Alena Baeva is one of the brightest stars of violin playing today. Currently Alena Baeva appears to great critical acclaim at the world’s finest concert venues, among them the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatoire, the Great Hall of the St Petersburg Philharmonic, Suntory Hall (Tokyo), the Sala Verdi Hall (Milan), the Louvre Concert Hall, the Salle Gaveau, the Théâtre des Champs Élysées and the UNESCO Hall (Paris), Carnegie Hall (New York), Victoria Hall (Geneva) and the Herkulessaal (Munich).

Alena Baeva appears with leading symphony ensembles including the Grand Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra, the Svetlanov Academic Symphony Orchestra, the Symphony Orchestra of the St. Petersburg Philharmonic, German Radio Orchestra, the National Orchestra of Belgium, the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestra of the Danish Royal Opera and the New Russia State Symphony Orchestra. She works with such acclaimed conductors as Sir Neville Marriner, Vladimir Fedoseyev, Vladimir Spivakov, Mark Gorenstein, Paavo Berglund, Alexander Lazarev and Yuri Bashmet. The musician places particular importance on concert music; her partners have included Аlexander Knyazev, Yuri Bashmet, Dmitry Sitkovetsky, Yulian Rakhlin, Shlomo Minz, Itamar Golan, Аlexander Melnikov and Vadim Kholodenko. Alena Baeva also had the honour of meeting and studying under Mstislav Rostropovich.

The musician frequently takes part in various festivals, among them December Evenings and Virtuosi of the 21st Century (USA), the Seiji Osawa Academy (Switzerland) and festivals in Vienna, Athens, Istanbul, Israel, Brazil and CIS nations. She has given acclaimed recital performances at the festivals Violin in the Louvre (France), Ravinia in Chicago (USA), the Juventus festival and the festival in Menton (France).

Alena Baeva was born in 1985 in a musical family. At the age of five she began studying the violin in Alma-Ata under Olga Danilova. From 1995 she was a student with Professor Grach, People’s Artist of the USSR, at the Central School of Music of the Moscow State Tchaikovsky Conservatoire and from 2002-2007 at the Moscow Conservatoire itself. In 2003 she was invited by Mstislav Rostropovich to train in France. At various master-classes she has studied under Ida Gendel, Shlomo Mintz, Boris Garlitsky and Maxim Vengerov.

Alena Baeva has a rich range of recordings made on radio and television in Belgium, Germany, Israel, Poland, Japan, Portugal, Russia and the USA. Her concerts have been broadcast by the TV channels Kultura, TV-Tsentr, Mezzo and Arte as well as on BBC radio.

Alena Baeva has enjoyed great success at competitions. Starting in 1994, she has won first prizes at competitions in Novosibirsk, Warsaw, Germany and at the prestigious Henryk Wieniawski competition in Poznań. She won the Grand Prix at the II Moscow International Niccolò Paganini Competition (2004), giving her the right to perform on the Stradivarius violin that belonged to Henryk Wieniawski, as well as the Gold Medal and audience prize at the III International Violin Competition in Sendai (2007). Alena Baeva has also received the Triumph youth prize (2007).

Alena Baeva’s discography includes recordings of concerti by Bruch and Shostakovich with the Russian National Orchestra (Pentatone Classics/Investment Programmes Fund), concerti by Szymanowski (DUX) and sonatas by Poulenc, Prokofiev and Debussy (SIMC). In 2009 Switzerland’s Orpheum foundation released a disc featuring a live recording from the Tonhalle (Zurich) on which Alena Baeva performed Prokofiev’s First Concerto with the Grand Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra under Vladimir Fedoseyev.

The violinist’s rapidly expanding repertoire includes over forty violin concerti and numerous sonatas and other works from different eras.

Alena Baeva performs on a Stradivarius violin provided by the State Collection of Unique Musical Instruments.

18 year old American violinist, Chad Hoopes, has been appearing with numerous ensembles throughout the world since he won the first prize at the Young Artists Division of the Yehudi Menuhin International Violin Competition. His exceptional talent and magnificent tone are acclaimed by critics worldwide. He is a violinist possessing vibrant virtuosity “with an inspiring blend of emotional expression and technical ease” (Press Democrat), and his mastery is described as “way beyond his years” (Press Democrat). During the 2011-12 season, he was the third Artist-in-Residence in the history of the Classical Minnesota Public Radio.

As part of MPR’s Artist-In-Residence program, Chad will play concerts throughout the greater Minneapolis/St. Paul area and will also participate and lead educational activities at local schools. At each school he will talk about the importance of music and the arts and will be joined by Classical MPR host Steve Staruch. Chad will also post blogs at classicalmpr.org.

His recent debuts include such orchestras as the Vancouver Symphony, San Francisco Symphony, Utah Symphony, Pittsburgh Symphony, Houston Symphony, San Diego Symphony, Minnesota Orchestra, Brussels Chamber Orchestra, Orchestra of the Welsh National Opera, Colorado Music Festival Orchestra, and Trondheim Symphony and the National Arts Centre Orchestra in Ottawa, Canada.

Chad is a frequent guest artist at the Menuhin Festival in Gstaad, Switzerland, since his debut in August 2009. He has appeared at the Tuscan Sun Festival in Cortona, Italy, performing Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, Festival del Sole in Napa Valley, and Festspiele Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, where he has just recently been named the winner of the prestigious audience award. In October 2012 he was signed by the French label NAIVE (Gramophone award label of the year 2012). His first recording will be released in the autumn of 2013.

Beyond the concert hall, Chad’s virtuosity and exuberant personality have been featured on the CBS Early Show, NBC affiliate station WKYC (Cleveland), NPR station WCLV in Ohio, ABC affiliate station KSTP Twin Cities Live, and on PBS’s From the Top: Live at Carnegie Hall. He was the soloist on the Emmy Award-winning June 2007 television commercial for the Cleveland Indians Major League Baseball team produced by SportsTime Ohio Network, which aired on NBC on SportsTime Ohio and on ESPN.
Chad began his violin studies in Minneapolis. He later studied at the Cleveland Institute of Music under David Cerone and Joel Smirnoff and has additionally studied at Ottawa’s NAC Young Artists Program and at the Heifetz Institute. Chad is living in Cleveland where he is in his final year of high school.

Chad plays the 1713 Antonio Stradivari Cooper; Hakkert; ex Ceci violin, courtesy of Jonathan Moulds.

“A genuine musician” – Isaac Stern

An outstanding international musician of our time, Vietnamese pianist Dang Thai Son was propelled to the forefront of the musical world in October 1980, when he was awarded the First Prize and Gold Medal at the Xth International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw. It was also the first time that a top international competition was won by an Asian pianist.

He began piano studies with his mother in Hanoi. Discovered by the Russian pianist Isaac Katz, who was on visit in Vietnam in 1974, he pursued his advanced training at the Moscow State Tchaikovsky Conservatory in Russia with Vladimir Natanson and Dmitry Bashkirov.

Since winning the Chopin Competition, his international career has taken him to over forty countries, into such world renowned halls as LincolnCenter (New York), Barbican Center (London), Salle Pleyel (Paris), Herculessaal (Munich), Musikverein (Vienna), Concertgebouw (Amsterdam), Opera House (Sydney), and Suntory Hall (Tokyo).

He has played with numerous world-class orchestras such as St-Petersburg Philharmonic, Orchestre Symphonique de Montreal, BBC Philharmonic, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre de Paris, Czech Philharmonic, Dresden Philharmonic, Staatskapelle Berlin, Baden-Baden Symphony Orchestra, Oslo Philharmonic, Warsaw National Philharmonic, Prague Symphony, NHK Symphony, New Japan Philharmonic, Helsinki Philharmonic, Sydney Symphony, Hungarian State Symphony, Moscow Philharmonic, Russian National Symphony, as well as Virtuosi of Moscow, Sinfonia Varsovia, Vienna Chamber, Zurich Chamber, Royal Swedish Chamber Orchestras, and the Ensemble Orchestral de Paris. Also, he has appeared under the direction of Sir Neville Marriner, Pinchas Zukerman, Mariss Jansons, Pavvo Jarvi , Ivan Fisher, Frans Bruggen, Vladimir Spivakov, Dimitri Kitaenko, James Loughram, Jiri Belohlavek, Hiroyuki Iwaki, Ken-Ichiro Kobayashi, Pavel Kogan, Jerzy Maksymiuk, Sakari Oramo, and John Nelson.

In the field of chamber music, he has performed with the Berlin Philharmonic Octet, the Smetana String Quartet, Barry Tuckwell, Tsuyoshi Tsutsumi, Pinchas Zukerman, Boris Belkin, Joseph Suk, and Alexander Rudin, and he has played duo-piano with Andrei Gavrilov.

Other career highlights include a New Year’s Day concert (1995) with Yo Yo Ma, Seiji Ozawa, Kathleen Battle, and the late Mstislav Rostropovich, in a major international event produced by the Japanese Broadcasting Corporation NHK; in January 1999, a Gala-concert opening the Chopin year, where he was the only foreign artist invited to appear as soloist with the Warsaw National Opera Theatre Orchestra; concerts in Isaac Stern’s last festival in Miyazaki, Japan in 2001, which included three performances with Pinchas Zukerman; a special performance in 2005 as the only guest artist at the Opening Gala Concert of the XVth International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw, where he was also a member of the jury; and on Chopin’s 200th Birthday, March 1st, 2010, he played at the Gala Concert the Concerto in f-minor with the Orchestra of the Eighteenth Century under the direction of Frans Bruggen at the Warsaw National Opera Theatre.

Dang Thai Son is frequently invited to give master classes around the world – such as the special class in Berlin in October, 1999, where he taught alongside Murray Perahia and Vladimir Ashkenazy, who extended the invitation. Since 1987, he has been a visiting professor at the Kunitachi Music College (Tokyo), and currently, he teaches at the Universite de Montreal (Canada). He has sat on the juries of such prestigious competitions as the International Chopin Piano Competition (Warsaw), Cleveland (USA), Clara Haskil (Switzerland), Artur Rubinstein (Tel-Aviv), Hamamatsu (Japan), Rachmaninoff (Russia), Piano Masters of Monte Carlo, Sviatoslav Richter (Moscow), C. Bechstein (Germany), and Villa-Lobos (Brazil), Vladimir Viardo (Dallas), and Jeunesses Musicales International Piano Competition (Montreal.)

Dang Thai Son has recorded for Deutsche Grammophone, Melodya, Polskie Nagrania, CBS Sony, Analekta, Victor JVC, and the Fryderyk Chopin Institute.

Mr. Dang’s latest recordings of “Selection of Nocturnes” with the Chopin National Institute in Poland, recorded on a 1849 Erard piano and a Steinway piano are available worldwide.

Dang Thai Son opened the 2012-2013 season with the Orchestra della Svizzera italiana of Switzerland in South America. He went on to perform all five Beethoven’s Concertos, the Beethoven Marathon, a colossal project that he considers the most significant since his winning at the International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw in 1980. Mr. Dang debuted the Beethoven Marathon in Sao Paulo State (Brazil) with the Symphony Orchestra of Ribeirao Preto; then with the New Japan Philharmonic in Tokyo (Japan) in two consecutive nights, and with the Vietnam National Symphony Orchestra in Hanoi (Vietnam). He will continue the Beethoven Marathon in Russia this year.

Dang Thai Son is the featured artist in the television program “Tomorrow”, produced by NHK (Japan Broadcast Corporation) in which he visited music students that were the victims of the 2011 earthquake and tsunami disaster in the Tohoku area in Fukushima (Japan). He shared with them his musical experiences but most importantly he encouraged them to continue their music education, to fight on, and to look forward to the future. The program was broadcast worldwide in February 2013.

More information about Dang Thai Son’s worldwide appearances can be found under the “News” section.

Dang Thai Son has received the “Doctor Honoris Causa” from the Music Academy in Bydgoczsz, Poland.

Mr. Dang is the subject of the biography, “A pianist loved by Chopin – The Dang Thai Son Story”, published by Yamaha Music Media Corporation in 2003.

With his extraordinary pianistic talents, Fazıl Say has been touching audiences and critics alike for more twenty-five years in a way that has become rare in the increasingly materialistic and elaborately organised classical music world. Concerts with this artist are something else. They are more direct, more open, more exciting; in short, they go straight to the heart. Which is exactly what the composer Aribert Reimann thought in 1987 when, during a visit to Ankara, he had the opportunity, more or less by chance, to appreciate the playing of the seventeen-year-old pianist. He immediately asked the American pianist David Levine, who was accompanying him on the trip, to come to the city’s conservatory, using the now much-quoted words: ‘You absolutely must hear him, this boy plays like a devil.’

Fazıl Say had his first piano lessons from Mithat Fenmen, who had himself studied with Alfred Cortot in Paris. Perhaps sensing just how talented his pupil was, Fenmen asked the boy to improvise every day on themes to do with his daily life before he went on to the essential piano exercises and studies. This contact with free creative processes and forms was the source of the immense improvisatory talent and the aesthetic outlook that make Fazıl Say the pianist and composer he is today. He has been commissioned to write music for the Salzburg Festival, the WDR, the Dortmund Konzerthaus, the Schleswig-Holstein and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern festivals and the Munich Biennale, among others. His output includes compositions for solo Keyboard and chamber music as well as solo concertos and large-scale orchestral works.

From 1987 onwards, Fazıl Say fine-tuned his skills as a classical pianist with David Levine, first at the Musikhochschule Robert Schumann in Düsseldorf and later in Berlin; this formed the aesthetic basis for his Mozart and Schubert interpretations in particular. His outstanding technique very quickly enabled him to master the so-called warhorses of the repertoire with sovereign ease. And it is precisely this blend of refinement (in Bach, Haydn, and Mozart) and virtuoso brilliance in the works of Liszt, Mussorgsky and Beethoven that gained him victory at the Young Concert Artists international competition in New York in 1994. Since then he has played with all the famous American and European orchestras and numerous leading conductors and has built up a multifaceted repertoire ranging from Bach, through the Viennese Classics (Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven) and the Romantics, right up to contemporary music, including his own piano compositions.

Guest appearances have taken Fazıl Say to countless countries on all five continents; the French newspaper Le Figaro called him ‘a genius’. In addition, he also appears regularly in chamber music: for many years he formed a fantastic duo with the violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja, and among his other notable partners are the Argentinian cellist Sol Gabetta, the Borusan Quartet of Istanbul, and other Turkish instrumental soloists. …/.

From 2005 to 2010 he was an exclusive artist at the Dortmund Konzerthaus; during the 2010/11 season he was artist in residence at the Berlin Konzerthaus; and he was a focal point of the programme of the Schleswig-Holstein Festival in the summer of 2011. There have been further residencies and Fazıl Say festivals in Paris, Tokyo, Meran, Hamburg, and Istanbul. During the 2012/13 season Fazil Say is artist in residence at the Hessischer Rundfunk in Frankfurt/ Main.

His recordings of works by Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Gershwin and Stravinsky have been highly praised by the critics and won several prizes. Since 2003 Fazıl Say has been under exclusive contract to the Naive label. He lives in Istanbul and has a daughter.

Over the next few years he was invited to join orchestras such as: Nurnberger Symphoniker, Philharmonisches Orchester der Stadt Munster, Philharmonisches Orchester der Stadt Kiel, Hamburger Camerata (Germany), Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra Radio Philharmonic Orchestra, Residentie Orchestra, Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra, Limburg Symphony Orchestra, Sinfonia Rotterdam, North Netherlands Symphony Orchestra (The Netherlands), Opera Antwerp / Gent, Symphnoic Orchestra of Flanders ( Belgium). He currently is a solohorn of Brussels Philharmonic Orchestra.

Hans van der Zanden worked with such renowned conductors as Mariss Jansons, Sir Neville Marriner, Jaap van Zweden, Mikhail Jurowski, Dmitry Liss, Dmitri Jurowski, Elijahu Inbal, Michel Tabachnik, Yakov Kreizberg, Neeme Jaärvi, Andrew Litton, Alexander Vedernikov, Vasily Petrenko and many others.

Hans van der Zanden plays almost the entire horn repertoire. Every year he is invited to play solo and chamber music in different festivals in Europa and abroad. Special for him, composed by Dutch composer Cees Nieuwenhuizen Sonata for Horn and Piano and 3 pieces for solohorn.

Hans van der Zanden plays a horn build by firm ALEXANDER and a customized horn, made for him, model “Hans van der Zanden” by popular master Klaus Fehr.

Hans van der Zanden is also a frequently asked horn player for film music and recorded music to movies like Oscar winning “The Artist”. He has been working directly with oscar composers like Steven Warbeck, Ludovic Bource, Hans zimmer, Eliot Goldenthal and many others.

The Gurnee F. and Marjorie L. Hart Chair
Joseph Alessi was appointed Principal Trombone of the New York Philharmonic in the spring of 1985. He began musical studies in his native California with his father, Joseph Alessi, Sr. As a high school student in San Rafael, California, and was a soloist with the San Francisco Symphony before continuing his musical training at Philadelphiaìs Curtis Institute of Music. Prior to joining the Philharmonic, Mr. Alessi was second trombone of The Philadelphia Orchestra for four seasons, and principal trombone of LìOrchestre symphonique de Montreal for one season. In addition, he has performed as guest principal trombonist with the London Symphony Orchestra in Carnegie Hall led by Pierre Boulez.

Mr. Alessi is an active soloist, recitalist, and chamber music performer. In April 1990 he made his solo debut with the New York Philharmonic, performing Crestonìs Fantasy for Trombone, and in 1992 premiered Christopher Rouseìs Pulitzer Prize-winning Trombone Concerto with the Philharmonic, which commissioned the work for its 150th anniversary celebration. His most recent appearance with the Philharmonic as soloist was in world premiere performances of Melinda Wagner’s Trombone Concerto in February of 2007.

Mr. Alessi has been a guest soloist with the Lincoln Symphony, National Repertory Orchestra, Colorado Symphony Orchestra, Syracuse Symphony Orchestra, Virginia Symphony, Alabama Symphony Orchestra, Santa Barbara Symphony, South Dakota Symphony, New Japan Philharmonic, Seoul Philharmonic, Orchestra of Teatro Massimo Bellini in Catania, Sicily, Mannheim National Theater Orchestra, National Symphony of Taiwan, Puerto Rico Symphony, Hague Philharmonic, Helsinki Philharmonic, and the Hartford Symphony. Mr. Alessi has also participated in numerous festivals, including the Festivale Musica di Camera in Protogruaro, Italy; Cabrillo Music Festival; Swiss Brass Week; and Lieksa Brass Week in Finland. He was featured in the 1997 International Trombone Festival in Feldkirch, Austria, and the International Meeting of Brass Instruments in Lille, France. He is a founding member of the Summit Brass ensemble at the Rafael Mendez Brass Institute in Tempe, Arizona. In 2002 Mr. Alessi was awarded an International Trombone Association Award for his contributions to the world of trombone music and trombone playing.

Mr. Alessi is currently on the faculty of The Juilliard School; his students now occupy posts with many major symphony orchestras in the U.S. and internationally. As a clinician for the Edwards Instrument Co., he has also given master classes throughout the world and has toured Europe extensively as a master teacher and recitalist. He has performed as soloist with several leading concert bands, including the U.S. Military Academy Band at West Point, U.S. Army Band (Pershing’s Own), and the U.S. Marine Band (President’s Own).

Mr. Alessiìs discography includes many releases on the Summit record label, including the recent Trombonastics, and a disc with New York Philharmonic Principal Trumpet Philip Smith entitled Fandango; he also recorded New York Legends on the Cala label. His live recording of the Rouse Concerto with the New York Philharmonic can be heard on Volume II of the recent release, An American Celebration, on New York Philharmonic Special Editions, the Orchestraìs own recording label. Three new recordings are scheduled for release in 2007: Return to Sorrento, on the Naxos record label, and two recordings on the Summit record label that feature Mr. Alessi with Columbus State University Wind Ensemble and the Imperial Brass Band. In addition, conductor/composer Bramwell Tovey recently recorded a piece written especially for Mr. Alessi, entitled Urban Cabaret with Mr. Alessi as soloist.

Mr. Alessi was invited by the International Trombone Association to record a solo disc of newly composed works, which was distributed to the Associationìs membership of 5,000 trombonists in early 1999 and is now available as Beyond the End of the Century through Summit Records. Recently, his recording of George Crumbìs Starchild on the Bridge record label, featuring Mr. Alessi as soloist, won a Grammy Award for 1999ñ2000. Other recordings featuring Mr. Alessi are with the Canadian Brass (Sony Classical and Philips Records). Further information about Mr. Alessi can be found on his website, www.slidearea.com.
С официального сайта http://www.josephalessi.com/bio.html

Katherine Broderick was the winner of the 2007 Kathleen Ferrier Award. She finished her studies at the National Opera Studio in London in 2008, having previously studied at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, where she won the Gold Medal, and took the undergraduate course at the Royal Northern College of Music, during which time she spent a year at the Mendelssohn Hochschule in Leipzig. She studies with Susan McCulloch and is currently a member of the ENO Young Singers Programme.

Opera plans this season and beyond include Ortlinde Die Walküre for The Royal Opera, Covent Garden; Woglinde Götterdämmerung for Opera North; a return to ENO for further performances of Donna Anna Don Giovanni as well as Berta The Barber of Seville and in concert, Helmwige Die Walküre (Act 3) with the Philharmonia Orchestra and Sir Andrew Davis and Miss Jessel in Britten The Turn of the Screw with the LSO and Sir Colin Davis.

In concert, Verdi Requiem with The Orchestra of Opera North at The Rydale Festival; Dvorak Te Deum with The Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra and Beethoven Symphony No 9 with the RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra and Gerhard Markson. Katherine will also appear in recitals at the Wigmore Hall with Malcolm Martineau and Eugene Asti, with Simon Lepper at the Opéra de Lille, as well being heard on a BBC Radio 3 recital with James Baillieu.

Past opera appearances have included Donna Anna in the new production of Don Giovanni for ENO; First Lady Die Zauberflöte for Glyndebourne on Tour; Helmwige Die Walküre and Miezyslaw Weinberg The Portrait for Opera North; Helmwige for Oper Leipzig and in concert with the Hallé Orchestra and Sir Mark Elder.

Katherine made her Proms debut at the 2007 Proms singing Woglinde Götterdämmerung with the BBCSO and Donald Runnicles, returning the following year to sing Young Lover in Puccini Il Tabarro with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra and Gianandrea Noseda.

Other recent concert highlights include Mahler Symphony No 2 with the Hallé and Bournemouth Symphony, with whom she has also sung Vaughan Williams Sea Symphony; Marguerite in Honegger Joan of Arc with the London Symphony Orchestra; Brahms Requiem in Cambridge with Sir Roger Norrington; Dvořák Stabat Mater and Requiem with the BBC Philharmonic and Bruckner Mass No 3 with the BBC Symphony Orchestras; Rossini Stabat Mater with the RLPO; Beethoven Mass in C Minor with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and Berlioz Les nuits d’été with the Ulster Orchestra.

She has also appeared with the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra and Paul McCreesh; National Orchestra of Spain and Simone Young; sung Mahler Symphony No 4 and Poulenc Gloria with The Singapore Symphony Orchestra and Beethoven Symphony No 9 with Ivor Bolton and the Mozarteum Orchestra. Katherine was one of the first recipients of the Susan Chilcott Award in 2005 and the following year won the Maggie Teyte Prize. She has also been aw arded successive Maidment Scholarships from the Musicians’ Benevolent Fund, the Claire Francis award from the Ogden Trust, the Sybill Tutton award, and is a Samling scholar.

Kim Woongsik is one of the most versatile percussionists. Most drummers in Korea specialize in one particular style such as sanjo or pansori accompaniment, percussion ensemble, folk style, or classical style, but Kim is uniquely fluent and proficient in multiple styles, including contemporary crossover styles. He is one of the most sought after sanjo accompanists and performers of new compositions by both Korean traditional style and Western style composers. Kim has been an active member of the ‘CMEK’ since 2003, a group known to frequently collaborate with Western composers and performers.

He has also been a member of the renowned creative world music group ‘PURI’ since 1995. All four current members of the group were taught by Kim Yongbae, one of the original members of the Kim Duksoo samulnori team. The puri group led by the composer Won Il takes the rhythmic elementalization achieved by samulnori a step further and also continually investigates ways to create traditional music based expression and ways to achieve Koreanistic improvisation idiomatic with contemporary Korean culture.

Kim Woongsik started out as a Korean classical voice major at the National Korean Traditional Music High School, but after encountering samulnori, he switched his major to percussion and studied at the Danguk University, where he currently teaches. Kim concertizes close to 100times a year, and since his first international concert tour of 1989, he has appeared in over 200 overseas performances in North America, Europe, the middle East, and Asia. He has also performed numerous times with the Traditional Orchestra of the KBS and frequently appears in various TV and Radio broadcasts of performance.

Samling Scholar Madeleine Shaw studied at the RSAMD and the National Opera Studio supported by English National Opera. Madeleine was subsequently part of the Young Singers Programme at ENO.

Solo performances include Elgar Sea Pictures and Dream of Gerontius, Copland In the Beginning, Bach B Minor Mass, Vaughan Williams Serenade to Music at the Edinburgh International Festival, Bach Christmas Oratorio, Tavener Lamentation for Jerusalem in Jerusalem and Bethlehem, Tippett A Child of our Time at The Sage (Zehetmair) and St Matthew Passion in Cambridge and Bury St Edmunds. She also sang in Duruflé Requiem and Haydn Nelson Mass and in an opera gala with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Mozart Requiem in Spain (John Eliot Gardiner), Debussy La Demoiselle Élue with BBC National Orchestra of Wales (Thierry Fisher), Duruflé Requiem at the Sage, Gateshead, Verdi Requiem in Ely and Gloucester Cathedral, Messiah in Norway (Sandefjord Kammerchor), Spain (Oviedo Cathedral), at Bridgewater Hall and at the Royal Festival Hall, The Three Cornered Hat with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, Wellgunde Götterdämmerung and Glagolitic Mass with the Hallé Orchestra (Elder) and Emilia Otello with the BBC Philharmonic (Noseda).

With ENO she has performed Annina Der Rosenkavalier, Beggar Woman Death in Venice, Second Lady The Magic Flute, Maddalena Rigoletto, Kate Pinkerton Madama Butterfly and in performances of songs by Kurt Weill and Samuel Barber at The Young Vic. Madeleine made her Royal Opera House debut as Forester’s Wife/Owl The Cunning Little Vixen.

Her operatic roles also include Juno La Calisto and Medea Giasone with The Early Opera Company and Christian Curnyn and Cretan Woman in Idomeneo at the Salzburg Spring Festival, in Berlin and Lucerne with Sir Simon Rattle, Adonella in Zandonai’s Francesca da Rimini for Opera Holland Park, as well as Beggar Woman Death in Venice with La Monnaie and La Scala and 1st Witch in After Dido, a joint venture by ENO/The Young Vic.
Engagements in 2012/2013 include Siegrune Die Walküre for Opera North, Rossweise Die Walküre at the Royal Opera, Covent Garden, and Mercedes Carmen and further performances of Death in Venice both for ENO and at the Holland Festival. Concert engagements include Messiah in Edinburgh and for Manchester Camerata and Giovanna Rigoletto with the LSO at the Barbican (Noseda). BBC Proms appearances at the Royal Albert Hall this season include She-Ancient A Midsummer Marriage with BBC Symphony Orchestra (Sir Andrew Davis) and Flowermaiden/Squire 2/Voice from Above Parsifal with the Hallé Orchestra (Sir Mark Elder). Subsequent engagements include Wellgunde Götterdämmerung for Opera North, Mercedes Carmen for WNO and Magdalene Die Meistersinger for ENO.

Mark Wilde was born in Scotland and was a chorister at Dundee Cathedral. He went on to study at the University of East Anglia and the Royal College of Music.

In 2000 Mark made his Glyndebourne debut as Ferrando in Così fan Tutte and appeared as second soldier in Stephen Pimlott’s highly acclaimed production of The Coronation of Poppea at English National Opera. Previously Mark has appeared in Donizetti’s Il Campanello at the Buxton Festival and roles in Vivaldi’s Giustine and Ottone in La Serenissima for BBC Radio 3. Other appearances include Jacquino in Fidelio for Glyndebourne on Tour, Ferrando in Così fan Tutte and Seven Deadly Sins for Welsh National Opera, Frederic Pirates of Penzance for English National Opera, Handel’s Saul and Cat in Jonathan Dove’s Pinocchio for Opera North (now released on DVD), Don Ottavio in Don Giovanni for the Mostly Mozart Festival, Don Ottavio, title role Candide, Alfredo La Traviata and Idamante Idomeneo with Birmingham Opera, Male Chorus in The Rape of Lucretia for the European Opera Centre in St Petersburg and Riga, Giannetto La Gazza Ladra, Albafiorita in Martinu’s Mirandolina, Snout A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Comte Miguel in Offenbach’s La Perichole at Garsington Opera, Rudolf in a new production of Euryanthe for the Netherlands Opera, Count Almaviva in Il Barbiere di Siviglia for Savoy Theatre Opera, Adelaide de Borgogna at the Edinburgh International Festival, Monteverdi’s Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria and the Madwoman in Britten’s Curlew River including a performance at the BBC Proms. Mark also sung Serano/Bertram in La Donna del Lago for Opera Rara at the Edinburgh Festival, Snout A Midsummer Night’s Dream in Bari and Reggio Emilia, Bird of Night at the Linbury Studio, Covent Garden and Tamino Die Zauberflöte, title role La Clemenza di Tito, Farmer Bunce in Picker’s The Fantastic Mr Fox, Flavio and The Fairy Queen for English Touring Opera.

Mark’s regular appearances on the concert platform include Mozart Requiem at the Barbican Hall with Carlo Rizzi for the Mostly Mozart Festival, Christmas Oratorio with the Russian National Orchestra in Moscow, St John Passion at the Perth Festival with the Hanover Band and the Lahti Symphony Orchestra, the St Matthew Passion in Helsinki, The Creation for the International Church Music Festival, Kristiansund, at the Barbican and Royal Festival Halls and for CBSO, Britten’s Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings with the Aalborg Symphony Orchestra and Britten Sinfonia, Monteverdi Vespers at St Paul’s Cathedral, Acis and Galatea at St John’s Smith Square, Messiah at Winchester Cathedral and in Oslo, Britten’s War Requiem in Westminster, Guildford, Ely, Norwich and Ypres Cathedrals. Mark also sung the St John Passion in Turku & Oulu, Finland, and in Hovik Kirke in Norway, as well as on tour in Spain with the Academy of Ancient Music, the Messiah with the Sixteen and City of London Sinfonia, Elgar’s The Dream of Gerontius in Japan with the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra, L’Enfance du Christ with Odense Symphony Orchestra, Pacini’s Alessandro nelle Indie with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Jonathan Dove’s On Spital Fields at London’s Spitalfields Festival, and recitals at St John’s Smith Square with Malcolm Martineau and Aldeburgh with Andrew West.

Mark has recorded Handel’s Ode to St Cecilia’s Day for Naxos records, ‘Ancient Melodies’, a recital CD of songs for tenor and guitar on Docker Records, Arthur Sullivan’s The Golden Legend and The Prodigal Son for Hyperion. Opera Rara recordings include Binet in Offenbach’s Vert-Vert, Ricci’s Corrado d’Altamura and Donizetti Pia de’ Tolomeo. Mark’s latest solo recording of Britten Complete Scottish Songs was released by Naxos in 2011.

Engagements in 2012/2013 include Sellem The Rake’s Progress at the Endellion Festival, Frederic The Pirates of Penzance for the RTE Concert Orchestra, title role Albert Herring for ETO, Messiah for Oxford Philomusica, St John Passion in Winchester Cathedral and Pedrillo Die Entführung aus dem Serail for Garsington Opera.