dr. Winn has been a solo pianist with the New York City Ballet, a member of the New York New Music Ensemble and of Hexagon, as well as a frequent guest with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and the Group for Contemporary Music. Well-known as a specialist in new music, he has been involved in world premieres and premiere recordings by many renowned composers, including thirteen Pulitzer Prize winners. Dr. Winn is a member of Argenta, UNR’s resident chamber group, the pianist of the Telluride Chamber Music Festival, and performs regularly in recital with New York based violinist Rolf Schulte. He is featured in more than three dozen CDs, and his compositions have been performed internationally.
He has received the UNR College of Liberal Arts’ Mousel/Feltner award for creative activity, an Artist Fellowship Grant from the Nevada Arts Council, the 2007 Award for Creative Activity from Board of Regents of the Nevada System of Higher Education, and the 2009 Governor’s Arts Award for Excellence in the Arts.
Mr. Winn’s appearance at the 2012 Nevada Chamber Music Festival is made possible by a generous gift from Kathy and Fred Jakolat.