Mark O'Connor is an American fiddle player and composer whose music combines bluegrass, country, jazz and classical. A three-time Grammy Award winner, he has won six Country Music Association Musician Of The Year awards and, was a member of three influential musical ensembles; the David Grisman Quintet, The Dregs and Strength in Numbers.
Robert Nathaniel Mann was a violinist, composer, conductor, and founding member of the Juilliard String Quartet, as well as a faculty member at the Manhattan School of Music. Mann, the first violinist at Juilliard, served on the school's string quartet for over fifty years until his retirement in 1997.
The Shanghai Quartet is a string quartet that formed in 1983. The quartet is made up of: first violinist Weigang Li, second violinist Angelo Xiang Yu, violist Honggang Li, and cellist Nicholas Tzavaras. On November 20, 2020 the ensemble announced the newest member, Angelo Xiang Yu. The Shanghai Quartet accepted the resignation of former second violinist Yi-Wen Jiang on March 17, 2020. The group's tours have included North America, South America, Japan, China, Australia, New Zealand, and Europe. Among their performances, the Shanghai Quartet has developed a long list of performance collaborators including Yo-Yo Ma, David Soyer, Eugenia Zukerman, Sharon Isbin, Ruth Laredo, Arnold Steinhardt, and Chanticleer.
Jonathan Anthony Rose is an Australian violinist, composer, and multimedia artist. Rose's work is centered in the experimental music known as free improvisation, where he has created large environmental multimedia works, built experimental musical instruments, and improvised violin concertos with accompanying orchestra. He has been described by Tony Mitchell as "undoubtedly the most exploratory, imaginative and iconoclastic violin player who has lived in Australia".
Ethel is a New York based string quartet that was co-founded in 1998 by Ralph Farris, viola; Dorothy Lawson, cello; Todd Reynolds, violin; and Mary Rowell, violin. Unlike most string quartets, Ethel plays with amplification and integrates improvisation into its performances. The group's current membership includes violinists Kip Jones and Corin Lee.
The Clinton String Quartet is a string quartet based in the Syracuse, New York area. Active for over 15 years, their most prominent works have been the debuts of many 20th century classical recordings with the Syracuse Society for New Music. All four members are also members of the Syracuse Symphony Orchestra.
Matthew John Hindson AM is an Australian composer.
Mark Feldman is an American jazz violinist.
Lynn Chang is a Chinese American violinist known for his work as both a soloist and a chamber musician. Chang is a founding member of the Boston Chamber Music Society and is currently a faculty member at MIT, Boston University, the Boston Conservatory, and the New England Conservatory of Music.
Andor John Toth was an American classical violinist, conductor and educator with a musical career spanning over six decades. Toth played his violin on the World War II battlefields of Aachen, Germany; performed with the NBC Symphony Orchestra under Arturo Toscanini in 1943 at age 18; and formed several chamber music ensembles, including the Oberlin String Quartet, the New Hungarian Quartet, and the Stanford String Quartet. For 15 years he was the violinist in the Alma Trio. Toth conducted orchestras in Cleveland, Denver and Houston. In 1969, he was the founding concertmaster of the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra under Neville Marriner. Toth taught at five important colleges and universities, and recorded for Vox, Decca Records and Eclectra Records.
David Balakrishnan is the founder of the Turtle Island Quartet.
Alan Shulman was an American composer and cellist. He wrote a considerable amount of symphonic music, chamber music, and jazz music. Trumpeter Eddie Bailey said, "Alan had the greatest ear of any musician I ever came across. He had better than perfect pitch. I've simply never met anyone like him." Some of his more well known works include his 1940 Neo-Classical Theme and Variations for Viola and Piano and his A Laurentian Overture, which was premiered by the New York Philharmonic in 1952 under the baton of Guido Cantelli. Also of note is his 1948 Concerto for Cello and Orchestra which was also premiered by the New York Philharmonic with cellist Leonard Rose and conductor Dmitri Mitropoulos. Many of Shulman's works have been recorded, and the violinist Jascha Heifetz and jazz clarinetist Artie Shaw have been particular exponents of his work both in performance and on recordings.
Quartet San Francisco is a non-traditional and eclectic string quartet led by violinist and String Masters co-founder Jeremy Cohen. The group played their first concert in 2001 and has recorded five albums. Playing a wide range of music genres including jazz, blues, tango, swing, funk, and pop, the group challenges the traditional classical music foundation of the string quartet.
David Serkin Ludwig is an American composer, teacher, and Dean of Music at The Juilliard School. His uncle was pianist Peter Serkin, his grandfather was the pianist Rudolf Serkin, and his great-grandfather was the violinist Adolf Busch. He holds positions and residencies with nearly two dozen orchestras and music festivals in the US and abroad. His choral work, The New Colossus, was performed at the 2013 presidential inauguration of Barack Obama.
Andreas Makris was a Greek-American composer and violinist, born in Kilkis, Greece, on March 7, 1930. He was a Composer-in-Residence for many years at the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington DC, working with conductors such as Howard Mitchell, Mstislav Rostropovich, Antal Dorati, and Leonard Slatkin. He composed around 100 works for orchestra, chamber ensembles, and solo instruments, including the Aegean Festival Overture, which, transcribed for concert band by Major Albert Bader of the USAF Band, became a popular piece with US bands. Grants and awards he received include the Damroch Grant, National Endowment for the Arts Grant, the Martha Baird Rockefeller Award, ASCAP Award, the Fulbright Scholarship, and citations from the Greek Government.
Jean François Toussaint Rogister was a Belgian virtuoso violist, teacher and composer.
Metropolitan Youth Symphony is a youth orchestra organization in Portland, Oregon, U.S.
Kenji Bunch is an American composer and violist living in Portland, Oregon. Bunch currently serves as the artistic director of Fear No Music and teaches at Portland State University, Reed College, and for the Portland Youth Philharmonic.
Oleg Vyacheslavovich Bezuglov – is a Russian violinist, chamber musician and teacher, co-founder of the violin and piano duo Class&Jazz. The Honored Worker of the Russian Musical Society since 2010.
Jessie Montgomery is an American composer, chamber musician, and music educator. Her compositions focus on the vernacular, improvisation, language, and social justice.
