Guest Artists Day 3

Featured Artist Recital: 7:00 PM MACM

TAIORO

TAI, the tide, represents the ebbs and flows of tangaroa (the sea) and the energy that we ourselves hold. ORO, means to resound or resonate, and is the Māori word used for a musical note.

 

Taioro is an ensemble born of a desire to weave te reo Māori (Māori language) and toikupu (poetry) with instrumental music. Performers Sharn Maree (spoken word poet), Donald Maurice (viola), and Sherry Grant (piano) have collaborated to reframe existing works and create new works that speak to the current climate of indigenous equity, social change and historical recollections. Taioro has performed as guests of the New Zealand High Commission in Canada, giving the world premiere of Taioro ki te Ao at the National Gallery in Ottawa. This work was recently nominated for three prestigious awards at the Wellington Fringe Festival - the Melbourne Fringe Tour Ready, the Auckland Fringe Tour ready, and Best Words.

For the International Viola Congress Taioro will present a programme of music by New Zealand composers Alfred Hill and Douglas Lilburn, and poetry inspired by them, and a collaborative set of pieces by Sharn Maree and award winning composer Anthony Ritchie.

Sharn is an acclaimed spoken word Māori poet, Donald is a veteran of international viola congresses, this will be his 20th, and Sherry Grant is a well-known pianist and poet. Information about Taioro can be found on www.taioro.org

Workshop Unleash Your Projection Power: What we can learn from French horn players

8 June 2023: 8:30 AM, PC 807

Workshop Unleash Your Projection Power: What we can learn from French horn players

8 June 2023: 8:30 AM, PC 807

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​Albert Houde is an accomplished orchestral musician, bringing his “standout horn playing” to ensembles across the eastern United States for twenty years. He is Principal Horn of the West Virginia Symphony and has been featured as a soloist with the Lancaster Symphony, Reading Symphony, and Allegro: The Chamber Orchestra of Lancaster. He has also performed with the Baltimore Symphony and Fort Wayne Philharmonic, among others. Albert teaches horn at Marietta College and Muskingum University. The Houdes live in Morgantown, West Virginia, with their four children.

Lecture Recital: Adapting Telemann's Solo Viola da Gamba Fantasias for the Viola

8 June 2023, 10:00 AM, PC 807

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​Paul Groh was born and raised in the Detroit area.  He studied viola with Ara Zerounian of the Interlochen Center for the Arts, Joseph Pietropaolo of the Boston Symphony, Nathan Gordon of the Detroit Symphony, and Ellen Rose of the Dallas Symphony.  He was the state of Michigan’s old-time country fiddle champion at age 19 and later spent several years as a bass guitarist and backup singer in country, blues, and rock and roll bands.  In 1992 he joined the Kentucky Symphony Orchestra as a section violist, later serving as the orchestra’s personnel manager, librarian, and utility string player (bass guitar, banjo and mandolin).  He migrated to Australia in 2000 and is currently principal viola in Newcastle’s Christ Church Camerata.  He has performed as a soloist and lectured at numerous viola events in Australia and New Zealand, as well as the Thailand International Viola Conferences in 2014 and 2016 and the 38th International Viola Congress in Cincinnati, USA.  He writes regularly for the ANZVS Journal about the viola and its literature and has composed a large body of music for solo viola.  He plays an early twentieth-century viola made by Charles Enel of Paris.

Partial Recital: Origins: Pre-21st Century Works of the African Diaspora for Solo Viola

8 June 2023, 6:00 PM, MACM

Lecture Recital: Celebrating Diversity Beginning Level Anthology

8 June 2023, 11:00 AM, PC 807

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Violist Hillary Herndon has earned a national reputation for her brilliant playing, “sweetly soaring tone” (Time Out New York), creative programming and insightful teaching. She has been heard on NPR and PBS and has collaborated with some of the world’s foremost artists, including Carol Wincenc, James VanDermark and Itzhak Perlman, who described Hillary as “having it all… a gifted teacher and an excellent musician.”     Ms. Herndon’s recordings La Viola and American Voices are available on MSR Classics.

 

Passionate about teaching, Ms. Herndon has published papers in the journals of the American String Teacher and American Viola Society Her recent appearances include performances and master classes at Carnegie Hall, the Sibelius Academy in Finland, Juilliard, Eastman, the University of Michigan, and International Viola Congresses.  Ms. Herndon teaches at the University of Tennessee, and in 2022-2023 is also teaching at the Eastman School of Music.  Herndon holds degrees from the Eastman and Juilliard Schools of Music and serves as President for the American Viola Society.

Lecture Recital: Celebrating Diversity Beginning Level Anthology

8 June 2023, 11:00 AM, PC 807

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Taiwanese pianist Bernadette Lo is a sought-after collaborative pianist, with extensive experience in both vocal and instrumental music.  She has worked in the studios of many renowned artists as Carol Vaness, Cynthia Haymon and Martina Arroyo, and has been an official collaborative pianist for the Orpheus National Vocal Competition in Murfreesboro, Tennessee since 2008.  She has been engaged by the Sugar Creek Festival, Opera Illinois, Knox Opera and Marble City Opera in Knoxville, TN.  Ms. Lo has performed in recitals with acclaimed instrumentalists such as Yuri Mazurkevich, Ronald Barron, Tadeu Coelho, Rex Martin, Les Neish and Joe Burgstaller. She has also concertized regularly with violist Hillary Herndon, with whom she recorded three albums including “La Viola: Music for Viola and Piano by Women Composers of the 20th Century,” receiving critical acclaim.   Ms. Lo is regularly invited to collaborate with guest artists at the Tennessee Cello Workshop, UT Viola Celebration and WKU Violin Fest, and has served as one of the official collaborative pianists for International Horn Symposium and International Tuba/Euphonium Conference.

Ms. Lo is a Visiting Assistant Professor of Piano at the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee and has taught applied piano since 2011. Previously she was a staff pianist for Western Illinois University in Macomb, Illinois. She is also on the faculty for the American Institute of Musical Studies in Graz, Austria. She joined the Knoxville Chamber Music Society in 2021, and is thrilled to return this season with other Knoxville musicians to bring diverse Chamber music to the local audience.

Partial Recital: Musical Hors d'Oeuvres for viola and violin from around the world  

8 June 2023, 6:00 PM, MACM

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The Viennese-born violist Jutta Puchhammer-Sédillot , former student of Siegfried Führlinger (Vienna) and Heidi Castleman (USA), is  described as a violist of exceptional qualitity.  She  is  full time professor of viola and chamber music at the Université de Montréal, Canada, as well as  on  the faculties of the Orford Music Festival (Quebec), the TTT Project (teach teachers teach) in Villaricca,Chile, the Meadowmount School of Music and the Sarasota International Music Festival (USA). She has taught at the at the Perlman Music Programm (PMP), the Heifetz International Music Institute (Virginia) and the North American Viola Insatitute (NAVI). She is reknown for her performances of rare post-romantic viola repertoire.  and was principal viola of the Laval Symphonie Orchestra (Laval, Québéc) over 20 years. She has toured extensively as a soloist, recitalist, chamber musician and lecturer, giving masterclasses in the most prestigious schools and summer programms such as The Juilliard School  of Music, The Curtis Institute , the Vienna University of Music (Austria), Conservatoire superieure de musique de Lyon

She was the host of the 36th International Viola congress held in Montreal ,  is president of the International Viola Society (IVS), and holds the Maurice Riley Prize for International achievement (2006) as well as the Canadian Life achievement award (2022)as well as the Silver Clef Award (2019) highest distinction of the IVS.

Her interest goes to  rediscovering late romantic music written for the viola, real gems of which many have been recorded on  solo CDs (« Alto Romantic Fantasies" ECCD 2060, "German Romantic works » FACD018).

Her latest discoveries focus on 27 « Pièces de Concours", of which 18 have been recorded   by Jutta on the Navona Level as well as 13 of   them edited  in 3 volumes by the Schott edition, winner of the best Editions Prize 2017, discribed as« Rare fin –de-siècle competition pieces providing a treasure trove of viola repertoire « .

Partial Recital: Musical Hors d'Oeuvres for viola and violin from around the world  

8 June 2023, 6:00 PM, MACM

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Annette-Barbara Vogel’s rich international performing career has featured her as a soloist, recitalist and chamber musician in over thirty countries across six continents. Considered one of the finest German violinists of her generation, she accepted her appointment as Full Professor at Western University/Ontario (Canada) in 2004, where she continues to serve as the area coordinator for the string area and is in high demand as a pedagogue and chamber music coach. 
Her students have gone on to win seats in many important professional orchestras including the Frankfurt Opera, the Duisburg-Düsseldorf Oper am Rhein, the Seattle
Symphony, the Portland Symphony Orchestra (OR), the Mozart Players London (UK), the Stockholm Opera, the Canadian Opera Company, London Symphonia, the Thunder Bay Symphony and the Victoria Symphony Orchestra. Several former students have
also gone on to successful careers as professors throughout the US and Canada.  Vogel’s prolific recording career as soloist and chamber musician has produced more
than fifteen commercial albums. Her 2011 CD release “Französische Komponistinnen,” received the British IRR Outstanding Recording Award. Her 2021 recording “First
Ladies” of violin sonatas by women composers Ethel Smyth, Elfrida Andrée and Mel Bonis appeared on Naxos Sweden's top 10 list in its first week of release. Vogel has recorded for Avie Records, Bluegriffin Recordings, Cybele Records, Eroica Classical Records, Harmonia Mundi Germany and Toccata, UK. At eleven years old, she was the youngest student ever accepted to the Folkwang- Hochschule Essen, where she later completed her solo and chamber music diplomas “summa cum laude.” Her early training as a violinist included the legendary Dutch
violinist, Herman Krebbers, at Amsterdam’s Sweelinck Konservatorium. At age sixteen Vogel was selected to study at the Menuhin Academy in Gstaad under Sir Yehudi
Menuhin. By then already touring professionally as a soloist and with piano trio, Trio Alani, Vogel studied chamber music under Walter Levin (LaSalle Quartet) at the Musik-
Akademie Basel, before enrolling in the Artist Diploma program at Los Angeles’ University of Southern California. In addition to her two German degrees (Performance
and Chamber Music) and her “Konzertexamen” which she completed all with highest possible honours, Vogel holds an Artist Diploma, “summa cum laude,” under Dorothy
Delay from the Cincinnati College-Conservatory. Vogel’s performance studies also include violin pedagogy courses under Alice Schoenfeld at USC. Vogel was chosen to
perform the Brahms Violin Concerto under the baton of Keith Lockhart at a Gala concert honouring Dorothy Delay’s seventy-fifth birthday.  Annette-Barbara Vogel is Artistic Director of the not-for-profit "Magisterra Soloists”
(founded in 2016, www.magisterra.com)

Lecture: Intentional Practice as a Performance Superpower

8 June 2023, 3:00 PM, PC 807

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Partial Concert: Portuguese Music for Viola and Piano

8 June 2023, 12:00 PM PC 807

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Jorge Alves is professor at the Escola Superior de
Música, Artes e Espetáculo – Porto and He is member
of the Matosinhos String Quartet. With this group, he
performs regularly in Portugal and abroad,
collaborating with some of the most prominent
musicians, and has been involved in the premiere and
recording of several contemporary pieces. Matosinhos
String Quartet was nominated ‘Rinsing Stars’ from the
prestigious European Concert Hall Organization..
Jorge Alves has an extensive performance experience, having appeared throughout Spain, France, United Kingdom, Switzerland, Belgium, The Netherlands, Germany, Slovenia, Italy, Brazil, Russia and China, as a soloist, as
well as with chamber ensembles and orchestras. He was awarded the first prize in viola (1996) and chamber music (1991) at the Radio National Competition PJM-RTP (Portugal), Santa Cecilia International Music Festival (Italy, 1996) and the Alcobaça International Chamber Music Competition (Portugal, 2009). After finishing his graduation in Portugal, he was awarded a grant from the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation that allowed him to study during four years with Tibor Varga (Sion, Switzerland) and Bruno Giuranna (Cremona, Italy). Jorge Alves is the founder and president of the Portuguese Viola Association and
He host the 42o International Viola Congress that took place at Porto from the 26th to the 30th November 2104, and He is founder President of the Portuguese Branch of the European String Teachers Association and since 2020 he is
member of the Central Board of ESTA International
Jorge Alves loves to teach and he regularly do viola and chamber music master classes all over Portugal but also in he Lemmens Institute, Leuven; Maastricht Conservatory, Malta Summer Festival, Conservatório de Cosenza, Campus delle Arti, Bassano Del Grappa and Santa Maria University, Brasil. Antwerp Conservatory, Petrozavodsk State Conservatory.

Partial Concert: Swedish Baroque Music

8 June 2023, 12:00 PM PC 807

Partial Concert: Potpourri

8 June 2023, 2:00 PM, MACM

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A Classical violist by training, recent years saw Jeremy Chiew take on leadership, creative programming and administrative positions with different performing arts groups and non-profit organisations. An adjunct lecturer with the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts, Jeremy engages
students frequently and encourages partnership-building between them and the communities at large. Jeremy’s own annual viola recitals aim at increasing awareness of this lesser-known member of the string family to the local audiences. These recitals have seen collaborations with
Singapore Symphony Orchestra (SSO) and T’ang Quartet musicians, as well as the Singapore National Youth Orchestra (SNYO). Jeremy’s most recent collaboration ‘Solitude: My Time at Sea’ supported by the Digital
Presentation Grant allowed for a digital exploration of music and videography as a response to the Singapore’s lockdown period in 2020. Keen to explore multidisciplinary artistry across genres and recognising the need for a contemporary and interpersonal approach towards audience-building, Jeremy debuted as Assistant Stage Director for New Opera Singapore’s production of Benjamin Britten’s ‘A
Midsummer Night’s Dream’ in 2019. He also volunteers as a viola coach at Beautiful Minds Charity, where he applies Alexander and Dalcroze techniques in his classes while serving children with special needs.

Partial Recital: Music by Young Canadian composer

8 June 2023, 2:00 PM, MACM

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Tasman Tantasawat is a violist from Thailand currently studying the Master in Music Performance degree program under the guidance of Sharon Wei. Tasman came to Canada in 2014 and spent most of his time in Halifax, Nova Scotia where he received his Bachelor of Music Degree in music performance from Dalhousie University. He is currently in his final year of the Master in Music program at the University of Western Ontario and is expected to graduate on the spring of 2023.  Tasman was the principal violist for the Nova Scotia Youth Orchestra for two years, and he was awarded winner of the Concerto Night competition, subsequently performing with Dalhousie Symphony orchestra as a soloist in 2021. Tasman has performed in multiple music festivals,
most recently participating in the Scotia Festival of Music 2022 in Halifax. He was accepted into the renowned National Youth Orchestra of Canada for their 2022 tour, where he performed in multiple cities across Ontario and Quebec.

Partial Concert: Norwegian solo compositions for viola

8 June 2023, 3:00 PM, MACM

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Povilas Syrrist-Gelgota (1976) was born in Lithuania but lives in Norway already for 23 years. 

 

He is a board member of Norwegian Viola Society, Artistic director of concert series “Toner og Tanker på Malerhjemmet” , former Artist Director of Asker Chamber Music festival, leader of several chamber groups and chamber music projects. 

Povilas is a member of The Norwegian Society of Soloists. 

 

Povilas is unusal violist. His wishes to build musical bridges between different styles, countries art forms.  

Povilas plays viola, sings and sings while he plays viola.  In his concerts audience can experience combinations of music, poetry, visual art. 

Povilas combines classical and folk music, tango, his own compositions in folk romantic style and new music of composers from Norway, Lithuania and Turkey. 50 new compositions was composed and dedicated to Povilas and his chamber groups. 

 

 

After 20 years as a member of Oslo Philharmonic orchestra Povilas  focuses  now on solo projects for singing violist, composing, teaching and promoting viola. Last 5 years he has played round 200 solo concerts in schools promoting viola. In May 2023 he was main organiser of «Viola days in Asker» - two days with viola workshops, concerts, seminars and lessons for children who play or want to try viola.

 

Povilas contributes to new viola repertoire . He is member of NOPA - Norwegian Society of Composers and Lyricists, and he has composed more than 30 compositions for viola.

 

Povilas is very active promoting Norwegian Music for viola abroad and he has received a medal from Lithuanian Embassy in Norway for his contribution in building cultural bridges between Norway and Lithuania. 

 

Povilas is member of Lithuanian Musicians Union.

 

Povilas has many recordings available on internet,  he is an active Youtube artist.

 

Povilas studied in Vilnius, Paris, London and Oslo

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Partial Recital: ViolaCello, Composers and folk music

8 June 2023, 3:00 PM, MACM

Partial Recital: ViolaCello, Composers and folk music

8 June 2023, 3:00 PM, MACM

Tiphaine Lucas was born in 2000 and begins playing the cello at the age of five. She studies at first in Angers’ conservatory in France, and is laureate of Angers’ conservatory soloist competition in 2017. In 2018, she starts her Bachelor curriculum in Switzerland, at the Haute École de Musique Vaud-Valais- Fribourg in Xavier Phillips’ class (HEMU Lausanne – Sion). She graduates in 2021, and is gratified with the HEMU Valais-Wallis special prize. Same year, she receives a scholarship from the Max D. Jost
foundation and the prize of the Chursächsischen Philharmonie. Passionate about chamber music, she plays in multiple festivals in France and Switzerland, such as the Februarkonzerte Zweisimmen, the Schubertiade in Sion , the Musique Halles de Lomagne, and the festival Esprit Sainf in Lausanne. She also plays with the Nexus Orchester and the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne. Tiphaine was involved with the research project on Rebecca Clarke in HEMU Lausanne.
As an artist, she has a specific interest about making music accessible for everyone, therefore she plays for the association “Les Concerts du cœur” for people in difficult social situations. She still develops her skills as a cellist with a Master of Arts in the Haute École de Musique Vaud-Valais-
Fribourg, and through masterclasses with masters of violoncello such as Marc Coppey, Peter Bruns, Steven Isserlis and Clemens Hagen.

Lecture Recital: Viola Music by Women: Exploring the Cooper Anthology

8 June 2023, 2:00 PM, PC 807

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Viola Professor at Florida State University, was praised by the American Record Guide for “superb technique anmusicianship.”  She performed with the Thailand Philharmonic the Bartok Viola Concerto (2014) and the Shulman Theme and Variations (2018). She was faculty artist for festivals at Aspen, Brevard, Yellow Barn, Schlern/Italy, Green Mountain, Idyllwild and Bowdoin and recorded chamber music for Naxos, Col Legno and Canadian Broadcasting Company labels. Guest return chamber appearances include Seventh Species (Oregon) and the Amelia Island Festival (Florida). She was principal violist of the Southwest Florida Symphony/Sanibel Chamber Orchestra and the Tallahassee Symphony (28 years). As researcher of Balinese rebab masters, she performed rebab with gamelans in Bali and San Francisco. She performs regularly as a jazz violist with JazzEtcetera of Tallahassee since 2010.  Ryan won the Aspen Young Artist Viola Concerto Competition, the FSU University Teaching Award and several research grants. She gave the collegiate viola master class at the ASTA (American String Teachers Association) 2008 national conference, and presented for ASTA at Santa Clara, Albuquerque, Atlanta, and Tampa national conferences.  She performed as soloist at the American Viola Society (AVS) Congress in Austin, presented at the Los Angeles national AVS Festival and gave a jazz workshop for the IVS international conference 2022; her article on viola caprices was featured in the 2013 AVS journal. A dedicated teacher and adjudicator (herself student of Karen Tuttle and Masao Kawasaki), she is proud of former students holding leadership positions in orchestras and schools on 5 continents.

Full Recital: Hindemith's Solo Viola Sonatas

8 June 2023, 5:00 PM, MACM

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Amadi Azikiwe, violist, violinist and conductor, has been heard in recital in major cities throughout the United States, such as New York, Boston, Cleveland, Chicago, San Francisco, Pittsburgh, Houston, Baltimore, and Washington, D.C., including an appearance at the U.S. Supreme Court. Mr. Azikiwe has also been a guest of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center at the Alice Tully Hall in New York, and at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. He has appeared in recital at the Piccolo Spoleto Festival in Charleston, the “Discovery” recital series in La Jolla, the International Viola Congress, and at the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Since then, he has performed throughout Israel, Canada, South America, Central America, Switzerland, India, Japan, Hong Kong, and throughout the Caribbean.

As a soloist, Mr. Azikiwe has appeared with the Prince George’s Philharmonic, Delaware Symphony, Virginia Symphony, North Carolina Symphony, Fort Collins Symphony, Virginia Beach Symphony, Roanoke Symphony, Winston-Salem Symphony, Western Piedmont Symphony, Salisbury Symphony, Richmond Philharmonic, SUNY Fredonia Symphony Orchestra, Gateways Music Festival Orchestra, City Island Baroque Ensemble of New York, National Symphony of Ecuador, and at the Costa Rica International Music Festival. He has also toured with Music from Marlboro, and performed at the Sarasota, Tanglewood, Aspen, Norfolk, and San Juan Islands Festivals, El Paso International Chamber Music Festival, Salt Bay Chamber Festival, Charlottesville Chamber Music Festival, Virginia Arts Festival, Maui Classical Music Festival, Missouri Chamber Music Festival, Yachats Music Festival, Staunton Music Festival, Carolina Chamber Music Festival, and the Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival. Mr. Azikiwe’s performances have been broadcast on National Public Radio’s “Performance Today”, “St. Paul Sunday”, on WNYC in New York, WGBH in Boston, WFMT in Chicago, and the BBC, along with television appearances in South America.

As a chamber musician, Azikiwe has appeared in concert with the Chicago Chamber Musicians, the Kandinsky Trio, the Harlem Chamber Players, the Chester, Miro, St. Lawrence, Anderson, Arianna, Harrington and Corigliano quartets. He has also performed extensively with the Ritz Chamber Players and the Concertante Chamber Players, with whom he recorded Tchaikovsky’s Souvenir de Florence, re- leased on the Helicon label. On the MSR label, Mr Azikiwe has recorded the Sonata for viola and piano by American composer James Cohn. Among Mr. Azikiwe’s prizes and awards are those from Concert Artists Guild, the North Carolina Symphony, the National Society of Arts and Letters, and the Epstein Young Artists Award from the Boys and Girls Clubs of America, with whom he still maintains a strong artistic and mentoring association.

Mr. Azikiwe was previously the conductor of the Old Dominion University Chamber Orchestra and
the Atlanta University Center Orchestra. He was also a visiting faculty member of Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music in Bloomington, IN. Currently, he is on the faculty of James Madison University, a Teaching Artist for Young Audiences of Virginia, ClassNotes, and Music Director of the Harlem Sym- phony Orchestra. He has guest conducted for the Intercollegiate Music Association, Tennessee Music Educators Association All-Collegiate Orchestra, Third Street Philharmonia, Gateways Music Festival, and Trinity Opera Company.

Mr. Azikiwe has appeared as artist faculty at the Brevard Music Center, Hot Springs Music Festival, Inter- lochen Center for the Arts, Apple Hill Center for Chamber Music, Killington Music Festival, Manchester Music Festival, Tennessee Governor’s School for the Arts, Mammoth Lakes Chamber
Music Festival, University of North Carolina School of the Arts Summer Session and the Aria International Academy in London, Ontario.

As an orchestral musician, he has appeared with the New York Philharmonic, Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, as principal violist of the SHIRA Jerusalem International Symphony Orchestra and guest principal violist of Canada’s National Arts Centre Orchestra. He has performed under the baton of conductors Lorin Maazel, James DePriest, Christoph Eschenbach, Gerard Schwarz, Marek Janowski, Leonard Slatkin, Seiji Ozawa, Michael Morgan, Pinchas Zukerman, Stanislaw Skrowaczewski, Sixten Ehrling, Gennady Rozhdestvensky, Charles Dutoit, Christoph von Dohnanyi, Michael Tilson Thomas, Kurt Masur, and Leonard Bernstein.

A native of New York City, Amadi Azikiwe was born in 1969. After early studies with his mother, he began his formal training at the North Carolina School of the Arts as a student of Sally Peck. He contin- ued his studies at the New England Conservatory with Marcus Thompson and conductor Pascal Verrot, receiving his Bachelor’s degree. Mr. Azikiwe was also awarded the Performer’s Certificate from Indiana University, where he served as an Associate Instructor, and received his Master’s Degree in 1994 as a student of Atar Arad.

Recital: Bruch's Kol Nidrei, Bloch's Suite Hébraïque, and  Franck's Violin Sonata (Kosmala edition in original key)

8 June 2023, 4:00 PM, MACM 

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Jerzy Kosmala has established himself as one of the world’s premiere violists. Internationally acclaimed as a concert violist and pedagogue, Kosmala has concertized throughout Europe, the former Soviet Union, Canada, North and South America, Asia, and South Africa, and has recordings on Orion, Vox/MGM, and Centaur labels. He is a frequent guest artist and performer at the world’s foremost festivals, International Viola Congresses, universities, and academies, including the Royal Academy of Music, Royal College, and Guildhall School of Music in London, England; the “Mozarteum” in Salzburg, Austria; Eastman, Juilliard, Manhattan, Berlin, Cologne, Stuttgart, Dresden, Vienna, Prague, Warsaw, Krakow, and Hong Kong Schools of Music; and Boston, Toronto, South California, Michigan, and Indiana Universities. Dr. Kosmala is a permanent jury member of virtually all the most prestigious international competitions, including the Lionel Tertis International Viola Competition in the Isle of Man, the Geneva International Viola Competition in Switzerland, the International Viola Competition in Munich, Germany; the International Competition in Markneukirchen, Germany; the International Chamber Music Competition in Trapani, Italy; the International Primrose Viola Competition in the USA; the International Brahms Viola Competition in Austria, the International Viola Competition in Bled, Slovenia, and the Concert Artist Guild International Competition in New York City. In addition, Dr. Kosmala has adapted and published numerous compositions for viola and has premiered many contemporary works, some of which were written especially for him. A former member of the Krakow String Quartet and renowned Eastman String Quartet. He is an erstwhile student of and assistant to the legendary William Primrose, and other masters, and a graduate of the Krakow Academy of Music, Eastman School of Music, and Indiana University. A former member of the executive board of the American Viola Society, Jerzy Kosmala serves on the faculty of the University of California, Irvine, and is a former visiting professor at the Royal Academy of Music in London, England.

 

Kosmala's upcoming performances and master classes will include Academia Santa Cecilia in Rome, Italy, the School of Music in Krakow Poland,.  Kosmala's upcoming judging engagements will include Brahms International Viola competition in Austria, and the Enkor International Competition.  In addition, Kosmala will be teaching at the Summer Music Academy in Krakow, Poland and performing with the UCI Symphony Orchestra.