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Chamber Music Institute Alumni Updates
(November 2011)

Music@Menlo’s Chamber Music Institute offers students daily interaction with world-renowned musicians, multiple performance opportunities, and an engaging series of classes and lectures. This immersive, personal, and rigorous approach to teaching is paying off, and we are pleased to share with you some recent accomplishments of our talented alumni. We will add new updates to the Web site quarterly, so please check back often. If you have alumni notes you’d like to share, please submit them online here.

Music@Menlo congratulates the five International Program alumni listed below, who were recently invited to join the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s CMS Two program in the 2012–13 season:

Gloria Chien (piano, International Program ’06; Chamber Music Institute Faculty ’07, ’08, and ’09; and Chamber Music Institute Director ’10 and ’11)

Romie de Guise-Langlois (clarinet, International Program ’09)

Sean Lee (violin, International Program ’09 and Chamber Music Institute Faculty ’10 and ’11)

Mihai Marica (cello, International Program ’10)

Areta Zhulla (violin, International Program ’08 and ’09)

In October 2011, the Amphion String Quartet (International Program ’10) won the 2011 Concert Artists Guild Victor Elmaleh Competition. The ensemble will receive a two-year management contract with Concert Artists Guild as well as multiple performance opportunities. Congratulations to violinists Katie Hyun and David Southorn, violist Wei-Yang Andy Lin, and cellist Mihai Marica!

Violinist Yujin Ariza (Young Performers Program ’05, ’06, ’07, and ’08) was appointed Concertmaster of the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra beginning in the fall of 2011. Yujin is currently a senior at Menlo School.

Violinist Nigel Armstrong (Young Performers Program ’04 and ’05) took Fourth Prize in the violin category at the prestigious XIV International Tchaikovsky Competition in July of 2011. He was also awarded top prize for the best performance of the commissioned work by John Corigliano. A graduate of the Colburn Conservatory of Music and now studying at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, Nigel was the highest ranking American across all divisions at the competition. Other highlights of Nigel’s 2011–12 concert season include concerto appearances with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra and the West Los Angeles Symphony. In the summer of 2011, Nigel completed a recital and concerto tour of Argentina.

In February 2011, cellist Dmitri Atapine (International Program ’08 and Chamber Music Institute Faculty ’09, ’10, and ’11) and pianist Hyeyeon Park (International Program ’09 and Chamber Music Institute Faculty ’10 and ’11) received Second Prize at the Premio Vittorio Gui Chamber Music Competition in Florence, Italy. In January 2011, Dmitri and Hyeyeon premiered a work for cello and piano titled Incident by Music@Menlo Artistic Administrator Patrick Castillo as part of the Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concerts at the Chicago Cultural Center.

Pianist Anna Boonyanit (Young Performers Program ’10 and ’11) performed a movement of Beethoven’s Piano Concerto no. 3 with the Palo Alto Philharmonic in May 2011.

Cellist Gabriel Cabezas (International Program ’10) collaborated with cellist Yo-Yo Ma and ballet star/director/producer Damian Woetzel in a unique outreach program at the Chicago Public Schools in October of 2011. A native of Chicago, Gabe continues his studies with Carter Brey at the Curtis Institute of Music.

In September 2011, cellist Jean-François Carrière (Young Performers Program ’10) began his studies at the prestigious Yehudi Menuhin School in London.

Cellist Will Chow (Young Performers Program ’06, ’07, ’08, and ’10) began studying at the Curtis Institute of Music in the fall of 2011.

In 2010–11, cellist Yves Dharamraj (International Program ’06) began as a member of the Academy (a program of Carnegie Hall, the Juilliard School, and the Weill Institute), taught at the Brooklyn High School of the Arts as part of his Academy program, and traveled to Haiti to assist with relief efforts. In 2011–12, he will continue as a member of the Academy.

Pianist David Fung (International Program ’10) performed multiple recitals at Yale University in the spring of 2011 and also toured Australia in March, where he performed Beethoven’s Piano Concerto no. 5, presented four solo recitals, and gave master classes. He was also recently invited to become a Steinway Artist and is now a member of its artist roster. He presented a master class at the Colburn Academy in September of 2011. An alumnus of the Colburn Conservatory of Music, David is currently teaching piano at Yale University while pursuing a doctoral degree at the Yale School of Music.

Violist Mario Gotoh (International Program ’10) is currently teaching viola at SUNY Suffolk and SUNY Stony Brook. As the winner of the 2011 Stony Brook University Graduate Competition, she performed the Walton Viola Concerto with orchestra in September 2011.

Clarinetist Romie de Guise-Langlois (International Program ’09) participated in Carnegie Hall’s Musical Connections outreach program as a member of the quintet Sospiro Winds.

Pianist Hilda Huang (Young Performers Program ’06, ’07, ’08, ’09, and ’10) was the First Prize winner in the Peninsula Symphony’s 2011 Marilyn Mindell Piano Competition and subsequently performed Bach’s Concerto for Harpsichord in D Major with Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra in January 2011. She is the youngest soloist ever to perform with the group. In November 2011, Hilda will perform Haydn’s Piano Concerto in D Major with the San Francisco Chamber Orchestra as the 2011–12 Debut Artist.

Violinist Alexi Kenney (Young Performers Program ’03, ’04, ’06, ’07, ’08, and ’10) began attending New England Conservatory of Music in the fall of 2011. Alexi is studying with the esteemed violin pedagogue Donald Weilerstein.

In October 2011, cellist Spencer Kim (Young Performers Program ’05 and ’06) won First Prize in the American Protégé International Competition of Romantic Music. Spencer will be performing at Carnegie Hall on November 12, 2011.

In May 2011, violist Edward Klorman (International Program ’06 and Chamber Music Institute Faculty ’09) was appointed Associate Chair for Music Theory at the Juilliard School, where he has also joined the chamber music faculty. He has been a faculty member and the chair of Juilliard’s Pre-College Music Theory Department since 2008.

In June 2011, violinist Kristin Lee (International Program ’09 and Chamber Music Institute Faculty ’10 and ’11) won second place at the Trio di Trieste International Chamber Music Competition in Italy.

Violist Wei-Yang Andy Lin (International Program ’08 and ’10) of the Amphion String Quartet cofounded the New Asia Chamber Music Society, presenting the finest works of chamber music from the canon of Western music as well as contemporary Asian culture. The group gave its inaugural concert at Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall in April 2011.

As a member of the NOW Ensemble, a chamber music ensemble dedicated to making new chamber music for the twenty-first century, pianist Michael Mizrahi (International Program ’06) performed on the ensemble’s second album, released in April 2011. The album features six new pieces of music, including three composed by NOW Ensemble members. Michael is currently on the piano faculty of Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin, and welcomed his first child (Miriam) to the world in September 2011.

Violinist Nathan Olson (International Program ’05) was appointed Co-Concertmaster of the Dallas Symphony in September 2011. Nathan is also Concertmaster of the Breckenridge Music Festival.

Violist Jessica Oudin (International Program ’05) joined the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra’s viola section in January 2011. Previously, she served as Principal Violist for both the Canton Symphony Orchestra and CityMusic Cleveland.

Pianist Young-Ah Tak (International Program ’03) performed a solo recital at Hoam Art Hall in Seoul in April 2011 and at the Busan National University in Busan, Korea in June. In July 2011, she was invited to teach and perform at the Piano at Peabody Keyboard Workshop at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore.

Lily Tsai (violin, Young Performers Program ’08, ’09, and ’10) was selected as winner of the Jim McAuliffe Award and won First Prize in the 2011 Young Musicians’ Competition of the Peninsula Symphony, subsequently performing the Paganini Violin Concerto in June of 2011.

In January 2011, violinist Stephen Waarts (Young Performers Program ’06, ’07, ’08, and ’09) performed Beethoven’s Violin Concerto with the Prometheus Symphony Orchestra in Berkeley and Oakland. Stephen began his studies at the Curtis Institute of Music in the fall of 2011.

In 2011, violinist Tien-Hsin “Cindy” Wu (International Program ’06) made her debut at both the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival and La Jolla Music Society’s SummerFest. Since fall 2010, Cindy has been an adjunct professor at the University of Southern California’s Thornton School of Music, where she teaches violin and chamber music. From 2008 through 2010, Cindy appeared at the Marlboro Music Festival, and she currently is an artist on the Musicians from Marlboro national tour.

Pianist Teresa Yu (International Program ’05 and Chamber Music Institute Faculty ’06, ’07, and ’08) and her San Francisco–based music school, Amabile, were recently featured in San Francisco Classical Voice. The article states that since the founding of the school in 2008, enrollment has tripled, and while the school accepts students of all ages, early childhood education has become something of a specialty. Teresa keeps up her own performing skills and recently gave nine concerts in France with her piano trio, the Aleron Trio. In addition to returning to France in summer 2011, the Aleron will perform Beethoven’s Triple Concerto with the Southeast Iowa Symphony in spring 2012.

Read past alumni updates:
December 2010
January 2010
Summer 2009
December 2008
Summer 2008