GARRICK OHLSSON

Piano, 2023 Special Guest Artist 

Since his triumph as winner of the 1970 Chopin International Piano Competition, pianist Garrick Ohlsson has established himself worldwide as a musician of magisterial interpretive and technical prowess. Although long regarded as one of the world’s leading exponents of the music of Frédéric Chopin, Mr. Ohlsson commands an enormous repertoire, which ranges over the entire piano literature. A student of the late Claudio Arrau, Mr. Ohlsson has come to be noted for his masterly performances of the works of Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert, as well as the Romantic repertoire. To date he has at his command more than 80 concertos, ranging from Haydn and Mozart to works of the 21st century, many commissioned for him. In the 2018/19 season he launched an ambitious project spread over multiple seasons exploring the complete solo piano works of Brahms in four programs to be heard in New York, San Francisco, Montreal, Los Angeles, London and a number of cities across North America. In concerto repertoire ranging from Mozart and Beethoven to Brahms and Barber, he returned to the Nashville, Oregon, Dallas Symphonies, Washington Kennedy Center with Melbourne Symphony and internationally with orchestras in Seoul, Helsinki, Zagreb, Tallinn, Manchester and London.

A frequent guest with the orchestras in Australia, Mr. Ohlsson has recently visited Perth, Brisbane, Melbourne, Sydney, Adelaide and Hobart as well as the New Zealand Symphony in Wellington and Auckland. In February 2020 he accomplished a seven city recital tour across Australia just prior to the closure of the concert world due to Covid-19. An avid chamber musician, Mr. Ohlsson has collaborated with the Cleveland, Emerson, Tokyo and Takacs string quartets, including most recently Boston Chamber Players on tour in Europe. Together with violinist Jorja Fleezanis and cellist Michael Grebanier, he is a founding member of the San Francisco-based FOG Trio. Passionate about singing and singers, Mr. Ohlsson has appeared in recital with such legendary artists as Magda Olivero, Jessye Norman, and Ewa Podleś.

TAKÁCS QUARTET

2023 Special Guest Artists

The world-renowned Takács Quartet, is now entering its forty-eighth season. Edward Dusinberre, Harumi Rhodes (violins), Richard O’Neill (viola) and András Fejér (cello) are excited about the 2022-2023 season that begins with a tour of Hong Kong, Japan and South Korea, and includes the release of two new cds for Hyperion Records. A disc of Haydn’s opp. 42, 77 and 103 is followed by the first recording of an extraordinary new work written for the Takács by Stephen Hough, Les Six Rencontres, presented with quartets by Ravel and Dutilleux. As Associate Artists at London’s Wigmore Hall, the Takács will perform four concerts there. In addition to programs featuring Beethoven, Schubert and Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel, one concert consists of works by Britten, Bartók and Dvořák that highlight the same themes of displacement and return explored in Edward Dusinberre’s new book Distant Melodies: Music in Search of Home. The book is published by Faber and the University of Chicago Press in the Fall of 2022. The quartet will perform the same program at several venues in the USA, complemented by book talks. During this season the quartet will continue its fruitful partnership with pianist Jeremy Denk, performing on several North American series.

Throughout 2022 and 2023 the ensemble will play at prestigious European venues including the Edinburgh and Schwetzingen Festivals, Madrid’s Auditorio de Música, Bilbao’s Philharmonic Society, Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw and the Bath Mozartfest. The group’s North American engagements include concerts in New York, Toronto, Vancouver, Philadelphia, Ann Arbor, Berkeley, Los Angeles, Pittsburgh, Seattle, Tucson, Portland and the Beethoven Center at San Jose State University.

The Takács Quartet is known for innovative programming. In 2021-22 the ensemble partnered with bandoneon virtuoso Julien Labro to premiere new works by Clarice Assad and Bryce Dessner, commissioned by Music Accord. In 2014 the Takács performed a program inspired by Philip Roth’s novel Everyman with Meryl Streep at Princeton, and again with her at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto in 2015. They first performed Everyman at Carnegie Hall in 2007 with Philip Seymour Hoffman. They have toured 14 cities with the poet Robert Pinsky, and played regularly with the Hungarian Folk group Muzsikas.

The Takács records for Hyperion Records, recently winning awards for their recordings of string quartets by Fanny and Felix Mendelssohn, and - with pianist Garrick Ohlsson - piano quintets by Amy Beach and Elgar. Other releases for Hyperion feature works by Haydn, Schubert, Janáček, Smetana, Debussy and Britten, as well as piano quintets by César Franck and Shostakovich (with Marc-André Hamelin), and viola quintets by Brahms and Dvorák (with Lawrence Power). For their CDs on the Decca/London label, the Quartet has won three Gramophone Awards, a Grammy Award, three Japanese Record Academy Awards, Disc of the Year at the inaugural BBC Music Magazine Awards, and Ensemble Album of the Year at the Classical Brits. 

In 2014 the Takács became the first string quartet to be awarded the Wigmore Hall Medal. In 2012, Gramophone announced that the Takács was the first string quartet to be inducted into its Hall of Fame. The ensemble also won the 2011 Award for Chamber Music and Song presented by the Royal Philharmonic Society in London.

Based in Boulder at the University of Colorado, the members of the Takács Quartet are Christoffersen Faculty Fellows, and the grateful beneficiaries of an instrument loan by the Drake Foundation. The members of the Takács are on the faculty at the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, where they run a summer string quartet seminar, and Visiting Fellows at the Guildhall School of Music, London.

The Takács Quartet was formed in 1975 at the Franz Liszt Academy in Budapest by Gabor Takács-Nagy, Károly Schranz, Gabor Ormai and András Fejér, while all four were students. The group received international attention in 1977, winning First Prize and the Critics’ Prize at the International String Quartet Competition in Evian, France. The Quartet also won the Gold Medal at the 1978 Portsmouth and Bordeaux Competitions and First Prizes at the Budapest International String Quartet Competition in 1978 and the Bratislava Competition in 1981. The Quartet made its North American debut tour in 1982.

ANI AZNAVOORIAN

Cello

The Strad magazine describes cellist Ani Aznavoorian as having “scorchingly committed performances that wring every last drop of emotion out of the music. Her technique is well-nigh immaculate, she has a natural sense of theater, and her tone is astonishingly responsive.” Ms. Aznavoorian is in demand as a soloist and chamber musician with some of the most recognized ensembles, and she has appeared with many of the world’s leading orchestras including the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Boston Pops, the Tokyo Philharmonic, the Helsinki Philharmonic, the Finnish Radio Symphony, the International Sejong Soloists, the Belgrade Philharmonic, the Juilliard Orchestra, and the Edmonton Symphony. This season marks Ms. Aznavoorian’s fifteenth year as Principal Cellist with Camerata Pacifica. 

Ms. Aznavoorian received the prestigious Bunkamura Orchard Hall Award for her outstanding cello playing and artistry. Some of her other awards include first prizes in the Illinois Young Performers Competition (televised live on PBS with the Chicago Symphony), the Chicago Cello Society National Competition, the Julius Stulberg Competition, and the American String Teachers Association Competition. She was a top prizewinner in the 1996 International Paulo Competition, held in Helsinki, Finland. As a recipient of the Level I Award in the National Foundation for the Arts Recognition and Talent Search, Ms. Aznavoorian was named a Presidential Scholar in the Arts and performed as soloist at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. where she met former U.S. President Bill Clinton.

As a first-year student at The Juilliard School, Ms. Aznavoorian won first prize in the institution’s concerto competition—the youngest cellist in the history of the school’s cello competitions to do so. As a result, she performed with the Juilliard Orchestra in a concert with conductor Gerard Schwarz at Avery Fisher Hall. With only 12 hours notice, Ms. Aznavoorian stepped in to replace Natalia Gutman in three performances of the Shostakovich Cello Concerto No. 1 with the San Jose Symphony—concerts that were hailed by the San Jose Press. Other notable appearances include concerts at Weill Hall and Zankel Hall at Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall, Ravinia’s Bennett Hall, Aspen’s Harris Hall, the Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concert Series, WFMT Live from Studio 1, and NPR’s Performance Today. She has been a member of the renowned string ensemble the International Sejong Soloists, and also performs frequently on the Jupiter Chamber Music series in New York. Ms. Aznavoorian received both her Bachelor and Master of Music degrees from the Juilliard School where she studied with Aldo Parisot.

In addition to performing, teaching plays an important part in Ms. Aznavoorian’s career. She has been a member of the distinguished music faculty at the University of Illinois in Champaign/Urbana, and in the summers has served on the faculty of the Great Mountains Music Festival in South Korea. Ms. Aznavoorian enjoys performing new music and has made the world premiers of many important pieces in the cello repertoire. Some of these include Ezra Laderman’s Concerto No. 2 with the Colorado Springs Philharmonic under the baton of Lawrence Leighton Smith, Lera Auerbach’s 24 Preludes for Cello and Piano on stage at the Hamburg Staatsoper with the Hamburg State Ballet—choreographed by John Neumeier, and Lera Auerbach’s Dreammusik for Cello and Chamber Orchestra, which was written for her and commissioned by Camerata Pacifica. Ms. Aznavoorian records for Cedille Records, and she proudly performs on a cello made by her father Peter Aznavoorian in Chicago.

LEMBIT BEECHER

Composer-In-Residence

Estonian-American composer and animator Lembit Beecher writes “hauntingly lovely and deeply personal” music (San Francisco Chronicle) that stems from a fascination with the ways memories, histories, and stories permeate our contemporary lives. Threading together fragments of family lore, distantly experienced legends, imagery, and songs from Estonian folk culture, and explorations of place, migration, natural processes, and ecology, he has created an idiosyncratic and thoughtful musical language full of fragile lyricism, propulsive energy, and visceral emotions, which draws raves for its “astonishing musical invention” (Philadelphia Inquirer) and “exquisite touches” (San Francisco Chronicle). Noted for his collaborative spirit and “ingenious” interdisciplinary projects (Wall Street Journal), Lembit has served three-year terms as the Music Alive composer-in-residence of the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra and the inaugural composer-in-residence of Opera Philadelphia, working with devised theater actors, poets, ethnographers, and engineers, as well as incorporating Baroque instruments, electronically-controlled sound sculptures, and recorded interview samples into his music. Lembit’s three operas with noted Canadian playwright Hannah Moscovitch have drawn particular acclaim. Starring Frederica von Stade and Marietta Simpson, his opera “Sky on Swings,” which traces the relationship of two women diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, was praised as “a monumental achievement” (Parterre) and “a shattering musical and theatrical evocation of what it feels like to have Alzheimer’s disease” (Wall Street Journal). Recent premieres include “Tell Me Again” for cellist Karen Ouzounian and the Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra, “100 Years Grows Shorter Over Time” for the Juilliard String Quartet, and “A Year to the Day,” a song cycle with librettist Mark Campbell, written for tenor Nicholas Phan and violinist Augustin Hadelich.

EDWARD DUSINBERRE

Violin

As first violinist of the Takács Quartet, Edward Dusinberre has won a Grammy and awards from Gramophone Magazine, the Japanese Recording Academy, Chamber Music America and the Royal Philharmonic Society. Outside of the quartet he has made a recording of Beethoven's violin sonatas nos. 9 (Kreutzer) and 10 on the Decca label. Dusinberre is also an author. His second book Distant Melodies: Music in Search of Home is published by Faber and University of Chicago Press in the Fall of 2022. The book explores the themes of displacement and return in the lives and specific chamber works of Dvorák, Elgar, Bartók and Britten. His first book Beethoven for a Later Age: The Journey of a String Quartet, takes the reader inside the life of a string quartet, melding music history and memoir as it explores the circumstances surrounding the composition of Beethoven's quartets and the Takács Quartet's experiences rehearsing and performing this music. The book won the Royal Philharmonic Society's 2016 Creative Communication Award. Announcing the award the RPS Committee said: "Few have told so well of the musician's life, or offered such illuminating insights to players and listeners alike." Dusinberre lives in Boulder, where he is Artist-in-Residence and a Christoffersen Fellow at the University of Colorado. In 2017 he was appointed a member of the faculty at the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara and is a Visiting Fellow at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.

ANDRÁS FEJÉR

Cello

András Fejér was born in 1955 into a musical family. His father was a cellist and conductor, and his mother was a pianist. He began playing the cello at the age of seven, because as legend has it, his father was unwilling to listen to a violin-upstart practicing. Since an early age, his parents have held string quartet weekends, which, for the young cellist were the most memorable of occasions, if not for the music, then for the glorious desserts his mother used to prepare for those sessions.

After attending a music high school, Mr. Fejér was admitted to the Franz Liszt Academy of Music in 1975, where he was a pupil of Ede Banda, András Mihály, Ferenc Rados and György Kurtág. That same year he founded the Takács String Quartet with three fellow classmates. Although the quartet has been his sole professional focus since then, he does perform as a soloist occasionally as well.

Mr. Fejér is married to a literature teacher. They have three children and live in the Rocky Mountains where they enjoy year-round sunshine in beautiful Boulder, Colorado. When he is not on tour he enjoys reading, photography, tennis and hiking. 

JAMES GARLICK

Violin (Co-Artistic Director, Music on the Strait) 

James Garlick teaches violin and chamber music at Macalester College and performs with Minnesota Orchestra. He has performed concerti from Tchaikovsky to Piazzolla with orchestras including the Northwest Sinfonietta, Everett Philharmonic, Seattle Baroque Orchestra, Cascade Symphony, and Philharmonia Northwest. This season, he returned to Medellin’s Orquestra Sinfonica EAFIT performance to perform the Barber Violin Concerto, and made his third visit to Cuba to teach and perform with American and Cuban musicians. 

James attributes his love of music to his many teachers and mentors in Port Angeles. He began lessons with JoDee Ahmann at age five and also worked closely with local music educators Phil and Deborah Morgan-Ellis, Nico Snel, Helena Emery, and Ron Jones. As a proud graduate of the strings program in Port Angeles, James believes in encouraging and fostering music in public schools—not only to nurture young musicians but also to enrich the entire community.

James earned degrees in violin performance from Oberlin Conservatory and neuroscience from Oberlin College as well as a graduate degree from The Juilliard School. He’s currently completing his fourth season as a full-time member of the violin section of the Minnesota Orchestra and also performs regularly with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra and Seattle Symphony. As concertmaster, James has led Orchestra Prometheus Chicago, the Amarillo Symphony, Juilliard Orchestra, Northwest Sinfonietta, Cascade Symphony, Bellevue Philharmonic, and others. He performs on a 1991 Samuel Zygmuntowicz violin. With his wife Emily and child Arthur, he divides his time between Minneapolis and Port Angeles. 

NOAH GELLER 

Violin 

Noah Geller was appointed to the position of concertmaster of the Seattle Symphony Orchestra by Music Director Emeritus Ludovic Morlot in September 2018. Mr. Geller came to Seattle from the Kansas City Symphony, where he was concertmaster under Michael Stern from 2012-18. He appeared frequently as soloist with the Kansas City Symphony, and made his solo recording debut on their recent release with Reference Recordings featuring music by Saint Säens.

​

Mr. Geller began his professional career in the first violin section of the Philadelphia Orchestra in 2007 while still pursuing his master’s degree. He served as acting assistant concertmaster of the Philadelphia Orchestra for the 2010 and 2011 seasons. Mr. Geller also has performed as guest concertmaster with the Symphony Orchestras of Pittsburgh, Houston, and Beijing (China National Symphony). In addition to his large-scale orchestral activities, he has performed frequently with the dynamic and spirited conductor-less group, East Coast Chamber Orchestra (ECCO). 

An active chamber musician, Mr. Geller is a regular at the Kingston Chamber Music Festival in Rhode Island.  Summer 2023 brings return performances at the Seattle Chamber Music Society and the Aspen Music Festival and School, as well as debut performances at Music on the Strait in Port Angeles, WA.  He is very happy to be on the roster of the Seattle Series, a local concert society in downtown Seattle.

Mr. Geller is an original member of Shir Ami, an ensemble dedicated to the music of composers whose lives were adversely affected by the Holocaust. 

Mr. Geller grew up in the Chicago area, studying privately with Jennifer Cappelli. He received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from The Juilliard School where he studied with Hyo Kang, Donald Weilerstein and Cho-Liang Lin. Mr. Geller currentlyl ives in Seattle with his wife, percussionist Mari Yoshinaga, and their dog, Monkey. He performs on a violin made by Justin Hess in 2020.

RICHARD O’NEILL

Viola (Co-Artistic Director, Music on the Strait)

Newly appointed violist of the Takács Quartet, Richard O'Neill has distinguished himself as one of the great instrumentalists of his generation. An EMMY Award winner, two time GRAMMY nominee and Avery Fisher Career Grant recipient, he has appeared as soloist with the world’s top orchestras including the London, Los Angeles, Seoul Philharmonics, the BBC, Hiroshima, Korean Symphonies, the Kremerata Baltica, Moscow, Vienna and Wurtemburg Chamber Orchestras, Alte Musik Koln, and has worked with distinguished musicians and conductors including Andrew Davis, Vladimir Jurowski, Francois Xavier Roth and Yannick Nezet-Seguin. An Artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and Principal Violist of Camerata Pacifica, for thirteen seasons he served as Artistic Director of DITTO, his South Korean chamber music project, leading the ensemble on international tours to China and Japan and introducing tens of thousands to music.

​

A Universal Music/Deutsche Grammophon recording artist, he has made 10 solo albums and many other chamber music recordings, earning multiple platinum discs. Composers Lera Auerbach, Elliott Carter, Paul Chihara, John Harbison and Huang Ruo have written works for him. He has appeared on major TV networks in South Korea and enjoyed huge success with his 2004 KBS documentary ‘Human Theater’ which was viewed by over 12 million people, and his 2013 series ‘Hello?! Orchestra’ which featured his work with a multicultural youth orchestra for MBC and led to an International Emmy in Arts Programming and a feature length film.

​

He serves as Goodwill Ambassador for the Korean Red Cross, The Special Olympics, UNIC

HARUMI RHODES

Violin

Acclaimed by the New York Times as a “deeply expressive violinist,” Harumi Rhodes has gained broad recognition as a multifaceted musician with a distinctive and sincere musical voice. Her generosity of spirit on stage is contagious, making her one of the most sought-after violinists of her generation. Recent solo engagements include performances of Bernstein Serenade, Beethoven Violin Concerto, Mozart Violin Concerto No 5, and Vivaldi Four Seasons with the Vermont Mozart Festival Orchestra. In addition to being a founding member of the Naumburg Award winning ensemble, Trio Cavatina, she has performed regularly with Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and Musicians from Marlboro. An avid supporter of contemporary music, she has been actively involved in commissioning and premiering new works as an artist member of the Boston Chamber Music Society, East Coast Chamber Orchestra(ECCO), and Music from Copland House. Recent discography includes Milton Babbitt’s String Quartet No. 6 (Tzadik); The Five Borough Songbook, including 20 different composers and commissions (GPR Records); Compadrazgo, a compilation of chamber works by Gabriela Lena Frank (Albany Records); Secret Alchemy, with ensemble works by Pierre Jalbert (Copland House Blend); and Clean Plates Don’t Lie, featuring new vocal chamber music works with texts from Chef Dan Barber and the sustainable food movement (Centaur). Rhodes has served as Head of Strings and Chamber Music at Syracuse University, Assistant Violin Faculty at the Juilliard School, and most recently as Assistant Professor of Violin at the University of Colorado-Boulder.

MARI YOSHINAGA

Marimba

Mari Yoshinaga is a Seattle-based percussionist who plays regularly in the Pacific Northwest. She has performed recently at Seattle Chamber Music Society, Seattle Japanese Garden, OnThe Boards, Emerald City Music, Seattle Symphony Orchestra and VancouverRecital Society. Upcoming local engagements include the Seattle Chamber Society Concert Truck, Music on the Strait (Port Angeles), Northwest Folklife Festival, and Central Washington University. As a member of new music ensembles such as arx duo and The Percussion Collective, Marihas performed with Boise Philharmonic, Curtis Orchestra, Lake George Music FestivalOrchestra, Louisville Orchestra and Symphony Tacoma. She has worked with percussion and composition students at Princeton University, Boston Conservatory, Peabody Conservatory, Greenwich Conservatory (UK), and Musashino Conservatory (Tokyo). Mari has served as a faculty member of the Young Artist Summer Program at the Curtis Institute of Music. She has commissioned and worked with composers such as Paul Chihara, Nick DiBerardino, Ian Gottlieb, Ted Hearne, Jonathan B Holland, Robert Honstine, Paul Lansky, Michael Larello, Steven Mackey, Dominic Murcott, Garth Neustadter, Angelique Poteate, Angie Chan Ramirez, Juri Seo, Christopher Theofanidis, Alejandro Vinao, and James Wood. Mari’s recording work includes Partita: Suite for Guitar and Percussion by Paul Lansky with guitarist David Starobin (Bridge Records), Cloud Polyphonies by James Wood (NMCRecordings), and The Harmonic Canon by Dominic Murcott (Nonclassical). Her most recent album as a member of arx duo, 'Ambient Resonances' is now available from Origin Records. Mari was born in Kagoshima, Japan. She began studying piano at age three, marimba at age five, euphonium at ten, cello at eleven, and percussion at twelve. She moved to the United States to attend The Curtis Institute of Music where she earned her bachelor’s degree, and later she earned her master’s degree at Yale School of Music. With gratitude, she proudly endorses Adams instruments, Evans drumheads, Pearl drums, VicFirth sticks and mallets, and Zyldjian cymbals. Mari resides in Seattle, WA with her husband, violinist Noah Geller, and their lovely dog, Monkey.