DAVID EHRLICH
Artistic Director and Violinist

Raised in Israel, violinist David Ehrlich started his professional career as concertmaster and soloist with the Tel Aviv Chamber Orchestra and toured as guest soloist with other Israeli chamber orchestras. In the US, after studying with Shmuel Ashkenasi, he served as concertmaster and soloist of the Colorado Festival Orchestra, Filarmonica de Caracas, Chicago Philharmonic Orchestra and was associate concertmaster with the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra. Later, he joined the Audubon Quartet as first violinist, and toured for 17 years all over the world, performing on some of the most prestigious concert series, collaborating with many of the world’s great chamber musicians, and appearing on radio and television.

David conducted master classes/lectures at USC, New England Conservatory, Oberlin, Cleveland Institute of Music, Chautauqua-NY, Arizona State University, Tel Aviv University, Ireland, Venezuela, Prague, Beijing, and many others.

David is the head of Intensive Studies course at Ameropa, an international summer music festival in Prague, CZ. This highlighted in a series of performances at the prestigious Prague Spring Festival, where he was artistic director of a program dedicated to Schoenberg and Mahler. David also performs annually at the Red Rocks Music Festival, taking place in Phoenix, and Sedona, AZ. In 2013-2014, David helped mentor a new professional string orchestra in Hong-Kong, and conducted an intensive chamber music seminar in Beijing, China.

In 1993, he and his wife, Teresa, founded the Renaissance Music Academy of Virginia, a nonprofit community music school located in Blacksburg, Virginia, which provides music lessons to children throughout all of southwest Virginia. In Blacksburg, David helped develop Virginia Tech’s Vocal Arts and Music Festival, where he is in charge of the instrumental chamber music program and intensive string quartet seminar. He is also the artistic director of Musica Viva, a chamber music concert series based in Blacksburg.

Since 2004, David has served as a Fellow of Fine Arts at Virginia Tech. He performs on a violin made by Carlo Bergonzi (1735), through the generosity of the Virginia Tech Foundation.

TERESA EHRLICH
Pianist

Ms. Ehrlich began her musical training at the age of four. Born and raised in the Midwest, she received her master of music degree in piano performance and pedagogy from Northern Illinois University as a student of Donald Walker. Ms. Ehrlich’s other teachers have included Gyorgy Sebok, Menachem Pressler, and Leon Fleisher. She has received critical acclaim throughout the United States, Israel and South America, where she has performed as recitalist and soloist with orchestras including the Sinfoica de Maracaibo and the Filarmonica de Caracas in Venezuela.

In addition to her solo and orchestral engagements, she is active as a chamber musician and has performed as a guest artist with the Audubon, Vermeer, Cassatt, and Vanbrugh quartets. Ms. Ehrlich has been a participant in the Banff Festival in Canada, Yale Chamber Music Festival, Music at Gretna Festival, New Hampshire Music Festival, Chautauqua Festival in New York, and the Sanibel Island Festival. She has performed during numerous live broadcasts on radio station WFMT in Chicago and is also frequently heard on National Public Radio.

As well as being a founder of the Renaissance Music Academy of Virginia, Ms. Ehrlich is also the Executive Director of the school and a member of the piano faculty. She is a member of the chamber group Avanti Ensemble which performs throughout Virginia. Since 2005, Ms. Ehrlich has been a faculty member in “Ameropa” an international summer festival in Prague, Czechoslovakia.

NIKOLA DJURICA
Clarinet

Nikola started playing the clarinet at a very young age of six in Belgrade, Serbia. He progressed very rapidly and started winning special prizes and accolades in competitions in his country, plus Italy, Macedonia, Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, Russia. He was invited to perform on television and radio in Serbia, and was honored as best young musician of the generation. Later, he was invited to a prestigious professional festival, BEMUS, where he was the youngest musician. Nikola attended summer festivals in Prague, CZ; Madrid, Spain; Amalfi coast, Italy; Austria, and Germany.

Nikola continued his studies in the US, where he went to Interlochen, and later the Cleveland Institute of Music. He was invited back to his country to receive a special award from the government, called; “New face of Serbia” which is given to the most successful or promising Serbians in their fields.

In his first year at Cleveland Nikola won the concerto competition and performed as soloist with the CIM orchestra.

Nikola is a member of the faculty in Ameropa, a chamber music festival in Prague, Czech Republic, and was one of very select group of faculty that were asked to participate in a special program at “Prague Spring”, one of the world’s most prestigious festivals.

Mr. Djurica is a founder and a member of an improvisational ensemble called “The Contranuities Quartet,” which” is dedicated to bringing diverse people together by exploring the intersections of musical genres and the cultures of the world. He currently resides in Serbia and Japan, where he performs regularly

SHLOMO MINTZ
Violin

Critics, colleagues and audiences regard Shlomo Mintz as one of the foremost violinists of our time, esteemed for his impeccable musicianship, stylistic versatility and commanding technique alike. Born in Moscow in 1957, he immigrated to Israel and studied the violin with Ilona Feher. At the age of 11, he made his concert debut with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra and at the age of 16 he made his debut in Carnegie Hall with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, under the patronage of Isaac Stern.

Since then he is a celebrated guest with orchestras and conductors on the international music scene, and has appeared with historical musicians like Sergiu Celibidache, Pablo Casals, Eugene Ormandy, Claudio Abbado, Lorin Maazel, Mistislav Rosptropovich and Carlo Maria Giulini. In the 2012/2013 Season, he celebrated his 50th anniversary with the National Orchestra of France in a special concert at the Champs Elysées Theatre as a conductor and a soloist.

A regular President of Jury (Wieniawski, Sion, Buenos Aires and Munetsugu violin competitions) and Artistic Director of many International Music Festivals, he is currently sought after to conduct Master Classes all over the world. Mintz is also a co-founder of Violins of Hope, a project that aims to promote peace through music.

He has won several prestigious prizes including the Premio Internazionale Accademia Musicale Chigiana, the Diapason D’Or, the Grand Prix du Disque, the Gramophone Award and the Edison Award. In 2006 he was awarded an Honorary Degree from the Ben-Gurion University in Beersheba, Israel.

In 2015 and during two years Mintz was named the soloist in residence of the Queensland Symphony Orchestra.

In Autumn 2016 Shlomo Mintz has been awarded with the Cremona Music Award 2016. Next season includes performances in Europe, North and South America and Asia.

HOWARD WALL
French Horn

Howard Wall, a native of Pittsburgh, joined the horn section of the New York Philharmonic in 1994 (The Ruth F. and Allan J. Broder Chair), after having been a member of The Philadelphia Orchestra for almost 20 years, and a former member of the Phoenix and Denver Symphony Orchestras. He also performs and records with the All-Star Orchestra.

 

Mr. Wall has appeared as soloist with the New York Philharmonic in Schumann’s Konzertstück for Four Horns in New York (1995, 2001, and 2007) as well as on New York Philharmonic tours in Europe (1996) and South America (2001). An avid chamber musician, he appears regularly at the New York Philharmonic Ensembles series at Merkin Hall, as well as at the New York Chamber Music Festival, and performs with the Delphinium Trio, the Amram Ensemble, and in a duo with his wife, violinist Elmira Darvarova. He can be heard on the CD “Take 9”, featuring the New York Philharmonic horn section and the American Horn Quartet, as well as on former Principal Horn Philip Myers’s “New York Legends” CD.

 

Howard Wall recorded Poulenc’s “Elégie” for Horn and Piano with world-renowned French pianist Pascal Rogé. Mr. Wall has also recorded David Amram’s “Blues and Variations for Monk” for Solo Horn, and gave its European Premiere in Paris. Howard Wall’s most recent CD is “Phillip Ramey: Music for French Horn” (Affetto Records, 2017).

 

Howard Wall began playing the horn at age ten and earned his bachelor’s degree in music performance at Carnegie Mellon University. He made his Carnegie Hall debut at age 19 performing Schumann’s Konzertstück for Four Horns; he most recently performed the same work again at Carnegie Hall in 2012. Howard Wall was among the performers awarded Gold Medal and Top Honors at the 2018 Global Music Awards.

ELMIRA DARVAROVA
Violin

Grammy®-nominated recording artist, a concert violinist since the age of four, and an award- winning performer (2017 & 2018 GOLD MEDAL at the Global Music Awards),  Elmira Darvarova caused a  sensation, becoming the first ever (and so far only) female concertmaster in the history of the Metropolitan Opera in New York.

 

With the MET Orchestra she toured Europe, Japan and the United States, and was heard on the MET's live weekly international radio broadcasts, television broadcasts, CDs and laser discs on the Sony, Deutsche Grammophon and EMI labels. As concertmaster of the Metropolitan Opera she has performed with the greatest conductors of our time, including the legendary Carlos Kleiber.

 

She studied with Yfrah Neaman at the Guildhall School in London (on a British Council scholarship), with Josef Gingold at Indiana University in Bloomington (as one of his assistants), and with Henryk Szeryng (privately). An award-winning artist (Gold Medal at the 2017 and 2018 Global Music Awards, the Gold Quill Award by Classic FM Radio, and the Boris Christoff Medal), and hailed by American Records Guide as a “marvelous violinist in the Heifetz tradition”, Elmira Darvarova can be heard on numerous CDs, recorded for several labels (recent releases include the world premiere recording of Vernon Duke's violin concerto with the ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, and a CD with world-premiere recordings of chamber music by René de Castéra, named by MusicWeb International a RECORD OF THE YEAR 2015). Several of her albums have been selected as Record of the Month by the prestigious publication MusicWeb International. Her CDs have won critical acclaim in such esteemed publications as The Strad Magazine, Gramophone, Fanfare, American Records Guide, BBC Music Magazine, Klassik Heute.

 

She has appeared on the most prestigious stages of five continents (including Carnegie Hall, as soloist with orchestra), and has performed concertos with the Moscow State Symphony, the ORF Vienna Radio Symphony, and with numerous other orchestras. Well-versed not only in opera, symphonic and chamber music repertoire, she performs and records in many other genres and styles, including tango, jazz, blues, folk, world music, contemporary/ electronic music, Stroh violin, and Indian Ragas.  She has partnered for chamber music performances with music giants such as Janos Starker, Gary Karr, Pascal Rogé, Vassily Lobanov, with tango and jazz legends such as Octavio Brunetti, Fernando Otero and David Amram, and with the world-renowned Indian classical musician, the superstar of the Sarod: Amjad Ali Khan, with whom she recorded a trilogy of CD albums, based on traditional Indian Ragas (released in the United States, and separately, on the Indian sub-continent).

 

She has recorded 2 CD albums of Baroque music (world-premiere recordings) with the world's most renowned double bassist Gary Karr, and she has performed with him Bottesini's Gran Duo Concertante in the United States and Canada. She has also recorded 3 CDs of music by Astor Piazzolla, two of them with the late great tango pianist and arranger Octavio Brunetti (named by the New York Philharmonic "the inheritor of Piazzolla's mantle"), and she has performed in a duo with Octavio Brunetti at festivals in the US and Europe. For the Naxos label she has recorded 3 CDs of chamber music by Franco Alfano (world-premiere recordings). Her recital at Bela Bartok's memorial house in Budapest was broadcast live throughout Europe.

 

A documentary film about her life and career was shown on European television. She performs in a duo with Grammy®-winner, pianist/ composer Fernando Otero, and is a founding member of The New York Piano Quartet, the Delphinium Trio, the Quinteto del Fuego and the Amram Ensemble. She is Jury President of several international chamber music competitions in Europe, and she is the President & Director of the New York Chamber Music Festival. Praised by Gramophone Magazine for her "ultra-impassioned performances", and in The Strad for her “intoxicating tonal beauty and beguilingly sensuous phrasing" and "silky-smooth voluptuous tone”, she was featured in Gramophone Magazine with an interview about her world-premiere recording of Vernon Duke's violin concerto (written for Heifetz in 1940), which she recorded recently with the ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra. For more information please visit her website www.elmiradarvarova.com

THOMAS WEAVER
Piano

Thomas Weaver is an American composer and pianist whose active solo and chamber career has included performances both in the United States and abroad. His playing has been hailed as displaying both “sensitivity” and “incredible dexterity.” Weaver has appeared in many concert halls, including those in New York (Carnegie/Weill Recital Hall, Greene Space, Lincoln Center, Merkin Hall), Philadelphia, Washington D.C. (Phillips Collection), Boston (Jordan Hall), Chicago, Nashville, Dallas, Berlin, and Tanglewood Music Festival. Weaver has performed with a number of eminent musicians including Elmira Darvarova, Jess Gillam, Kenneth Radnofsky, Jennifer Frautschi, Gene Pokorny, and members of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, Boston Symphony Orchestra, and others. Weaver is a currently a member of the Amram Ensemble, Trio Ardente, and New England Chamber Players. A champion of new music, Weaver has premiered many pieces, including works by David Amram, David Loeb, John Wallace, and Christopher LaRosa. Recently, Weaver was featured performing Leonard Bernstein’s Symphony No. 2 “Age of Anxiety” with the Boston University Tanglewood Institute Orchestra as part of Bernstein’s centennial celebration. This summer, he is performing George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue conducted by H. Robert Reynolds at Seiji Ozawa Hall. His playing can be heard on the CD, David Amram: “So In America”, released by Affetto Records, which includes many world premiere recordings.

 

An award-winning composer, Thomas Weaver’s music has been performed throughout the United States, Germany, Austria, and Japan. His works have been commissioned by number of organizations and musicians including The New York Chamber Music Festival, Elmira Darvarova, Britt Lasch, Pharos Quartet, Kenneth Radnofsky, Joshua Blumenthal, and the Daraja Ensemble. Weaver’s works have also been performed by large ensembles such as the Boston University Symphony Orchestra, Alea III, and Mannes American Composers Orchestra. His works have been conducted by various conductors including Theodore Antoniou, Alan Pierson, and Konstantin Dobroykov.

 

An active educator, Weaver holds faculty positions at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, PA and the Boston University Tanglewood Institute. Weaver has presented lectures and classes at a variety of locations, including Northwestern University, Murray State University, Austin Peay State University, and The People’s Music School in Chicago, and was keynote speaker at Boston University Tanglewood Institute’s opening exercises. Weaver’s primary piano teachers include Anthony di Bonaventura, Victor Rosenbaum, and Pavel Nersessian. His primary composition teachers include David Loeb, Dr. John Wallace, and Dr. Martin Amlin. For more information please visit www.thomaseweaver.com.

JAN SIMIZ
Cellist

A native of Romania, Jan Simiz studied at the Ciprian Porumbescu Conservatory in Buchares. In 1980, Mr. Simiz arrived in Los Angeles and won the principal cellist position with Neal Stulberg and the Young Musicians' Foundation "Debut" Orchestra. He received his master's degree in cello performance from the University of Southern California where he studied with Eleanor Schoenfeld.

In 1985 Mr. Simiz joined the Phoenix Symphony and became assistant principal cellist in 1989. He is also principal cellist for the Music in the Mountains Festival in Durango, Colorado. He frequently performs in chamber music ensembles.