2011/2012

VETTA CHAMBER MUSIC ARTISTS

Joan Blackman, Violin, Artistic Director of Vetta
Joan Blackman, Associate Concertmaster of the Vancouver Symphony, enjoys a vibrant musical life in our community. Besides playing in the orchestra, she is sought after as a first class chamber musician in North America. She is also an active teacher, giving master classes throughout B.C. Joan has performed and recorded as soloist with Vancouver Symphony, Victoria Symphony, CBC Radio Orchestra, and the Banff Festival Orchestra.

“Shapelier phrases and sweeter tone would be hard to imagine”, “a ravishing tone”, “first rate soloist”, “exx`x`changed lines meltingly in a flawless performance” “playing with lyricism, precision, and evident joy”; are accolades that have graced Joan’s reviews. Zach Carstensen of Seattle’s Gathering Note wrote “Your heart would need to be made of stone not to have loved Joan Blackman's splendid solo".  

As Artistic Director of the Vetta Chamber Music and Recital Society, she programs and performs with the best of BC talent along with invited guests from afar. She is also a member of the acclaimed American String Project, which brings together concertmasters and soloists throughout North America. Joan has performed at several summer festivals including the Hornby Island and Pender Harbour Chamber Music festival, and will perform this summer at the Victoria Chamber Music Festival, and in Musicfest Vancouver with the Vetta String Quartet.

Eugene Osadchy, Artistic Advisor of Vetta, Cello
Currently the Associate Professor of Cello at the University of North Texas, Eugene Osadchy is also the Artistic Advisor of the Vetta Chamber Music series, of which he was Music Director for some 20 years. He is hailed as having..." the most refined and balanced string playing..." by the New New York Times and called "the paragon of Russian élan " by the Vancouver Sun, "a soloist with a clearly defined at musical personality" by Newsday, and "extraordinary playing" by the Dallas Morning News. Eugene Osadchy regularly performs throughout Canada, the United States, Europe and the Orient. Born in Kiev to a family of professional musicians, Eugene Osadchy started his musical education at the age of five on the piano, and a year later on the cello. After graduating from The Special Music School for Talented and Gifted Children, Eugene continued his education at the Kiev State Conservatory of Music and graduated with honors. Professor Osadchy became a Laureate of Republic of the Ukraine Cello Competition. Other musical credits include the composition of two film scores and releases of several CDs on the Melodia label featuring his own arrangements and compositions. He also has numerous recordings on the CBC label.

Anastasia Markina, Piano
Anastasia Markina was born in St. Petersburg, Russia in 1978. She started playing piano when she was almost four winning her first competition six years later. Her first teacher, Tatyana Shrago led her to win her first international piano competition in Marsala, Italy in 1992. After graduating from Music School, she took lessons with Alexander Mndoyants and Maria Mekler. In 1994, she entered the Rimsky-Korsakov College of Music where she studied for four years in the studio of Mary Guseva, student of Pavel Serebryakov. While there, she won several international piano competitions, including 1st prize at the 1st International Maria Yudina Piano Competition, 1st prize in solo and 1st prize in chamber music at the Beach of Hope International Music Festival and Competition in Dobrich-Albena, Bulgaria, and was one of the three prize winners at the Peter the Great Music Festival in Groningen, Holland in 1997.

After receiving her diploma with honors from the College of Music, she was invited to study in the United States by Victor Rosenbaum, well-known teacher and pianist, and director of the Longy School of Music in Cambridge, MA. In 1999, she moved to the Dallas-Fort Worth area to continue her education at the University of North Texas in the studio of Prof. Vladimir Viardo (Gold medalist of the 1973 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition).

While studying at UNT, she continued winning competitions in the United States, including 1st prize at the San Angelo Sorantin International Music Competition, 1st prize at the First Boesendorfer International Piano Competition, 1st and Grand prize at the Young Texas Artist Music Competition, and 2nd prize at the First Jose Iturbi Music Competition. In November 2005, she has performed Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini with the San Angelo Symphony under Hector Guzman. In January 2007, she has performed Ravel Piano Concerto in G with the Phoenix Symphony under Lawrence Golan. Her upcoming performances include solo and orchestra appearances in the United States, Mexico and Austria.

Yariv Aloni, Viola
Both Violist and Conductor Yariv Aloni is currently the Conductor and Artistic Director of Victoria’s Galiano Ensemble, the Victoria Chamber Orchestra, Comox Valley Youth Music Centre and an Associate Music Director for the Greater Victoria Youth Orchestra.

Mr. Aloni is acclaimed by critics for his sensitivity and virtuosity. He has performed as recitalist and chamber musician in major concert halls around the world, including Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Centre in New York, Tonhalle in Zurich, the Alte Oper in Frankfurt, the Louvre in Paris and the Music Theatre in Jerusalem.

He is a former member of the Aviv and Penderecki Quartets and has collaborated with many musicians, including Isaac Stern, Pinchas Zuckerman, Mischa Maisky and Christoph Eschenbach. Mr. Aloni has recorded for the CBC, the BBC, National Public Radio, Radio-France and the Israeli Radio. He can also be heard on Compact Discs issued by the United, Marquise, Tritonus, and CBC labels. As a conductor, he has received praise for his “impassioned, inspiring and magnificently right” interpretations of major orchestral and choral repertoire. Reviewers also describe him as "a musician of considerable insight and impeccable taste " Yariv Aloni studied Viola with Michael Tree, Daniel Benyamini and David Chen, and conducting with the Hungarian conductor János Sándor.

Zoltan Rozsnya, Cello
Zoltan Rozsnyai was born into a musical family. Both his parents and grandparents were professional musicians. He studied piano and violin, before taking up the cello at the age of six. He joined the Windsor Symphony at 15, then left to attend the University of Toronto two years later. While in Toronto, he studied with Vladimir Orloff and Daniel Domb. Zoltan also took masterclasses at the Banff School of Fine Arts, studying with Aldo Parisot, Tsuyoshi Tsutsumi, and Janos Starker. He played for many years in the Canadian Opera Company and National Ballet orchestras, as well as performing as soloist and chamber musician throughout Ontario. Zoltan also spent a year in India with his electric cello, traveling and collaborating with musicians. In 1999 he joined the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, and has been the Assistant Principal cellist since 2001.

Baya Kakouberi , Piano
Baya was born in Tbilisi, Georgia, and made her piano debut at the age of eleven. After graduating from Tbilisi Special School of Music for the Talented and Gifted, she entered the Moscow Conservatory, where she continued her studies on the Master’s and Doctorate levels under the tutelage of famous pianist and professor, Sergei Dorenski, and Tchaikovsky Competition Gold Medalist Vladimir Kraniev. Ms. Kakouberi has given recitals and appeared as a soloist with orchestras in Moscow, Georgia, Armenia, Latvia, Italy and the United States. She has recorded with the Moscow Philharmonic on Melodia Records and with the Allegro Sinfonia in Minneapolis. In 1996, she was among the “World’s Ten Most Distinguished Pianists” chosen by the Palm Beach Invitational Piano Competition. Since 1996, she regularly appears as a faculty member of the Conservatory Music in the Mountains in Durango, Colorado. In the summer of 2000, Ms. Kakouberi was chosen as recipient of the “Most Outstanding and Distinguished Pianist” award in the IBLA International Competition in Italy. Ms. Kakouberi is the founder of the BlueCandle Music Series in Dallas.

Jenny Press, Violin
Jennie Press began her violin studies at the age of three in St. John's, NL. She made her solo debut with the Newfoundland Symphony at thirteen and has since had solo appearances with several symphonies and chamber orchestras in Canada and the United States. Ms. Press has been a national finalist numerous times in the Canadian Music Competitions, the Shean Strings Competiton and the National Music Festival, both as a soloist and as a chamber musician. She has also been a prize winner in numerous competitions including the Marbury Violin Competition, the Yale Gordon String Competition, the Alexandria Symphony Competiton and the Wellesly Symphony Competition.

Jennie has performed in many symphony and chamber orchestras including the Baltimore Chamber Orchestra, Concert Artists of Baltimore Chamber Orchestra, Annapolis Symphony, Lancaster Symphony, and Key West Symphony, and has served as concertmaster in several orchestras including Royal Opera Canada, Annapolis Opera, Washington Summer Opera, De Camera Chamber Players, Peabody Symphony Orchestra and the Peabody Concert Orchestra. She has also performed with many pops orchestras which have led to performances in Hong Kong, at the Kennedy Centre in Washington, DC, and at Carnegie Hall in New York. She is currently Second Assistant Concertmaster of the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra.

David Harding, Viola
David Harding has an extensive solo and chamber music career, having performed throughout Europe, the United States, Canada and Central America. His performances have been broadcast on BBC, NPR and Deutschland Radio, Berlin. David is frequently featured on CBC Radio in Canada. He regularly performs at Chamber Music festivals throughout North America and is a member of the Music Toronto Chamber Society, Triskelion string trio and the American String Project.

He was the winner of the Sir John Barbirolli award at the Lionel Tertis International Viola Competition. Having served on the faculty of Indiana University South Bend, he is currently Professor of viola at the University of British Columbia. David plays on a viola made by Pietro Antonio dalla Costa, Tresviso Italy, circa 1750.

Ariel Barnes, Cello
Ariel Barnes, enjoys a diverse career performing as a soloist, chamber, and orchestral musician. At eighteeen, he was a top prize winner in the Burnaby Clef Society Competition and made his debut as a soloist playing Ernst Bloch’s “Schelomo, Hebraique Rhapsody for Solo Cello and Orchestra”. In recent years as a soloist, and as a member of the Borealis String Quartet, Ariel has appeared in recital and in chamber music concerts across Canada, the United States and Mexico.

An avid chamber musician, Ariel is the cellist of Trio Accord, a Vancouver-based string trio that is quickly developing a reputation for being the finest ensemble of its kind in Canada. He has also collaborated with such great performers as The St. Lawrence String Quartet, Scott St. John, Rita Costanzi, William Aide, David Harding, Rena Sharon, Ian Parker, Cary Chow, Nancy DiNovo, Barry Shiffman, Daniel Phillips, Tara Helen O’Connor, Mehan Esfahani, Daniel Bolshoi, Andrew Dawes, and many others. Memorable appearances at summer music festivals include the Ottawa Chamber Music Festival, The Banff Festival, Festival Orford, Festival Vancouver, and Mendocino Music Festival.An avid chamber musician, Ariel is the cellist of Trio Accord, a Vancouver-based string trio that is quickly developing a reputation for being the finest ensemble of its kind in Canada. He has also collaborated with such great performers as The St. Lawrence String Quartet, Scott St. John, Rita Costanzi, William Aide, David Harding, Rena Sharon, Ian Parker, Cary Chow, Nancy DiNovo, Barry Shiffman, Daniel Phillips, Tara Helen O’Connor, Mehan Esfahani, Daniel Bolshoi, Andrew Dawes, and many others. Memorable appearances at summer music festivals include the Ottawa Chamber Music Festival, The Banff Festival, Festival Orford, Festival Vancouver, and Mendocino Music Festival.

Sara Davis Buechner , Piano
Sara Davis Buechner is a classical concert pianist of noteworthy accomplishment, virtuosic mastery, artistic sensitivity and extraordinary versatility. A major prizewinner of many of the world's most prestigious international piano competitions -- Reine Elisabeth of Belgium, Leeds, Salzburg, Sydney and Vienna -- she established her career by winning the Gold Medal of the 1984 Gina Bachauer International Piano Competition in Salt Lake City, Utah, and as a Bronze Medalist of the 1986 Tchaikowsky International Piano Competition in Moscow.

Growing in popularity in Canada, Sara has also recently performed with the CBC Radio Orchestra, Orchestra London, the Montreal Chamber Orchestra, Hamilton Philharmonic and McGill Chamber Orchestra, and has played recitals from the Canadian Atlantic to the Pacific. She was recently the subject of a feature profile in MacLeans, Canada's national news magazine.

In 2003 Ms. Buechner joined the eminent Piano Faculty of the University of British Columbia - Vancouver, where she is now Associate Professor of Piano, Piano Literature and Chamber Music. She is a former faculty member of New York University, and has presented lectures and masterclasses worldwide, from the Royal Academy in London to Indiana University to National Taiwan Normal University to The Juilliard School to the Senzoku Conservatory and Kobe-Yamate Gakuen of Japan. Ms. Buechner is a proud Yamaha artist; she speaks and reads Japanese and is an Honorary Member of the Hanshin Tigers Baseball Team of Osaka.

Maria Larionoff , Violin
"An outstanding talent intoxicating in its brilliance" raved the San Francisco Chronicle at Ms. Larionoff's solo debut. Since then, she has appeared with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Seattle Symphony, and the Orquestra Sinfonica with Carlos Chavez in Mexico City, the University of Washington Orchestra, the Yakima Symphony, the Port Angeles Symphony and the San Francisco Chamber Orchestra.

A Loomis Scholarship Award winner at the prestigious Juilliard School, Ms. Larionoff was a student of Dorothy DeLay, and, upon graduating, was invited by the esteemed Maestro Carlo Maria Giulini to join the violin section of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Ms. Larionoff serves as Concertmaster of the Seattle Symphony, where she has been featured as a soloist on numerous occasions. Her unusual versatility as a violist as well as a violinist has led to invitations at many chamber music festivals, including the Seattle Chamber Music Society, Chamber Music Northwest, The International Music Festival, the Marrowstone Festival and the Mostly Mozart Festival.

Ms. Larionoff has collaborated in chamber music concerts with many distinguished artists including Emanuel Ax, Itzhak Perlman, Lynn Harrell, Steven Staryk, Dmitri Sitkovetsky, Glenn Dicterow and William Preucil. She has worked with some of the world's leading conductors, among them Sir Simon Rattle, Zubin Mehta, Pierre Boulez, Andre Previn, Kurt Sanderling and Erich Leinsdorf.

Jeanette Jonquil , Clarinet
Jeanette Jonquil has been the principal clarinetist with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra since 2005. In 2006, she also performed with the Minnesota Orchestra as guest principal clarinetist. Before moving to Vancouver, she was the principal clarinetist in the Charleston Symphony Orchestra (South Carolina) where she was first featured as a soloist in her second month with the orchestra. Prior to that, she performed with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra in Wellington and was also a member of the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra. While with the MSO she was part of their historic tour to Cuba, making them the first American orchestra to perform there in over 50 years.

In the summers, Ms. Jonquil is the principal clarinetist with the Colorado Music Festival Orchestra in Boulder. This summer she also looks forward to performing at the Pender Harbour Chamber Music Festival on the Sunshine Coast. She has attended the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival in Germany, Pacific Music Festival in Japan, Spoleto Festival USA, Chautauqua Music Festival in New York and was a fellow at Tanglewood where she was awarded the Gino B. Cioffi Memorial Prize for most outstanding woodwind playing.

Jonathan Goldman , Bandoneon
Specialising in 20th-century music history, Jonathan Goldman is Assistant Professor of Musicology at the School of Music of the University of Victoria. Editor-in-Chief of the journal Circuit, musiques contemporaines, he completed undergraduate studies in philosophy and mathematics at McGill University. He went on to earn an M.A. and PhD from the Université de Montréal under the direction of Jean-Jacques Nattiez, with a dissertation which deals with form in the thought and works of French composer Pierre Boulez. Dr. Goldman wrote the preface to Leçons de musique (2005), a collection of Boulez's writings published in France by Christian Bourgois. He is currently working on a book on Boulez scheduled to be published by Cambridge University Press. He is also interested in the history of analytical practices and is a member of the research team "Mise en tableau/Écoute segmentée" at IRCAM (Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique) in Paris. Jonathan Goldman also performs on the accordion and the bandoneon, focussing on tango repertoire; in 2002, an arrangement he made of an orchestral piece by Astor Piazzolla was published by Éditions Henry Lemoine.

Tangissimo Trio
Tangissimo has thrilled thousands of people with live concerts, broadcasts and recordings since their formation in 2003. Piazzolla's violinist Fernando Suárez Paz calls them "... un grupo divino." Shouts of Bravissimo! Tangissimo! have been heard from Buenos Aires to Keremeos.

Tangissimo has unusually wide appeal to diverse audiences. They have won the hearts of sophisticated listeners everywhere, from classical and jazz lovers in North America to tango aficionados in Buenos Aires. The music they play is as eclectic as their public - a passionate blend of tango, jazz and classical styles. From Alberto Ginastera to Astor Piazzolla - Júlian Plaza to Horacio Salgán - tangos old and new - they cover the complete palette of Argentine colors, sounds and emotions. Their first CD Tangissimo Live was chosen one of the best new releases of 2004 by CBC Radio Canada's Espace Musique and was celebrated at the Vancouver International Jazz Festival that same year. Their new CD Chasing the Tango High will surely be another hit. Pianist Linda Lee Thomas, guitarist Ed Henderson and bassist Miles Hill make up this wonderfully diverse trio of Vancouver’s most respected musicians. Together they combine their vast musical experiences to breath life into the music of Argentina. The music they play is eclectic : a passionate blend that embraces classical, jazz and, of course, TANGO. From Alberto Ginastera to Astor Piazzolla - Julian Plaza to Horacio Salgan - tangos old and new - they cover the complete palette of Argentine colors, sounds and emotions. The trio has been blessed by Maestro Horacio Salgan - Argentina’s most celebrated tango composer and pianist - “por las magnificas versiones de mis obras”. This says it all. Hear them.