2024 Faculty and Guest Artists

Faculty

Joana Genova, violin and Artistic Director

Bulgarian-born violinist Joana Genova has built a diverse career as a chamber and orchestral musician, soloist, recitalist, and teacher. Jim Lowe of The Rutland Herald wrote “Genova played with an infectious mix of passion and warmth, coupled with the requisite virtuosity”.

Joana is co-artistic director of Taconic Music, second violinist of The Indianapolis Quartet, a member of Taconic Chamber Players, and appears as a frequent guest at festivals and concert series, performing extensively throughout United States and internationally in Italy,  Bulgaria, Holland, Germany and Bosnia-Herzegovina.

 Joana has been Artist Associate at Williams College since 2007, and in the fall of 2022 became Adjunct Professor and Coordinator of Chamber Music at Montclair State University, and Instructor at Bennington College. From 2017 to 2022, she was Assistant Professor of Violin and Director of String Activities at the University of Indianapolis.

Her collaborations include The Shanghai Quartet, Kalichstein-Laredo-Robinson Trio, Horszowski Trio, Andrés Cárdenes, Carmit Zori, Nathaniel Rosen, Nathaniel Parke, Danwen Jiang, Austin Hartman, Renee Jolles, Michael Rudiakov, Tom Landschoot, Sophie Shao, Roberta Cooper, Jon Klibonoff, Ruth Laredo, Gili Melamed-Lev, Davide Cabassi, David Krakauer, Deborah Buck, Duo Jalal, Raman Ramakrishnan, Heather Braun, Willis Delony, Eugene Drucker, and Drew Petersen, among others. She has appeared live on GNAT-TV and CAT-TV in Vermont, WISH-TV Indianapolis, WQXR Albany, Vermont Public Radio, and WBAA and WICR in Indiana.  Her recordings include Chamber Music of Vittorio Giannini; Vision: Music of the 20th and 21st Centuries; Four Seasons x2: Piazzolla and Vivaldi; Reflections and Whimsies: Chamber Music for Strings and Voice by Frank Felice; Mark Ortwein: Stretching Boundaries; Robert Paterson’s String Quartets 1-3; Maxine Linehan’s This Time of Year and Stephen Dankner: Four Sonatas for Violin and Piano with Willis Delony.

As a soloist Joana has been featured with the Metropolitan, Rockaway, Danbury, and Berkshire symphonies, Adelphi Chamber Orchestra, Harlem Chamber Players, Manchester Festival Orchestra, Yonkers Philharmonic, and under the baton of Raymond Leppard with the University of Indianapolis Gala Orchestra. She is principal second violinist of the Berkshire Symphony Orchestra since 2007 and has appeared as a guest concertmaster of the Carmel Symphony, Indianapolis Chamber Orchestra and Louisiana Philharmonic. In the fall of 2024 Joana was concertmaster and soloist of Viva Bach Festival in Peterborough, New Hampshire. Joana has been member of Amsterdam Sinfonietta, Amsterdam Bach Consort, Brooklyn Philharmonic and New Haven Symphony.

A graduate of the National School of Music and Dance “Dobrin Petkov” in Plovdiv, where she made her solo debut at age 12 with the Plovdiv Chamber Orchestra, Joana is a top prizewinner of Bulgaria’s “Svetoslav Obretenov” National Competition. She earned her bachelor’s degree at the Conservatory of Amsterdam and her Master’s in Chamber Music at the Rotterdam Conservatory in The Netherlands. Her teachers include Boyanka Shopova, Alexander Spirov, Peter Brunt, Ilya Grubert, and Samuel Thaviu. Joana performs on a Johannes Cuypers violin made in The Hague in 1786.

Ariel Rudiakov, viola, conductor, and Artistic Director

Conductor and violist Ariel Rudiakov is Music Director and conductor of the Yonkers Philharmonic, co-founder and co-artistic director of Taconic Music in Manchester, Vermont, Music Director and conductor of the Danbury (Conn.) Symphony Orchestra, and Assistant conductor of the Greenwich (Conn.) Symphony Orchestra. In the spring term of 2024, he joined the faculty at Bennington College as adjunct viola instructor.

Ari enjoys a diverse musical life, performing to critical acclaim throughout the U.S. and abroad; most recently, chamber music for the 2023 Pikes Falls Chamber Music Festival and in 2022, the Kawai a Ledro Festival in Italy. He is a former member of the New York Piano Quartet and Equinox String Quartet, a founding member and past president of SONYC (String Orchestra of New York City), and, from 2000 to 2016, was Artistic Director of Vermont’s Manchester Music Festival.

Among his recordings are the complete string quartets by Camille Saint-Saëns and the piano quintet by Vittorio Giannini (MSR Classics), which Fanfare magazine described as “utterly superb.”  Composers Richard Lane, Philip Lasser and Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson have dedicated works to Ari, who is active in commissioning and recording new music. At the podium, his resident and guest conducting positions have included the Adelphi Chamber Orchestra, Metropolitan Symphony, Bergen, and Yonkers Philharmonics, Antara Ensemble, Manchester Chamber Orchestra, Harlem Chamber Players, Sage City Symphony and recording sessions with Dance Theater of Harlem.

Ari attended pre-college at Manhattan School of Music and went on to receive bachelor’s and master’s degrees at SUNY Purchase and University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He was a scholarship student at Yale University’s master’s program where he studied viola with Jesse Levine and chamber music with members of the Tokyo String Quartet. Ari plays and viola made in 2000 by Geoffrey Ovington.

Heather Braun, violin

Heather Braun performs as first violinist of the prize-winning Arneis Quartet and as a member of the Orchestra of Emmanuel Music and Taconic Music Chamber Players. Heather began teaching violin and chamber music at the Boston University School of Music in 2014 and joined the Saint Anselm College faculty in 2016. She has performed throughout the United States, Canada, China, and Italy, including venues such as the Beijing Modern Music Festival, Cabot Theater, Concord Free Library, Frederick Collection, Music on Main (Vancouver), Rockport Chamber Music Festival, Stanford University, Swarthmore College, University of Indianapolis, and Williams College.

Heather has performed as a soloist with various orchestras in Boston, Milwaukee, Washington DC, Danbury, CT and Manchester, VT. She has performed as visiting concertmaster for the Greenwich Symphony Orchestra and as a guest artist with the Greenwich Chamber Players. Other chamber music and solo collaborations include performances with Tony Arnold, Randall Hodgkinson, Marc Johnson, Robert Levin, St. Lawrence String Quartet, and Shanghai Quartet.
Heather earned her Bachelor of Music degree from the Eastman School of Music and completed her Doctor of Musical Arts degree at Boston University, studying with Peter Zazofsky. While a Tanglewood Music Center Fellow, she received the Jules C. Reiner Violin Prize; other awards received include the Zulalian Foundation Award (BU), the John Lad Prize (Stanford University) and Silver Medal at the ICMEC Competition. Heather is on the faculty at the Boston University Tanglewood Institute, Taconic Music Chamber Intensive and Danbury Chamber Music Intensive. She has also taught at Point Counterpoint, Duxbury Music Festival, Manchester Music Festival, and Apple Hill Center for Chamber Music. Her recordings include chamber music by John Wallace, as a violinist soloist and member of the orchestra for Bach Cantatas with soprano Kendra Colton, and on Elena Ruehr’s latest album, Icarus, released in the spring of 2022 and featured on NPR and BBC Proms.

Davide Cabassi, piano

Davide Cabassi made his debut at the age of thirteen with Rai Symphony Orchestra of Milan playing the Shostakovitch’s Second Concerto conducted by Vladimir Delman, starting a career as soloist which led him to perform with the major European and American orchestras including the Munchner Philharmoniker, Orchestra Filarmonica della Scala, Neue Philharmonie Westfalen, Russian Chamber Orchestra, Magdeburg Philharmoniker, Fort Worth Symphony, Enid Symphony, Big Spring Symphony, Hartford Symphony, Orquesta Sinfonica de Cordoba, Orchestra Haydn Bolzano, Orchestra Verdi Milano, Orchestra Pomeriggi Musicali Milano, Orchestra of Padua and Veneto, Orchestra Romantique Paris, OSI of Lugano, OFT of Turin, Orchestra of the Arena of Verona, Tiroler Festspiele Erl Orchestra and many others.

Davide has played for the most important Italian musical Institutions, including Società del Quartetto, Serate Musicali, Società dei Concerti, Brescia and Bergamo Piano Festival etc., and abroad, invited to perform both in Europe and in more than 35 American states, in China and Japan, in Carnegie Hall in New York, Rachmaninoff Hall in Moscow, Gasteig in Munich, Mozarteum in Salzburg, Louvre and Salle Gaveau in Paris, Forbidden City Hall and NCPA in Beijing, Roque d'Antheron, and Tiroler Festspiele.

Passionate about chamber music, Davide has played in numerous chamber ensembles, from duo to decimino (in 2018 he founded the Baggio Sinfonietta) and his large repertoire shows his particular interest in contemporary music—many are the compositions dedicated to him and performed in world premiere.
A long collaboration with the Teatro alla Scala has led him to play for stars such as Roberto Bolle, Svetlana Zacharova, Massimo Murru and Sylvie Guillem. Along with his concert activity, Davide has undertaken an intense recording schedule. He released his first recordings for labels such as Sony BMG (his first album Dancing with the orchestra won the Classic Voice magazine's 2007 Critics’ Award for best debut of the year), Concerto Classics, and Col Legno. 2012 saw his debut for Decca, with an extraordinarily successful album (Mozart Sonatas and Variations), and he began recording Beethoven's complete piano sonatas.

Davide began studying piano at a very young age, graduating with honors in the studio of Prof. Edda Ponti at the Giuseppe Verdi Conservatory in Milan. He was the first Italian admitted to the International Piano Foundation in Cadenabbia, on Lake Como, studying with William Grant Naborè, K.U. Schnabel, L. Fleisher, D. Bashkirov, R. Tureck, A. Weissemberg, and many others. He has taught in Italian conservatories since 2003 and his students are regular prizewinners in major international competitions. Davide is the artistic director of the Kawai a Ledro music series in Ateneo (Kawai - Cattolica, Milan), Incontri Contemporanei (Milan), and of the Shigeru Kawai International Competition. In 2010, together with his wife, the Russian pianist Tatiana Larionova, he founded the Primavera di Baggio concert series, aiming to enhance and relaunch the disadvantaged suburbs of his city, involving children and "invading" the association spaces, especially those redeemed from the mafia.

Hannah Holman, cello

Hannah Holman joined the New York City Ballet Orchestra at the beginning of the 2012-2013 season. Her career has encompassed orchestral and chamber music, solo performances, and teaching. In a review of the second CD she recorded with pianist Réne Lecuona, Fanfare magazine declares "her tone and technique are the stuff that cello legends are made of "... Holman's cello sings with a lustrous tone that's hard to resist."
In addition to her work with the New York City Ballet Orchestra, Hannah is the principal cellist of the Quad City Symphony, a position she has held since 2008. She began her professional career in England playing with the English String Orchestra under Yehudi Menuhin and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra under Simon Rattle. Her previous orchestral work also includes serving as assistant principal cello with the Michigan Chamber Orchestra, the Richmond Symphony; and the American Sinfonietta.

Hannah is fortunate to have a diverse career allowing much time for solo work.  She is currently in postproduction of CD #3 with Réne Lecuona featuring cello sonatas by women composers from the past. In 2022 Hannah performed Jerome Robbin’s Suite of Dances on stage as part of the NYCB Move’s tour to the Vail Dance Festival and Schelomo by Bloch with the Quad City Symphony Orchestra. Other recent engagements with the QCSO have been the Korngold’s Cello Concerto and Jennifer Higdon’s Soliquoy, which she also played with the Solomon Chamber Orchestra in Indiana. Hannah is in the middle of a video project highlighting the lives of women cellists from the past and performed six pieces with the Iowa City Community Chamber Orchestra, each piece focusing on a different cellist.  In 2020 she performed in Carnegie Hall as part of the Bach Cello Suite Festival, celebrating 300 years of the cello suites.  Upcoming concerto appearances include the Korngold’s Concerto with the Jackson Symphony Orchestra in her hometown. 

An active chamber musician, Hannah is a founding member of Trio 826, with Susanna Klein, violin and Julia Bullard, viola, the Beaumont Piano Trio, which performed around the United States and England, and Quadrivinium, an ensemble in residence at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. From 2002-2011, she was a member of the Maia Quartet, the University of Iowa's quartet in residence, which toured China, Japan, and the US, including teaching residencies at Interlochen Center for the Arts, the Great Wall International Music Academy in China, and the Austin Chamber Music Center. She regularly performs in chamber ensembles with musicians from throughout the United States.

 A dedicated private teacher who finds great fulfillment in helping students of all ages grow musically, Hannah was on the University of Iowa faculty from 2002-2012 and has served on the faculties of the University of Northern Iowa, Biola Conservatory, Worcester College (UK), Michigan State University Community School, and Virginia Union University. She has participated in numerous festivals and has been on the faculty of the Eastern Music Festival since 2001 and currently teaches at the International Cello Institute, the Five Seasons Music Festival, and Taconic Music.  Hannah is the founder and Artistic Director of a new music school based in the Quad Cities, The Deanery School of Music.

Hannah studied at the Eastman School of Music and Michigan State University, where she completed her Bachelor of Music degree. She obtained her Master of Music Degree with Fritz Magg at the New England Conservatory. Her musical education began at age 5 with her grandmother, whose 1925 Becker cello she plays today. She is eternally grateful for the fine teaching of a transformative teacher, Louis Potter, during her junior high and high school years.

Hannah - whose hobbies include foodie and thrifting activities, as well as traveling to new places- divides her time between NYC and Iowa City, Iowa, where she lives with her son, Matisse, and their cat, Ripley. 

Danwen Jiang, violin

Danwen Jiang has concertized as concerto soloist, recitalist, and chamber musician across the United States and around the world. She was called by the Boston Globe “an intelligent, agile and breathtaking violinist”, and by The American Record Guide “an exceptional violinist. The Fanfare Magazine described her performances as “absolutely exquisite”.

Jiang has collaborated in concerts with members of the renowned Guarneri, Juilliard, Tokyo, Emerson, and Shanghai String Quartets, The Boston Players, American Chamber Players, and other distinguished musicians such as André-Michel Schub, Lilian Kallir, Igor Kipnis, Ani Kavafian, Eric Rosenblith, Stanley Drucker, and Regina Carter. She has appeared at Sanibel Chamber Music Festival, Yale Chamber Music Series, Rutgers SummerFest, Taconic Music, Montecito International Music Festival in the United States, Music&More SummerFest in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Festival du Quercy Blanc and Festival Dan le Gard in France, Harpa International Music Festival in Iceland, InterHarmony International Music Festival in Italy and Germany, and Victoria International Music Festival in Canada.

A highly regarded string pedagogue, Danwen Jiang is Professor of Violin in the School of Music, Dance and Theatre at Arizona State University in the United States, where she was a recipient of the Professor of the Year Special Recognition Award, President’s Tenure/ Promotion Faculty Exemplar Award, and Distinguished Teacher Award. She was a recipient of Outstanding Teacher’s Award in Hong Kong International Violin and Chamber Music Competition, as well as the Music Teachers National Association’s National Young Artist String Competition. Previously, Jiang taught at Oberlin Conservatory of Music at Oberlin College and University of Illinois at Urbana – Champaign. As guest professor, she has taught at the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing, Iceland Academy of the Arts in Reykjavík, State University of Music and Performing Arts Stuttgart in Germany, Sydney Conservatorium of Music at The University of Sydney in Australia, Vancouver Academy of Music in Canada, and Academy of Music in Kraków, Poland.

Thomas Landschoot, cello

Praised for his charismatic playing and his virtuoso and poetic music making, Belgian cellist Thomas Landschoot enjoys an international career as a concert and recording artist and pedagogue. He has toured North America, Europe, South America and Asia and has appeared on national radio and television worldwide. He has soloed with the National Orchestra of Belgium, the Frankfurt Chamber Orchestra, Tempe Symphony, Prima la Musica, Symphony of the Southwest, Shieh Chien Symphony Orchestra, Symphony Orchestra of Flanders, Scottsdale Philharmonic, Bucharest Festival Orchestra, Flemish Symphony Orchestra, Kaohsiung City Symphony, Loja Symphony Orchestra in Ecuador and the Orchestra of the United States Army Band, and has appeared at Bargemusic, Park City, Santa Barbara, Mammoth Lakes, Eureka, Utah, Red Rock, Park City, Manchester, Fresno, Madeline Island, Waterloo, Killington and Texas Music Festivals. His recordings are available on Summit, Organic, Kokopelli, ArchiMusic and Centaur Records. He is a member of world class Rossetti Quartet.

Tom has also performed with the Takacs, Dover and Arianna Quartets and members of the Cleveland, Vermeer, Tokyo, and Orion Quartets. Past collaborations include Lynn Harrell, Peter Wiley, Gilbert Kalich, Cho-Liang Lin, Martin Beaver and Martin Katz. An avid promoter of music of our time, he has commissioned and premiered over 20 new works for cello, including concerti by Dirk Brosse and Frank Nuyts. He has served as a faculty member at the Music Academy of the West, Castleman Quartet Program, Killington, Meadowmount, Foulger International, High Peaks, Madeline Island, Manchester, Montecito, and Texas Music Festival. Tom has given masterclasses at conservatories and universities throughout Asia, the U.S., Europe and South America. Tom teaches at the Arizona State University; his students can be found among the ranks of national and international competition winners, occupy principal positions in major orchestras and teach at Universities around the US and abroad. Thomas Landschoot is the Artistic Director of the Sonoran Chamber Music Festival, as well as the President of the Arizona Cello Society. He performs on a cello by Tomaso Balestrieri (1776) and a Dominique Pecatte bow.

Drew Petersen, piano

Acclaimed young American pianist Drew Petersen is a sought-after soloist, recitalist, and chamber musician. He has been praised for his commanding and poetic performances of repertoire ranging from Bach to Zaimont. He is the recipient of the 2018 Avery Fisher Career Grant and winner of the 2017 American Pianists Awards and Christel DeHaan Classical Fellowship.

During the 22/23 season, Drew was heard in Washington, DC, Wisconsin, California, Illinois, and Florida with orchestras, in chamber music, and recital, including 92NY. As a prizewinner of the Hilton Head International Piano Competition at age 17, he will return in spring 2024 for the closing concert of the BravoPiano! Festival. Other orchestral appearances in 23/24 include Asheville and Charlotte, North Carolina and Eugene, Oregon. In recital he can be heard in Florida, Alabama, and Virginia.

2018 marked the release of Drew’s first solo recording of music by Barber, Carter, and other American composers on the Steinway & Sons label for which BBC Music Magazine acknowledged his presence as a rising star. A frequent radio contributor, Drew has performed on McGraw-Hill Young Artists Showcase, From the Top, and Performance Today. Profiles include The New York Times, New York magazine, and the documentary “just normal” by award-winning director Kim A. Snyder. A champion of chamber music, Drew appeared on French radio’s France Musique while a member of a Verbier Festival piano trio.

Drew Petersen’s firm belief in the importance of music in contemporary society led to collaborations with Young Audiences NY, which presents performances in New York City’s public schools. His appearance in Andrew Solomon’s New York Times bestselling book, Far From the Tree, sparked a nationwide conversation on raising extraordinary and different children who test the willpower and capabilities of their families and society. Drew ceaselessly advocates for the necessity of classical music and other arts in society, and was named a 2006 Davidson Fellow for his portfolio entitled “Keeping Classical Music Alive.”

Raman Ramakrishnan, cello

As a founding member of the Horszowski Trio, cellist Raman Ramakrishnan has performed across North America, Europe, India, Japan, and in Hong Kong, and recorded for Bridge Records and Avie Records. For eleven seasons, as a founding member of the Daedalus Quartet, he performed around the world. Raman is currently an artist member of the Boston Chamber Music Society and on the faculty of Bard Conservatory.

Raman has given solo recitals in New York, Boston, Seattle, and Washington, D.C., and has performed chamber music at Caramoor, at Bargemusic, with the Chicago Chamber Musicians, and at the Aspen, Bard, Charlottesville, Four Seasons, Kingston, Lincolnshire (UK), Marlboro, Mehli Mehta (India), Oklahoma Mozart, and Vail Music Festivals. He has toured with Musicians from Marlboro and has performed, as guest principal cellist, with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra. As a guest member of Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Ensemble, he has performed in New Delhi and Agra, India and in Cairo, Egypt. He has served on the faculties of the Taconic and Norfolk Chamber Music Festivals, as well as at Columbia University.

Raman was born in Athens, Ohio and grew up in East Patchogue, New York. His father is a molecular biologist and his mother is the children's book author and illustrator Vera Rosenberry. He holds a Bachelor’s degree in physics from Harvard University and a Master’s degree in music from The Juilliard School. His principal teachers have been Fred Sherry, Andrés Díaz, and André Emelianoff. He lives in New York City with his wife, the violist Melissa Reardon, and their young son. He plays a Neapolitan cello made by Vincenzo Jorio in 1837.

2024 Guest Artists

Roberta Cooper, cello

Cellist Roberta Cooper won the Artists International Competition, which sponsored her Carnegie Hall debut. She is a member of the Walsh-Drucker-Cooper Trio, which has performed extensively on major series in the U.S. and Europe.

Roberta is the assistant principal cellist of the American Symphony Orchestra and is a member of the American Composers Orchestra and the Westchester Philharmonic. She has performed in the Berlin Philharmonic, the Brooklyn Philharmonic, the New York City Opera and the ballet orchestras of both the NYC Ballet and American Ballet Theatre, and has been a guest cellist with the Emerson Quartet in concerts throughout the US and Europe.  She has been the continuo player with the Berkshire Bach Society for more than two decades and has been a regular chamber music festival participant, most recently at Classical Tahoe, Festival Napa, and the St Bart’s Music Festival.  She made her debut on Frank Almond’s chamber music series Frankly Music in Milwaukee in January 2024.

A favorite project was as featured soloist on pop singer Linda Ronstadt’s recording of jazz standards, titled Hummin’ to Myself. This group, filled with jazz legends, performed for an A&E TV special and at Jazz@Lincoln Center.    

Roberta Cooper was a scholarship student of Lorne Munroe and Harvey Shapiro at the Juilliard School, where she earned her Bachelor and Master of Music degrees and was awarded the William Henderson Prize for outstanding achievement. 

Eugene Drucker, violin

Violinist Eugene Drucker, a founding member of the multiple Grammy Award-winning Emerson String Quartet, is also a soloist. He has appeared with the orchestras of Montreal, Brussels, Antwerp, Liège, Hartford, Richmond, Louisville, and Jerusalem, as well as with the American Symphony Orchestra, the Aspen Chamber Symphony and the Las Vegas Philharmonic. A graduate of Columbia University and the Juilliard School, where he studied with Oscar Shumsky, Eugene was concertmaster of the Juilliard Orchestra, with which he appeared as soloist several times. He made his New York debut as a Concert Artists Guild winner in the fall of 1976, after having won prizes at the Montreal Competition and the Queen Elisabeth Competition in Brussels. Eugene has recorded the complete unaccompanied works of Bach, reissued by Parnassus Records, and the complete sonatas and duos of Bartók for Biddulph Recordings.

His first novel, The Savior, was published by Simon & Schuster in 2007 and later appeared in a German translation called Wintersonate. A second novel, Yearning, was published in 2021.

Eugene’s suite for string quartet, Series of Twelve, was commissioned by the New Music for Strings Festival in Denmark. It was premiered in Copenhagen and Reykjavik in August 2018 and was later performed by the Escher Quartet in the U.S. He has also composed several settings of poetry by Shakespeare and Denise Levertov for voice and strings.

Eugene Drucker has taught at Stony Brook University since 2002, and recently joined the faculty of the Manhattan School of Music. He became Music Director of the Berkshire Bach Society’s “Bach at New Year’s” Concerts in 2017, and was appointed year-round Artistic Director for that organization in 2024. He lives in New York City with his wife, cellist Roberta Cooper.

Wayne du Maine, Trumpet

A native of St. Louis, MO, Wayne J. du Maine has been performing successfully in the New York City area for over thirty years. As a trumpeter, Wayne has performed and recorded with such ensembles as the New York Philharmonic, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, and Orchestra of St. Luke’s. He currently holds the principal chair with the Brooklyn Philharmonic and the American Composers Orchestra. Mr. du Maine has also led the Hartford Symphony, Brooklyn Philharmonic, and Westchester Philharmonic as conductor of educational concerts. As a trumpet soloist, he has performed numerous concerti with the Concordia Orchestra as well as orchestras from Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, St. Louis, Jacksonville, Springfield (MA), and Mid Coast (ME). As a longtime member of the Manhattan Brass, Wayne has presented and created numerous educational outreach programs for K-12 students in the five boroughs, CT, NJ, and PA. He enjoyed his 20 years as a faculty member of Juilliard’s Music Advancement Program, where he led the trumpet ensemble and was founder, music director, and conductor of the MAP Orchestra. He has also taught at Columbia University, Princeton University, Bar Harbor Brass Week, and the Bowdoin Music Festival. Wayne is currently the Director of Bands at the Elisabeth Morrow School in Englewood, NJ, where he leads the Jazz Ensemble, Concert Bands, Jazz Quintet, Rock Band, and Trumpet Ensemble. Mr. du Maine dedicates his summers to performing at music festivals. This began back in the late 80s, when he spent three summers with the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra performing as principal trumpet under Leonard Bernstein and Seiji Ozawa. He has since performed at festivals including Spoleto, Aspen, Vermont Mozart, Manchester (VT), Berkshire Choral, Bard, and, most recently, the prestigious Marlboro Music Festival. Wayne has also been contracted to play many Broadway shows like Titanic, Music Man, Man of La Mancha, and The King and I. He has served as associate conductor for Fiddler on the Roof, the Lincoln Center production of South Pacific, and The Scottsboro Boys. A major highlight of his career was having the opportunity to perform with Prince at his Paisley Park home in Chanhassen, MN. Wayne can be heard on Prince’s Newpower Soul recording. Mr. du Maine holds degrees from the Juilliard School where he received the Peter Mennin and William Schuman Awards for outstanding excellence. He has been an associate musician with the Metropolitan Opera for 26 years. As a member of ensembles such as Absolute, Xenakis, and Orpheus, he has toured five continents. He has been Program Director of Brass at NYU Steinhardt since 2017.

Evangelia Leontis, soprano

Soprano Evangelia Leontis has extensive experience on the opera, concert and recital stages. She has been seen on the operatic stage in roles including Woglinde in Das Rheingold, Susanna in Le Nozze di Figaro, Zerlina in Don Giovanni, Frasquita in Carmen, Gretel in Hansel and Gretel, Lucy in The Telephone, Zweite Dame in Die Zauberflöte, Barbarina in Le Nozze di Figaro and Le Feu in L'Enfant et les Sortilèges with companies including Barn Opera, Tundi Productions, MassOpera, Opera del West, Longwood Opera, Riverside Theater Works, Odyssey Opera, and Opera Boston.

On the concert stage, Evangelia has been the soprano soloist in works by Berlioz, Britten, Handel, Haydn, Fauré, Rossini, Bach, Bizet, Mozart, Grieg, Orff, and Vaughan Williams with ensembles including Albany Pro Musica, the Keene Chorale, Greensboro Opera, the Greensboro Oratorio Society, the Newburyport Choral Society, Newton Choral Society, Clear Lakes Chorale, and Polymnia Choral Society. She holds the degree of Doctor of Musical Arts from UNC Greensboro, a Master of Music degree in vocal performance from Boston University, and a Bachelors of Music degree in vocal performance from the Eastman School of Music.

Evangelia Leontis currently serves on the voice faculties of Keene State College and Castleton University and maintains a private voice studio. Also an avid proponent of art song, she serves as Administrative Director of Calliope’s Call. She lives in southern Vermont with her husband, twin toddler daughters, and dog.

Stefanie Taylor, viola

Stefanie Taylor is the assistant principal violist of the Vermont Symphony Orchestra, and founding violist of the VSO JukeBox Quartet. She has been principal violist of both Middlebury Opera and Green Mountain Opera, and led the Burlington Chamber Orchestra as concertmaster. She has performed with the Craftsbury Chamber Players, Vermont Virtuosi, Williams Chamber Players, Richardson Chamber Players, the Manchester Music Festival, Capital City Concerts, Central Vermont Chamber Music Festival, and Portland Chamber Music Festival.

In nearly twenty years in New York, Stefanie performed frequently with the New York Philharmonic and as guest principal violist of the American Symphony, and in ensembles including the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra. She premiered several chamber works in venues including Merkin Hall, Roulette, Miller Theater, and performed live on WQXR.

Stefanie is an Affiliate Artist at Middlebury College, is on the faculty of the Middlebury Community Music Center and Berkshire Summer Music, and is Artistic Director of the Manchester and the Mountains Chamber Music Workshop.

A graduate of Indiana University and Stony Brook University, Stefanie studied violin with Miriam Fried, viola with Caroline Levine, and, as a member of the Stony Brook graduate quartet, chamber music with Julius Levine and Tim Eddy. She was a fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center, the Steans Institute at Ravinia, and Villa Musica (Germany).