2024 Chamber Music Intensive Young Artists

Keigan Iwanicki, viola Indiana University Jacobs School of Music

Growing up in Massachusetts, Keigan Iwanicki participated in New England Conservatory’s Preparatory School, performing with the orchestra in NEC’s Jordan Hall and during a Central European tour. In 2019, she served as principal viola of NEC’s Summer Orchestra Institute. Keigan attended Ipswich Public Schools, where she served as principal viola in the Honors Chamber Orchestra and String Ensemble, and also performed and competed with the jazz band. She has performed in all-state festivals at Boston Symphony Hall, participated in the Bowdoin International Music Festival, and played in masterclasses led by Daniel Getz, Steven O. Laraia, Jason Amos, Steve Tenenbom, and Zoë Martin-Doike. Additional performance venues include the Rudolfinum Hall in Prague, House of Culture in Jihlava, Slovak Radio Hall in Bratislava, and the Riding Hall of Gödöllő Palace in Hungary. In 2020, she collaborated in a virtual project to create a fundraising video, You Will Be Found, which featured Mass General cancer survivors and raised over $1 million for continued cancer research. Keigan studied viola with Michael Coelho in Massachusetts and currently attends the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University, where she studies under Mark Holloway, violist of the Pacifica Quartet. She is double majoring in viola performance and music education.

Tyler James, cello Longy School of Music of Bard College

Lauded as performing “like a gladiator” and with a “phenomenal color palette” (Radda), cellist Tyler Michael James stands out as an ebullient artist of his generation. He is a top prize winner at the Radda International String Competition and regularly performs internationally as a soloist and chamber musician. He recently released the official recording of Jessie Montgomery’s Loisaida, My Love on the Monday Records label. Tyler has appeared as soloist with several orchestras, including the Handel Society, Orchestra Flex, Fermata Chamber Soloists, and the Citizen’s Artist Chamber Orchestra. He regularly performs as a chamber musician and soloist with the Hornby Island Chamber Music Festival, the Red Door Chamber Music Series, Lyrica Boston, and the Boston Healthcare for the Homeless program. He has performed chamber music with such artists as the Horszowski Trio, Castle of Our Skins, Karen Dreyfus and Peter Zazofsky. Born in Virginia, Tyler did his initial studies at the Governor’s School for the Arts under the tutelage of Leslie Frittelli. He received his bachelor’s degree from New York University’s Steinhardt School on full scholarship, studying under Marion Feldman. Tyler was awarded a joint master’s degree and Artist Diploma on full scholarship from the Longy School of Music of Bard College, where he studied under Terry King, protégé of the late Gregor Piatigorsky. He is currently a fully-funded MBA candidate at the College of William & Mary, focusing on how to rethink classical music education for financially underprivileged students like himself.

Amina Knapp, violin Oberlin Conservatory

Amina Knapp received her bachelor’s degree in Violin Performance from Oberlin Conservatory, where she studied with Sibbi Bernhardsson. Originally from Shoreview, Minnesota, she has participated in chamber music and orchestral programs including Madeline Island, Domaine Forget, Encore Music, and Round Top Festival Institute. Amina’s previous teachers include Leslie Shank, Aaron Janse, and Natsuki Kumagai. Recent achievements have included two orchestral performances in Carnegie Hall and three-time appointment as concertmaster of the Oberlin Orchestra. Amina has a passion for chamber music and has spent much of her life playing and commissioning works with her twin brother, Daniel Knapp. Amina is a founding member of the Eris Quartet, which completed their West Coast tour in the spring of 2023. She is currently working on Crumb’s Black Angels and multiple commissioned works. Outside of her music studies, Amina enjoys sight-reading chamber music, eating “Off the Eaten Path” veggie chips, journaling, and singing karaoke with her friends.

Christopher Nelson, violin Bitó Conservatory of Bard College

Raised in Southern California, violinist Christopher Nelson has performed music ranging in style from Monteverdi to Kurtág. Past festival attendance includes the Aspen Music Festival, National Repertory Orchestra, Round Top Festival Institute, Taconic Chamber Music Intensive, and the Fellowship String Quartet Program at Madeline Island Chamber Music. He has studied with William Fitzpatrick, Moni Simeonov, Daniel Phillips, Paul Kantor, and Gail Mellert, among others. During his studies at Chapman University (BM ‘20), he developed an engulfing interest in the history of the Soviet Union through the music of Dmitri Shostakovich. In the years following the COVID-19 lockdowns, Christopher gained teaching experience as an itinerant music teacher in the Palos Verdes Peninsula Unified School District, leading group classes as well as teaching privately in the area. During this time, he also worked closely with Chapman University’s Keyboard Collaborative Arts Department, rehearsing with graduate pianists in the program as the violinist in various piano trio ensembles. In 2022, Christopher began studies at the Bitó Conservatory of Music at Bard College (MM ‘24) where he studied with Carmit Zori in the Graduate Instrumental Arts Program. In his free time, Chris might be found reading, playing a board game, or foraging for wild mushrooms.

Arianna Pope, violin, Oberlin Conservatory

Violinist Arianna Pope began her studies with Rebecca Hang of the Felici Piano Trio. She graduated in December 2023 from the Oberlin Conservatory, where she studied with Francesca dePasquale after transferring from the University of Nevada, Reno, studying with Stephanie Sant’Ambrogio. Arianna has appeared as soloist with the Eastern Sierra Chamber Orchestra. At Oberlin, she was concertmaster of the Oberlin Baroque Orchestra and participated in the Advanced String Quartet Seminar, where her ensemble concentrated on the late Beethoven quartets. She has performed in masterclasses for Grigory Kalinovsky, Shmuel Ashkenazi, Robert Patterson, Helen Kim, Katie Lansdale, and Corey Cerovsek; chamber coaches have included the Verona, Meta4, and Fry Street Quartets, as well as Sibbi Bernhardsson, Kirsten Docter, and Nokuthula Ngwenyama. Since 2014, she has attended the Sierra Academy of Music in Mammoth Lakes, CA, spending her summers learning and performing chamber music masterworks. She was named the 2023 Michael Davis Fellow at the Lancaster Festival Orchestra under the direction of Maestro Gary Sheldon, and was invited back again as the Davis Fellow for the 2024 season. She has also attended the Credo Festival in Oberlin, OH, the Green Mountain Chamber Music Festival in Burlington, VT, and the Aria International Summer Academy in Mount Holyoke, MA. Arianna is passionate about exploring the works of underrepresented composers, and recently performed Caroline Shaw’s Three Essays and Paul Wiancko’s Lift with her quartet.

Rebecca, Rosmanitz, violin Arizona State University

Rebecca began her violin studies at age 4 under the tutelage of Betty Haag, and was quickly accepted into Chicago’s prestigious Magical Strings of Youth performing group. From a very young age, Rebecca’s performance opportunities have taken her to such venues as Carnegie Hall’s Isaac Stern Auditorium, the Walt Disney Concert Hall, The Berliner Dome, and The Teatro Nacional de São Carlos. She has performed in masterclasses for Shlomo Mintz, Vadim Gluzman, Olga Kaler, Stephanie Jeong, and Ruggero Allifranchini, among others. Rebecca earned her bachelor’s degree in Violin Performance under the direction of Danwen Jiang at Arizona State University. She performs regularly with the Symphony of the Southwest, West Valley Symphony, and at various events throughout the Phoenix area. In addition to performing, Rebecca has taught students of all ages for many years. She is passionate about bringing up the next generation of musicians and tailors her teaching style to each student’s unique personality and needs. Rebecca finds great joy in helping her students reach their goals and watching them grow as musicians.

Tamara Shu, cello Indiana University Jacobs School of Music

In May 2024, Tamara Shu received her bachelor’s degree in Cello Performance and Comparative Literature from Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music, where she studied under Brandon Vamos. She began playing cello at 10, joining the South Bend Youth Symphony Orchestra three years later and being appointed principal cellist the following season. In 2019, she was the winner of the SBYSO’s annual concerto competition and Penn High School’s selected senior soloist. A passionate chamber musician, Tamara has dedicated much of her undergraduate degree toward intensive studies in collaborative music, participating in a wide variety of chamber ensembles in performing both traditional repertoire and commissioned new music. In 2021, her quartet was selected to participate in the Advanced Quartet Seminar class taught by members of the Pacifica Quartet. Currently, she is the cellist of the Solaris Quintet, a piano quintet founded by friends based in Bloomington, IN that works to fuse chamber music standards with lesser-known works in the quintet repertory. Aside from professional engagements, she enjoys freelancing as a gig musician and participating in community outreach projects. As a soloist, she premiered Jessica Carter’s “Rancor and Triumph,” Concerto for Cello and Orchestra in 2022 at the University of Notre Dame’s DeBartolo Performing Arts Center with the South Bend Youth Symphony Orchestra. Tamara is both a multifaceted performer and committed academic who strongly believes in the importance of interdisciplinary education in the arts. She will begin legal studies as a J.D. candidate at Indiana University’s Maurer School of Law in the fall of 2024.

Sachin Shukla, viola New England Conservatory

Sachin Shukla is a violist and teacher based in Boston. He is on the faculty of the Powers Music School in Belmont, MA, a teaching artist with the Boston Music Project, and a member of the New Bedford Symphony Orchestra. Performances have brought him to the stages of Carnegie Hall, Boston Symphony Hall and NEC’s Jordan Hall, and he has performed with NEC’s conductorless Chamber Orchestra and the Boston Philharmonic, among others. Sachin won the 2021 Northwestern Viola Prize and has performed at festivals including the Heifetz International Music Institute, the Bowdoin International Music Festival, Taconic Music Summer Festival, and the Cazenovia Counterpoint Festival. He is active in the world of historically-informed performance, and has performed in ensembles led by Ingrid Matthews, Phoebe Carrai, and Aislinn Nosky. Sachin is a graduate of Northwestern University and the New England Conservatory, where he is currently pursuing further graduate work. His principal teachers are Helen Callus and Mai Motobuchi. Sachin’s article on the Walton Viola Concerto, which he presented at the American Viola Society’s 2022 Conference, is forthcoming in the peer-reviewed Journal of the American Viola Society, after garnering first place in its 2021 David Dalton Research Competition. Another of his papers was featured at the 2022 Galant Schemata conference. In addition to his musical activities, Sachin is a public policy enthusiast. He served as research assistant to Diane Schanzenbach and Ajay K. Mehrotra, and was a member of the executive board of Northwestern University’s Political Union for three years, culminating in a term as co-president.

Lucia Zavagna, piano Conservatorio Tartini, Trieste, Italy

A native of Udine, Italy, Lucia Zavagna began her piano studies with Francesca Calabrese at age 00. She later attended the Liceo scientifico Niccolò Copernico, where she sang in the school choir also served as a piano accompanist. Lucia earned her bachelor’s degree in Piano Performance from Udine’s Conservatorio Jacopo Tomadini, studying with Luca Trabucco, and completed her master’s degree at the Conservatorio Tartini in Trieste, under the guidance of Luca Trabucco and Irene Russo, earning top marks. In 2019–20, she participated in the Erasmus program, the EU’s flagship student exchange program, and spent a semester in Sofia, Bulgaria, studying with Borislava Taneva. She has performed with the Cultural Association “Together for Music” in Lignano Sabbiadoro, the RiMe MuTe Cultural Center in Udine, and for the Piano City Milano festival in a performance project encompassing all nine Beethoven symphonies transcribed for eight hands and two pianos. The piece was also recorded at the Kawai Centre of Corsico. Lucia has participated in masterclasses with Massimiliano Damerini, Roberto Cominati, and Mariagrazia Bellocchio, among others. She is currently pursuing post-graduate studies with Davide Cabassi.