SOLOISTS AND CONDUCTORS
SOLOISTS & CONDUCTORS MIN KWON, piano Min Kwon received her BM at Curtis Institute of Music and her MM and DMA at The Juilliard School. Her post-doctoral studies have taken her to the University of Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria. A Steinway Artist, Kwon is a soloist, chamber musician, and teacher. Her professional engagements have taken her to 62 countries and to all 50 states in the U.S. She has performed in venues such as Carnegie Hall, Avery Fisher Hall and Alice Tully Hall at Lincoln Center, the United Nations in New York, Orchestra Hall in Chicago, the Academy of Music in Philadelphia, Seoul Arts Center in Korea, Börsensäle in Vienna, and Klementinum in Prague. She has performed in the festivals of Aspen, Ravinia, Cape & Islands, Caramoor, Colmar (France), Salzburg and Altenburg (Austria), Kuhmo (Finland), Interlaken (Switzerland), Freiburg (Germany), and Prague (Czech Republic). Performance highlights include critically acclaimed, sold-out recitals at Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall and at London and Sydney's Steinway Hall, Singapore›s National University; as well as appearances in Australia, Curacao, Czech Republic, Estonia, Italy, Malaysia, and Norway. Kwon has given over 200 recitals, workshops, and master classes throughout the United States under the auspices of CAMI Community Concerts. She has recorded for BMG/RCA Red Seal and MSR Classics. She is regularly invited to teach by major institutions and festivals around the world, among them the Royal College of Music in London; the Shanghai Conservatory and the Beijing Central Conservatory in China; the Yong Siew Toh Conservatory in Singapore; the Academy of Fine Arts and National University in Hong Kong; Vladimir Feltsman’s Summerfest in New Paltz, New York; the AMEROPA International Festival in Prague; the Positano International Festival in Italy; and the Altenburg Music Akademie and MozartFest in Austria. The grand prize winner of Korea’s KBS Emerging Artists Award in 1995, Kwon was also the recipient of The Juilliard School’s Gina Bachauer International Piano Awards, the school’s highest award given to a pianist. She has garnered more than two dozen top prizes in national and international competitions in the United States, Italy, Scotland, and Spain.
SYDNEY MANCASOLA, soprano A Grand Finals winner of the 2013 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions and a graduate of the Academy of Vocal Arts in Philadelphia, soprano Sydney Mancasola has been praised by the New York Times for her “lovely lyric soprano and radiant high notes.” The 2015 – 2016 season will mark Ms. Mancasola’s European debut at the Komische Oper Berlin as the three heroines in Les Contes d’Hoffmann, Cleopatra in Giulio Cesare, Pamina in the Barrie Kosky production of Die Zauberflöte, and Servilia in a concert performance of Clemenza di Tito. She will also reprise the title role in Massenet’s Manon in a return to Des Moines Metro Opera, conducted by David Neely. Concert work includes her debut with the San Francisco Symphony in Handel’s Messiah, conducted by Ragnar Bohlin. The 2014 – 2015 season saw Ms. Mancasola’s company debut with Palm Beach Opera as Marie in La fille du régiment and role debut as Leïla in Les pêcheurs de perles with Florida Grand Opera.
Ms. Mancasola also returned to Opera Theatre of St Louis as Lisette in Puccini’s La Rondine, of which the St Louis Post-Dispatch said “her singing and acting were both first-rate.” Concert work included Barber’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915 with the Sun Valley Symphony, as well as Handel’s Messiah with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra. Honors and awards include Top Prize Winner of the Gerda Lissner Foundation Competition, 2nd Prize and Audience Favorite at the Houston Grand Opera Eleanor McCollum Competition, and 1st Prize in the Loren L. Zachary National Vocal Competition. Ms. Mancasola is an alumna of the Santa Fe Opera Apprentice Program, where she received the Judith Raskin Memorial Award for Singers, as well as the Gerdine Young Artist program at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis and the Brevard Music Center. Ms. Mancasola began her musical training as a classical violinist in her home state of California and went on to study voice at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, where she completed her Bachelor of Music degree in 2011 and was the recipient of the Margot Bos Standler Scholarship.
ROBERT MCDUFFIE, violin Grammy-nominated violinist Robert McDuffie enjoys a dynamic and multi-faceted career. While appearing as soloist with the world’s foremost orchestras, he can also be found sharing the stage with Gregg Allman and Chuck Leavell in “Midnight Rider,” with actress/ playwright Anna Deavere Smith in Martin Luther King’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” or playing Bach for Memphis Jook dancer Li’l Buck. Philip Glass dedicated his Second Violin Concerto, The American Four Seasons, to Mr. McDuffie. Robert McDuffie has appeared as soloist with most of the major orchestras of the world, including the New York and Los Angeles Philharmonics; the Chicago, San Francisco, National, Atlanta, Houston, Dallas, and Toronto Symphonies; the Philadelphia and Cleveland Orchestras; the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, the Düsseldorf Symphony, the Frankfurt Radio Orchestra, the Hamburg Symphony, Bruckner Orchestra Linz, Santa Cecilia Orchestra of Rome, Venice Baroque Orchestra, Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional de Mexico, Orquesta Sinfónica de Mineria; and all of the major orchestras of Australia. Mr. McDuffie gave the world premiere of Philip Glass’ Violin Concerto No. 2, The American Four Seasons, with the Toronto Symphony. He then completed a thirty-city US tour with the Venice Baroque Orchestra, pairing the Glass Four Seasons with the Vivaldi Four Seasons. Robert McDuffie recorded The American Four Seasons with the London Philharmonic and Marin Alsop on Philip Glass› Orange Mountain Music label. His acclaimed Telarc and EMI recordings include the violin concertos of Mendelssohn, Bruch, Adams, Glass, Barber, Rózsa, Bernstein, William Schuman, and Viennese violin favorites. As founder of the Rome Chamber Music Festival, Robert McDuffie has been awarded the prestigious Premio Simpatia by the Mayor of Rome in recognition of his contribution to the city›s cultural life. He served for ten years on the board of directors of the Harlem School of the Arts in New York City where he was chairman of the artistic and education committee. Mr. McDuffie holds the Mansfield and Genelle Jennings Distinguished
2016 Summer Institute & Festival
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