2014 PIANO COMPETITION JURY MEMBERS
Daniel Epstein
Pianist Daniel Epstein made his orchestral debut with Eugene Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1973.
A graduate of the Juilliard School, where he studied with Adele Marcus, he was presented in his Carnegie Hall debut recital by the Concert Artists Guild.
Winner of many awards and prizes including the Kosciusczko Chopin Award, the National Arts Club Prize, the Prix Alex de Vries in Paris, Epstein has appeared as guest soloist
with major symphony orchestras including those of Philadelphia, San Francisco, Houston, Dallas, Detroit, and Rochester.
He has given recitals at Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, and the 92nd Street Y as well as in major cities throughout the U.S., Europe, and Asia,
complemented by master classes and intensive seminars for pianists.
Recent performances include two tours to China for recitals and master classes; performances and teaching at Intituto Musicale Vaccaj in Tolentino, Italy; solo and duo concerts at the Festival of the Canary Islands; and performances of both Brahms piano concerti in New York.
As the pianist and founding member of the famed Raphael Trio since 1975, Daniel Epstein has performed virtually the entire piano trio repertoire. He has collaborated with renowned string quartets, including the Ying, American, Chiara, New Zealand, and Talich as well as with the members of the Juilliard, Guarneri, and many other distinguished chamber musicians and soloists.
Daniel Epstein is a member of the piano faculties of Manhattan School of Music as well as the Precollege Division and Rutgers University.
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Donn-Alexandre Feder
Donn-Alexandre Feder has performed throughout Europe, Asia, Canada, Mexico, and the United States.
He made his New York Town Hall debut as the recipient of a Martha Baird Rockefeller Award and earned Kosciuszko Foundation awards for his acclaimed Chopin-Szymanowski recital at Alice Tully Hall and his pioneer recording Szymanowski Piano Music for Protone Records.
Dr. Feder has also recorded for the BBC, Poland's Radio Polska, and with the Netherlands Philharmonic under Franz Allers and Willem van Otterloo.
During a two-year residency in Warsaw through a U.S.-Polish Government grant, Dr. Feder was the first American pianist to perform in the house of Chopin's birth at Zelazowa-Wola and was a finalist in the Seventh Chopin International Competition. He served for many years thereafter as an adjudicator for the Kosciuszko Foundation's Chopin Scholarship Competition in New York.
A member of the Manhattan School of Music piano faculty since 1969, Dr. Feder has presented master classes in Korea, Japan, and the Republic of China.
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Dmitry Rachmanov
Dr. Dmitry Rachmanov is Professor of Piano at California State University, Northridge, where he serves as Chair of Keyboard Studies.
Hailed as an "indisputable musician" by the Brussels' Le Soir and "suave and gifted pianist' by the New York Times, Rachmanov has been heard at venues such as New York's Carnegie Hall, Washington DC's Kennedy Center, London's Barbican and South Bank Centres, and Beijing Concert Hall, and his tours brought him to Mexico, Europe, Russia, Turkey and the Far East.
He has recorded for Naxos, Parma/Navona, Master Musicians and Vista Vera labels, and collaborated as a soloist with Manhattan Philharmonia, Indianapolis Chamber Orchestra, Orlando Symphony, London Soloists Chamber Orchestra, Ukraine National Symphony and National Orchestra of Porto, Portugal.
A strong proponent of the Russian repertoire, he gave the US premiere of Boris Pasternak's Piano Sonata, broadcast nationwide by the NPR, and his recital "The Art of the 19th Century Russian Character Piece" was noted by the New York Times for "considerable color and focus" he brought to each work.
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2014 VIOLIN COMPETITION JURY MEMBERS
Joey Corpus
Joey Corpus is one of the most sought after violin and viola teachers in the world.
Many of his students have distinguished careers as soloists, chamber musicians and orchestra players.
He was featured in a five-page article in the 2001 November issue of The Strad magazine.
He was a student of the late Jascha Brodsky. He also studied chamber music with members of the Curtis String Quartet. Joey makes his home in New York City.
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Wendy Y. Chen
"playing that had a kind of clean intoxication to it, pulling the listener along... " - New York Times
Born into a musical family in Shanghai, China, Wendy Chen started her violin studies at the age of four.
She has performed extensively throughout Asia, Europe, and North America as the founding first violinist of the Vega String Quartet.
Appearances include Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center (Mostly Mozart), Schneider Series, and Museum d'Orsay of Paris.
Ms. Chen's selected awards include four of the total six prizes from the 1999 Bordeaux International String Quartet Competition in France, as well as the Grand Prize of the International Music Critics, the First Prize of the 1997 Coleman Chamber Ensemble Competition in USA, and a top prize of the Fourth National Violin Competition of China.
Ms. Chen has recorded under the Naxos Record label and the YinXiang Record of Shanghai. Prior to joining the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, her solo and quartet performances have been heard on NPR's Performance Today, New York's WQXR Radio, the National Radio of China, France, Germany, and the Czech Republic.
Ms. Chen holds a Master's Degree from the Juilliard School and a performance certificate from the Shanghai Conservatory of Music.
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Daniel Phillips
Daniel Phillips began violin at age four with his father , a violinist in the Pittsburgh Symphony. He studied with Ivan Galamian and Sally Thomas at Juilliard, and later with Sandor Vegh and George Neikrug. He won the Young Concert Artists Auditions in 1976. As a soloist he gave critically acclaimed recitals at Tully Hall, and the 92nd St Y, and has appeared as soloist with many orchestras, such as Pittsburgh, Houston, San Antonio, Amarillo, Honolulu, and the NY String Orchestra at Carnegie Hall. As recitalist he has collaborated with pianists Christopher O'Riley, Robert Levin, and Peter Serkin. He is a founding member of the 26-year-old Orion String Quartet, in residence at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.Available on CD and download from ITunes and Google are the complete quartets of Beethoven and the four quartets of the great recently deceased American composer, Leon Kirchner. Works written for them by Wynton Marsalis, Chick Corea, John Harbison, and Marc Neikrug are also available on CD. They recently played a week of concerts devoted to Brahms at the new King Place Concert Hall in London. Last spring, they collaborated in a two week run with the Bill T Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company and completed their first tour of Japan.Visit www.orionquartet.com. They are touring throughout the 2013-2014 season with pianist Peter Serkin. He appears regularly at the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Chamber Music Northwest, Spoleto USA and the International Musicians Seminar in Cornwall, England.
In 2010 he served as juror for the Bordeaux International String Quartet Competition. In 1985, he toured and recorded in a string quartet (for SONY) with Gidon Kremer, Kim Kashkashian, and Yo-Yo Ma.
He is professor of violin at the Aaron Copland School of Music at Queens College, CUNY and is on the faculty of the Mannes College of Music, and Bard College Conservatory.
Danny lives with his wife, flutist Tara O'Connor, on Manhattan's upper west side
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2014 CELLO COMPETITION JURY MEMBERS
Chris Finckel
Born into a family of cellists, Chris Finckel began his studies with his father George Finckel and is a graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music where he studied with Mischa Schneider and Orlando Cole.
Currently, Mr. Finckel is the cellist of the Manhattan String Quartet with whom he performs on major Chamber Music series throughout the United States and Europe. A frequent guest artist with such renowned ensembles as the Tokyo String Quartet and the Orpheus Chamber Ensemble, Mr. Finckel has appeared at the Casals, Santa Fe, Ravinia, Saratoga, Norfolk, and Rockport Chamber Music festivals, and he has recorded for the Nonesuch, New World, CRI, Bridge, and Vanguard record labels. A dedicated performer of 20th century music, Chris Finckel has been involved in New York City's contemporary music scene for over 20 years.
Through his affiliations with such organizations as the New York New Music Ensemble, Parnassus, The Contemporary Chamber Ensemble, and Speculum Musicae, he has participated in the premieres of the works of over 100 composers including pieces by Milton Babbitt, Jacob Druckman, Elliot Carter, Mario Davidovsky, Donald Martino, Steve Reich, and Charles Wuorinen.
Mr. Finckel is the co-founder and artistic director of the Sarajevo Chamber Music Festival.
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Katie Schlaikjer
Cellist Katie Schlaikjer is an accomplished chamber musician, having performed throughout the United States, Canada, England, Australia and Israel. A former member of the Colorado String Quartet (2009-2013), Katie joined the Penderecki String Quartet and the faculty of Wilfrid Laurier University in 2013.
Her tenure with the Colorado Quartet included performances at Symphony Space and The Kennedy Center and cycles of the complete Beethoven and Bartok Quartets. Her recent solo engagements include a premiere of J Mark Scearce's cello concerto "Aracana" and Haydn's D major cello concerto with the Wuhan Symphony Orchestra in China.
Katie has taught cello at the University of Connecticut (2010-2013), the Hartt Music School, Bard Conservatory's Preparatory music program and coached chamber music at New England Conservatory's Extension Division, Stony Brook University's pre-college program, and at the Colorado Quartet's intensive summer quartet institute, Soundfest. Ms Schlaikjer received her Doctoral and Master's degrees from Stony Brook University and her Bachelor's degree from the New England Conservatory where her teachers included Timothy Eddy and Laurence Lesser.
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Jonathan Spitz
Jonathan Spitz has established himself as one of the leading cellists in the New York area with his performances as a soloist, chamber musician, and orchestral principal.
He has been Principal Cello of the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra since 1991 and tours internationally as a member of the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, where he also serves as Co-Artistic Director.
He performs as Principal Cellist of the American Ballet Theater Orchestra and the American Symphony Orchestra at the Bard Music Festival.
Spitz has appeared as a soloist with the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra on numerous occasions, including performances of the cello concertos of Schumann, Dvorák, Haydn, Tchaikovsky's Rococo Variations, as well as Brahms' Double Concerto with NJSO Concertmaster Eric Wyrick.
He has also performed frequently as a soloist with Orpheus, the Riverside Sinfonia, and the Northeastern Pennsylvania Philharmonic.
An active chamber musician, Spitz was a participant at the Marlboro Music Festival and has performed with legendary artists such as Rudolf Serkin, Benita Valente, Felix Galimir, and Oscar Shumsky.
Mr. Spitz is in great demand as a teacher and serves on the Artist Faculties of the Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University and the Brevard Music Center. A graduate of the Curtis Institute, he was a student of David Soyer. Spitz has recorded for Deutsche Grammaphon, EMI, Decca, Nonesuch and Blue Note, among others.
He performs on a cello by Grubaugh and Seifert from 2012.
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