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The 22nd Nevada Chamber Music Festival
December 28-31 2025
at UNR's Hall Recital Hall
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All 2025 NCMF concerts will feature a pre-concert talk in the hall, one hour prior to concert time
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​​Event Passes $290 includes reserved seating to all six concerts and an invitation to an open rehearsal reception
Single Concert Tickets $55, per concert
reserved seating at UNR's Hall Recital Hall
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Meet the Musicians
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Described as a cellist whose “playing is highly impressive throughout" (The Strad), DMITRI ATAPINE has appeared at leading venues such as Alice Tully Hall, Zankel and Weill Halls at Carnegie Hall, Chicago Cultural Center, and the National Auditorium of Spain. He regularly preforms with The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and is a frequent guest at festivals including Music@Menlo, Chamber Music Northwest, La Musica Sarasota, Cactus Pear, Pacific Music Festival, Aldeburgh, and Aix-en-Provence.
Mr. Atapine's many awards include top prizes at the Carlos Prieto International Cello, and the Premio Vittorio Gui chamber competitions. His recent engagements included collaborations with such distinguished musicians as Cho-Liang Lin, Paul Neubauer, David Finckel, Ani and Ida Kavafian, Wu Han, Bruno Giuranna, David Shifrin, the Emerson, St. Lawrence and Miró quartets. Mr. Atapine’s recordings, including a world-premiere of works by Lowell Liebermann, can be found on the Naxos, Albany, Urtext Digital, BlueGriffin and Bridge record labels.
Mr. Atapine holds several directorships, among them Friends of Chamber Music Kansas City, Apex Concerts, Young Performers at Music@Menlo and Ribadesella Festival. Cello professor at the University of Nevada, Reno, Mr. Atapine holds a doctorate from the Yale School of Music where he was a student of Aldo Parisot.
Trio Azura​
Trio Azura was founded in 2022 at the Colburn Conservatory of Music in Los Angeles, California. The ensemble consists of Canadian violinist Duncan McDougall, South Korean cellist Yejin Hong, and Chinese pianist Yanfeng (Tony) Bai. Beginning in August 2025, they will be the Ensemble in Residence and Colburn Artists at the Colburn School, studying under esteemed faculty members Jonathan Brown, Fabio Bidini, Martin Beaver, and Clive Greensmith.
The Trio won the Grand Prize and Gold Medal at the 51st Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition. In addition, they received the Lift Every Voice Prize for the best performance of a work by an underrepresented composer, as well as the Horszowski Trio Prize. They are also prize winners at the Schoenfeld International String Competition in Harbin, China. In 2023, Trio Azura took part in the Accademia Musicale Chigiana in Siena, Italy, where they were awarded the “Rotary Club Siena” prize and performed in recital with renowned cellist Clive Greensmith. They have participated in masterclasses with internationally acclaimed artists, such as Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Orion Weiss, Pedja Mužijević, Arnaud Sussman, Nicholas Tzavaras, and the Horszowski Trio.
During the 2024-25 season, Trio Azura completed their Fischoff Double Gold Tour across the US Midwest, where they gave workshops and masterclasses for over 500 middle school and high school students in Indiana and Michigan. They also undertook a week-long residency at the American University of Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates, which was a unique opportunity for cultural exchange with Arabic poets. Other season highlights included appearances at the Chamber Music American National conference, La Jolla Music Society, The Music Guild, Friends of Chamber Music of Troy, New York, a full Baroque recital at the Boston Court in Pasadena, Emerging Artists at the Mimir Festival in Fort Worth, and a recital tour at the Emilia Romagna Festival in Italy.
Trio Azura’s upcoming engagements in 2025-2026 season include appearances at the Brisbane Festival in Australia, Nevada Chamber Music Festival, South Bay Chamber Music Society, Pelican Chamber Concerts, and the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel in Belgium.
James Baik​
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Cellist James Baik has been described as an artist with “an undeniable authority,” and one possessing “a real warmth emerging in lyricism” by Belgian newspaper Le Soir, after his astounding performance at the 2021 Queen Elisabeth competition. First Prize Winner of the 2023 Young Concert Artists Susan Wadsworth International Auditions and recipient of the Paul A. Fish Memorial Prize and the Bridgehampton Chamber Music Prize, James is a YCA Jacobs Fellow and is managed worldwide by Young Concert Artists.
James was also a finalist at the 2019 Stulberg International String Competition and would go on to receive the first prize at the Irving M. Klein International Competition.
Highlights from recent and upcoming performances include James’ recital debuts at the Kennedy Center and Merkin Hall, Haydn’s Cello Concerto in C Major with the Kansas City Symphony alongside Jeannette Sorrell, and the Orchestre Royal de Chambre de Wallonie alongside Vahan Mardirossian, Beethoven’s Triple Concerto with the Mobile Symphony, the DvoÅ™ák Cello Concerto with the Colburn Orchestra, under the baton of Sir Andrew Davies at Walt Disney Concert Hall, Brahms’ Double Concerto with the Peninsula Symphony under the baton of Mitchell Sardou Klein, Schumann’s Cello Concerto with the Brevard Music Center, and chamber music performances at the Rockport Chamber Music Festival, Bridgehampton Chamber Music, Nevada Chamber Music Festival, and the Buffalo Chamber Music Society.
An active chamber musician, James is a member of the Galvin Cello Quartet. He has worked with many notable musicians such as Noah Bendix-Balgley, Vadim Gluzman, Atar Arad, Arnaud Sussmann, Miriam Fried, Orion Weiss, Michael Stephen Brown, Tessa Lark, and Alexander Sitkovetsky. James is an alumni of the Meadowmount School of Music, Aspen Music Festival, and the Ravinia Steans Music Institute.
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Molly Carr​
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Ms. Carr is the violist of the Juilliard String Quartet and the Carr-Petrova Duo, and collaborates regularly with many of the world’s most beloved classical artists such as Itzhak Perlman, Emanuel Ax, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, and Pinchas Zukerman. She appears annually on many of the world’s premiere stages, including Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center, Disney Hall, The Kennedy Center, Concertgebouw, Salzburg’s Mozarteum, and London’s Wigmore Hall, and is also a frequent performer and faculty member in festivals around the world – including the Marlboro Music Festival, Kneisel Hall Chamber Music Festival, Meadowmount School of Music, Perlman Music Program, and the Juilliard School’s annual Juilliard String Quartet Seminar.
Highlights of recent seasons include the Juilliard String Quartet’s world premiere performances of Jörg Widmann’s String Quartets No. 8 & No. 10 across North America, Europe, and Asia – including a performance in Berlin’s Pierre Boulez Saal which was subsequently released on Deutsche Grammophon’s STAGE+ in Spring 2025. Additional highlights include and a sold-out recital debut in Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall – praised by the Classical Post as “deeply moving […] categorically astonishing in its beauty, ensemble, artistry, quality of sound, and almost uncanny ability to draw into the music” – and solo recitals at the United Nations, Smithsonian, Jerusalem Music Center, Sala Maria Cristina in Spain, Rikers Island, and the Dheisheh Refugee Camp in Palestine.
Ms. Carr is honored to have commissioned and premiered more than a dozen new works for the viola repertoire, including “In Memoriam” by James MacMillan premiered in 2023 at YellowBarn, “The Blue Hour Duo” by Kenji Bunch premiered in 2024 at Lincoln Center, and the “Novel Voices Suite” by Fernando Arroyo Lascurain premiered in 2019 at Carnegie’s Weill Hall. Additional premieres include works by Andrea Casarrubios, Michelle Barzel Ross, Henrique Eisenmann, Remy Le Boeuf, and J.P. Jofre. The 2025-2026 Season will see the Lincoln Center premiere of “The Hill We Climb Suite for Viola and Piano” – a six-movement suite of works inspired by Youth Poet Laureate Amanda Gorman, composed by six different Americans with uniquely diverse backgrounds and ethnic heritages. Ms. Carr is also an enthusiastic champion of the creation and addition of new viola/piano duo arrangements to the repertoire – regularly adding new transcriptions of both newly-discovered and well-loved works of all genres to the viola/piano duo literature. Additionally, as a member of the Juilliard String Quartet, Ms. Carr looks forward to continuing the quartet’s 80-year legacy of annually commissioning new works for the string quartet repertoire.
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From 1999 until its final season in 2013, Clive Greensmith was a member of the world-renowned Tokyo String Quartet, giving over one hundred performances each year in the most prestigious international venues, including New York’s Carnegie Hall, Sydney Opera House, London’s South Bank, Paris Chatelet, Berlin Philharmonie, Vienna Musikverein, and Suntory Hall in Tokyo. He has collaborated with international artists such as Andras Schiff, Pinchas Zukerman, Leon Fleisher, Lynn Harrell, Dmitry Sitkovetsky, Alicia de Larrocha, and Emanuel Ax.
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Mr. Greensmith has given guest performances at prominent festivals worldwide. In North America, he has performed at the Aspen Music Festival, Marlboro Music Festival, Music@Menlo, La Jolla SummerFest, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Cleveland Chamber Fest, and the Ravinia Festival. He is a regular guest of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and will undertake a national tour with Paul Huang, Wu Han, and Matthew Lipman in 2020. Internationally he has appeared at the Salzburg Festival in Austria, Edinburgh Festival in Scotland, Pacific Music Festival in Japan and the Hong Kong Arts Festival. As a soloist, Clive Greensmith has performed with the London Symphony Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Seoul Philharmonic, and the RAI Orchestra of Rome among others.
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During a career spanning over twenty-five years, Mr. Greensmith has built up a catalog of landmark recordings, most notably The Complete Beethoven String Quartets for Harmonia Mundi with the Tokyo String Quartet, Mozart’s ‘Prussian’ Quartets with the Tokyo String Quartet, Brahms Cello Sonatas with Boris Berman for Biddulph Recordings, and Clarinet Trios of Beethoven and Brahms with Jon Nakamatsu and Jon Manasse for Harmonia Mundi. In June 2018 he performed the newly reconstructed Pál Hermann cello concerto (1925) with the Lviv Philharmonic Orchestra under conductor, Theodor Kuchar. Toccata Classics released a live recording of his world premiere performance of the Concerto with Theodore Kuchar and the Lviv International Symphony Orchestra in the spring of 2019.
Deeply committed to the mentoring and development of young musicians, Clive has enjoyed a long and distinguished teaching career. In addition to his fifteen-year residency with the Tokyo String Quartet at Yale University, Mr. Greensmith has served as a faculty member at the Yehudi Menuhin School and Royal Northern College of Music in England, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and the Manhattan School of Music. In 2013, following the final concerts of the Tokyo String Quartet, Mr. Greensmith joined the faculty at the Colburn School where he is currently a professor of cello and coaches chamber music for the Conservatory of Music and the Music Academy. Students of Mr. Greensmith have gone on to secure major positions in orchestras throughout the world and have won a number of prestigious awards.
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In July 2019, he succeeded Günther Pichler as director of string chamber music at the Accademia Chigiana International Festival and Summer Academy in Siena, Italy. Also in 2019, Greensmith became the Artistic Director of the Nevada Chamber Music Festival.
Mr. Greensmith is a founding member of the Montrose Trio with pianist Jon Kimura Parker, and violinist Martin Beaver.
Hanako Greensmith ​
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Hanako is a graduate of Pace University's Class of 2018 with a BFA in musical theatre. She has been a part of workshops, concerts, and off-Broadway productions, but is best known for her role as Violet Mikami in NBC's Chicago Fire.
John Lenz​
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John Lenz, cellist and hornist, retired from the UNR music department in 2010 after 38 years of teaching. He received his MM from the New England Conservatory, studying cello with Jules Eskin and horn with Harry Shapiro, both members of the Boston symphony.
He serves as principal horn with both the Reno Phil and the Reno Chamber Orchestra where he has played since 1972. John was a member of the Telluride Chamber players and the Argenta ensemble for over 30 years and still plays with the Great Basin Brass.
Ruth Lenz
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Ruth Lenz is concertmaster of the Reno Chamber Orchestra and the Reno Philharmonic. She performs as recitalist, chamber musician, soloist and concertmaster in venues throughout the United States.
She has shared the stage with such notable performers as Itzhak Perlman, Edgar Meyer, Luciano Pavarotti and Natalie Cole. In addition to the Nevada Chamber Music Festival, Ruth has participated in the Telluride Chamber Music Festival, CO; Kammermusiktage (Germany); Mayshad Festival (Morocco); La Musica, FL; Sunriver, OR; Classical Tahoe, NV; Festival Napa, CA; and Spoleto Festival USA, SC.
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.
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An avid chamber musician, Park has collaborated with such musicians as David Shifrin, Ani Kavafian, Ida Kavafian, Paul Neubauer and many others appearing frequently at Yellow Barn Festival (Vermont), Santander Music Festival (Spain), Great Mountains Festival (Korea), Music@Menlo Festival (California), Chamber Music Northwest (Oregon) and Nevada Chamber Music Festival. She is the founding member of Atapine-Park duo and Atria Ensemble, groups that respectively won the prizes at Premio Vittorio Gui International Chamber Music Competition (Italy) and Plowman Chamber Music Competition (Missouri). Her duo recordings for cello and piano with cellist Dmitri Atapine were distributed by Naxos to a great critical acclaim. The duo's recent world-premiere recording of Lowell Liebermann's complete works for cello and piano was reviewed as "a valuable disc for the collector" by American Record Guide. Her solo CD "Klavier 1853" was released in 2017 under Blue Griffin label. An advocate for new music as a passionate musician who pursued career as a composer as well, Park enjoys working closely with contemporary composers. She has commissioned and premiered works by Lowell Liebermann, Patrick Castillo, Libby Larsen, Ezra Laderman and David Ludwig to name a few.
Park holds a Bachelor of Music degree at Korea National University with Professor Daejin Kim, Master of Music degree and Artist Diploma from Yale School of Music with Professor Peter Frankl, where she was a post-graduate artist associate following her graduation. She holds the Doctor of Musical Arts degree from Peabody Conservatory with Professor Yong Hi Moon. Currently, Park is the Artistic Co-Director of Friends of Chamber Music Kansas City, Co-Director of Music@Menlo Chamber Music Festival Smith Family Young Performers Program and Associate Professor of Piano at the University of Nevada, Reno, where she also is the Artistic Co-Director of the Apex Concerts.
Yuhsin Galaxy Su ​
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Yuhsin Galaxy Su, from Taipei, Taiwan is known for her“unique vision” and “dedicated musical interpretations.” As a clarinetist and pianist, She has performed as a soloist and collaborator around the world.
In 2024, Galaxy won the clarinet audition for the San Francisco Symphony and will join the 2024 season as a section clarinetist in the symphony.
In 2013 and 2014, Galaxy was the top prize winner in the HSNU concerto competition, perform-ing works by Weber and Mozart. In 2015, she was awarded a full scholarship to participate the International Morningside Music Bridge in Canada. She subsequently won third prize at the 18th Morningside Music Bridge Concerto Competition, as well as the audience prize. At the age of 15, Galaxy released her first album "The Best of my First Fifteen Years.“ In the following year, she won the first prize of the Young Classical Virtuoso of Tomorrow Music Competition.
Galaxy entered Curtis Institute of Music at the age of 16. There, she studied with Anthony McGill, principal clarinet of the New York Philharmonic. She was chosen to be a member of the Curtis 20/21 Ensemble, offering her opportunities to perform Pierrot Lunaire in fully choreo-graphed productions at the Kimmel Center, Columbia University, Kennedy Center and Curtis Field Recital Hall.
In 2022, Galaxy entered the prestigious Colburn School of Music to pursue her master's degree under the tutelage of Yehuda Gilad. During her time at Colburn, she was invited to perform as a concert soloist at the Musique et Vin Music Festival and as a chamber musician at the Marlboro Music Festival.
Her past accomplishments include being invited as a soloist to the International Clarinet Associa-tion and the Beijing international Clarinet Festival, winning a full-scholarship to participate the Pacific Music Festival, winning the Chimei Arts Award twice, and an acceptance to the Juilliard School as a Kovner fellowship.
Ray Ushikobo ​
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Ray Ushikubo is a twenty-four-year-old Japanese-American pianist and violinist who has performed on the stages of Carnegie Hall and Walt Disney Concert Hall, and appeared on NBC’s The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. Ushikubo made his orchestral debut at age ten with the Young Musicians Foundation Orchestra in Los Angeles’s Dorothy Chandler Pavilion with Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 1 alongside conductor Teddy Abrams. A recipient of the prestigious Davidson Fellow Laureate Award in 2014, Ushikubo was named a Young Steinway Artist and won the 2017 Hilton Head International Piano Competition and the 2016 Piano Concerto Competition at the Aspen Music Festival and School. Ushikubo was featured as a Young Artist-in-Residence of the national radio broadcast Performance Today with host Fred Child and he has been featured on NPR’s From the Top where he was named a Jack Kent Cooke Young Artist.
James Winn​
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James Winn, piano and composition professor at the University of Nevada, Reno since 1997, emeritus since 2024, made his professional debut with the Denver Symphony at the age of thirteen, and has been performing widely in North America, Europe, and Asia ever since. 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 (Musical America wrote about the team “Not since Josef and Rosina Lhevinne regaled us in the thirties have we heard such technical prowess paired with such genuine musical values”). Dr. Winn has been a solo pianist with the New York City Ballet, a member of the New York New Music Ensemble, of Hexagon (woodwind quintet plus piano), and the pianist and resident composer of the Telluride Chamber Music Festival, as well as a frequent guest with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Speculum, the Group for Contemporary Music, Cactus Pear Chamber Music Festival, La Musica International Chamber Music Festival, and Bargemusic. Well-known as a specialist in new music, he has been involved in numerous world premieres and premiere recordings by many renowned composers, among them 13 Pulitzer Prize winners. He was a member of Argenta, UNR’s resident piano trio, a founding member and regular participant in the Nevada Chamber Music Festival, and performs frequently in recital with internationally acclaimed New York based violinist Rolf Schulte. An active recording artist, Winn is featured in more than four dozen CDs as soloist, chamber musician, and composer. He has received numerous career recognitions including an Artist Fellowship from the Nevada State Council of the Arts and the Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts.