Artists

Violin & Artistic Director

Angella Ahn

Violinist Angella Ahn has had an extensive career performing in every state in the US and in over 30 countries. As a member of the Ahn Trio she has played in venues as diverse as the White House, the Jazz Dock in Prague, Buenos Aires’s Teatro Colon, Vienna’s Musikverein, New York’s Lincoln Center, Leipzig’s Gewandhaus, Beijing’s Concert Hall, Istanbul’s Aya Irini in Topkapi Palace, the iTunes Festival, and TEDWomen.

In addition to live performances, Angella has an impressive discography with her trio. The nine enthusiastically received albums include Lullaby for My Favorite Insomniac, released by Sony (No. 8 in the Billboard Charts for 26 weeks); Dvorak, Suk and Shostakovich, released by EMI (winner of Germany’s prestigious ECHO Award); and their most recent, Blue, a musical diary. She has recently released two digital tracks with her trio, “Nuvole Bianche “and “Candybox.” Wide-ranging collaborations have allowed the trio to work with modern dance companies (including a B-boy group), film directors, rock bands, and DJ Spooky. Because of their eclectic interests and innovative exploration in music, New York Newsday has called the trio “Classical revolutionaries.”

Angella enjoys living in Bozeman, Montana, where she is currently Associate Professor of Violin and Viola at Montana State University. The depth of her experience and knowledge has made her perfectly suited to help the next generation of young musicians and she is a devoted and sought-after teacher, named by the university as both a “Most Valuable Professor” and “Professor of the Month.” Beyond her teaching she serves on the Montana Arts Council, on the board of the Bozeman Symphony, and is the artistic director of the Big Sky Classical Music Festival, where she is heard performing with many guest artists such as Matt Haimovitz and Rachel Barton Pine. She has often taught at Mark O’Connor’s Fiddle camps and has been featured with musicians as diverse as Phil Aaberg, Darol Anger, Emmylous Harris, and John Prine. She can be seen in “Angella Ahn and Friends,” a program presented by Montana PBS’ Emmy award- winning 11th & Grant with Eric Funk, as well as in The Hive, a film produced by Tippet Rise Art Center in collaboration with the acclaimed sculptor Stephen Talasnik and director Matthew McKee.

Angella has given masterclasses throughout North America, Asia, and Europe. A graduate of Juilliard School of Music, she shares the widely regarded pedagogy of her mentors Dorothy DeLay and Hyo Kang. She plays a 2013 violin made for her by the renowned luthier Sam Zygmuntowicz of Brooklyn, New York.

Greg Anderson

In pursuit of his mission to make classical music a relevant and powerful force in society, Greg Anderson has developed a multi-faceted career as a pianist, composer, and filmmaker. Today Greg is an internationally renowned concert pianist with live tours reaching four continents and 24 countries, 30+ million music video views, daily radio plays, and over a thousand performances of his compositions every year. His intuitively creative approach and ability to connect with the next generation have attracted the attention of such media outlets as PBS, MTV, the BBC, and the Today Show. He is profiled in Nick Romeo’s Driven and has been featured on NPR’s Performance Today, All Things Considered, and A Prairie Home Companion, as well as Pianist, Gramophone, and Listen magazines.

For over two decades, Greg has performed in collaboration with Elizabeth Joy Roe as the Anderson & Roe Piano Duo, noted as “the most dynamic duo of this generation” (San Francisco Classical Voice) and “the very model of complete 21st-century musicians” (The Washington Post). Their five critically acclaimed albums on the Universal and Steinway record labels have spent over a dozen weeks at the top of the Billboard Classical Charts.

Greg has toured extensively as a soloist, duo pianist, and chamber musician, performing in many of the world’s most significant concert halls, from Carnegie Hall to Beijing’s National Centre for the Performing Arts. He has performed at dozens of summer music festivals, at the Gilmore and Gina Bachauer International Piano Festivals, and with the orchestras of San Francisco, Vancouver, Calgary, St. Paul, Rochester, Liverpool, and more.

A world leader on the advancement of classical music, Greg has been invited to present at numerous international leader symposiums, and he has hosted NPR’s From the Top and webcasts of the Cliburn International Piano Competition. He has produced, directed, and edited 70+ music videos, and with an Emmy nomination, premieres at international film festivals, and millions of views on YouTube, his films have been influential in shaping the 21^st-century classical music video genre. His 100+ compositions and arrangements are featured on the Universal, Sony, EMI, and Steinway record labels and are frequently performed by concert pianists, major orchestras, and amateurs alike.

Greg received his Doctorate and Master of Musical Arts degrees from Yale University and his master’s and bachelor’s degrees from The Juilliard School. Greg is a Steinway artist.

String Quartet

Attacca Quartet

Grammy award-winning Attacca Quartet, as described by The Nation, “lives in the present aesthetically, without rejecting the virtues of the musical past”, and it is this dexterity to glide from the music of the 18th through to the 21st century repertoire that place them as one of the most versatile and outstanding ensembles of the moment –a quartet for modern times.

Passionate advocates of contemporary repertoire, their latest recording, Orange, features string quartet works by Pulitzer-prize winning composer Caroline Shaw. Greatly received by the critics, Attacca Quartet won the 2020 Grammy award in the category “Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance” in recognition for their work on this album. Previous recordings include three critically acclaimed albums with Azica Records, including a disc of Michael Ippolito’sstring quartets, and the complete works for string quartet by John Adams. Touring extensively in the United States, recent and upcoming highlights include Carnegie Hall Neighborhood Concerts, New York Philharmonic’s Nightcap series, Lincoln Center’s White Lights Festival and Miller Theatre, both with Caroline Shaw, Phillips Collection, Chamber Music Austin, Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, and Trinity Church at Wall Street where they will perform the complete cycle of the Beethoven String Quartets. Attacca Quartet has also served as Juilliard’s Graduate Resident String Quartet, the Quartet in Residence at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Ensemble-in-Residence at the School of Music at Texas
State University. Outside of the US, recent performances include Gothenburg Konserthuset, MITO Septembre Festival in Italy, and their debut in London at Kings Place and in Oslo at the Vertravo Haydn Festival. As well as their recent tour in Central and South America, they will return to Europe for a tour of ten concerts around Sweden as well as taking part in the Prague String Festival and September Me Festival in the Netherlands.

Passionate advocates of contemporary repertoire, their latest recording, Orange, features string quartet works by Pulitzer-prize winning composer Caroline Shaw. Greatly received by the critics, Attacca Quartet won the 2020 Grammy award in the category “Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance” in recognition for their work on this album. Previous recordings include three critically acclaimed albums with Azica Records, including a disc of Michael Ippolito’s string quartets, and the complete works for string quartet by John Adams.

Kinan Azmeh

Hailed by critics and audiences alike, winner of Opus Klassik award in 2019 clarinetist and composer Kinan Azmeh has gained international recognition for his distinctive voice across diverse musical genres.
Originally from Damascus, Syria, Kinan Azmeh brings his music to all corners of the world as a soloist, composer and improviser. Notable appearances include the Opera Bastille, Paris; Tchaikovsky Grand Hall, Moscow; Carnegie Hall and the UN General Assembly, New York; the Royal Albert Hall, London; Teatro Colon, Buenos Aires; Philharmonie, Berlin; the Library of Congress, the Kennedy Center, Washington DC; the Mozarteum, Salzburg, Hamburg’s Elbphilharmonie; and in his native Syria at the opening concert of the Damascus Opera House.

He has appeared as a soloist with the New York Philharmonic, London Philharmonic, Seattle Symphony, Bavarian Radio Orchestra, Dusseldorf Symphony, the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, The Azerbaijan State Symphony, Winnipeg Symphony, Symphony Nova Scotia, Toronto Symphony, A Far Cry, The Knights Orchestra, Calgary philharmonic, Qatar Philharmonic and the Syrian Symphony Orchestra among others, and has shared the stage with such musical luminaries as Yo-Yo Ma, Daniel Barenboim, Marcel Khalife, John McLaughlin, Francois Rabbath, Aynur and Jivan Gasparian.

Kinan’s compositions include several works for solo, chamber, and orchestral music, as well as music for film, live illustration, and electronics. His resent works were commissioned by The New York Philharmonic, The Seattle Symphony, The Knights Orchestra, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Elbphilharmonie, Apple Hill string quartet, Quatuor Voce, Brooklyn Rider, Cello Octet Amsterdam, Aizuri Quartet and Bob Wilson.

An advocate for new music, several concertos were dedicated to him by composers such as Kareem Roustom, Dia Succari, Dinuk Wijeratne, Zaid Jabri, Saad Haddad and Guss Janssen, in addition to a large number of chamber music works.

In addition to his own Arab-Jazz Quartet CityBand and his Hewar trio, he has also been playing with the Silkroad Ensemble since 2012, whose 2017 Grammy Award-winning album “Sing Me Home” features Kinan as a clarinetist and composer.

Kinan Azmeh is a graduate of New York’s Juilliard School as a student of Charles Neidich, and of both the Damascus High institute of Music where he studied with Shukry Sahwki, Nicolay Viovanof and Anatoly Moratof, and Damascus University’s School of Electrical Engineering. Kinan earned his doctorate degree in music from the City University of New York in 2013.
His first opera “Songs for Days to Come” which is fully sung in Arabic, was recently premiered in Osnabruck, Germany in June 2022 to a great acclaim. He has recently been appointed to the National Council for the Arts on a nomination by President Joe Biden.

Viola

Chi-Chi Bestmann

A native of Taiwan, conductor and violist Chi-Chi Lin Bestmann enjoys a diverse career, from performing Mozart in Carnegie Hall to jamming with rapper Jay Z at Radio City Music Hall to conducting The Annual Westchester All-County Orchestra Festival. Her ability to straddle both roles of musician and conductor across different genres, has led her to venues including Saturday Night Live, Carnegie Hall, Avery Fisher Hall, Alice Tully Hall, and Merkin Hall, performing with such artists including Kurt Masur, Beyoncé, and Enya.

In addition to presenting recitals and collaborative concerts in the US, Europe and Asia, Ms. Bestmann is a devoted teacher. She was a faculty member at Mannes School of Music (Extension), Hoff-Barthelson Music School, and Riverdale Country School. Ms. Bestmann was also the conductor of the Philharmonia orchestra at Third Street Music School Settlement. Her commitment to education inspired the creation of Petite Concerts Inc., a nonprofit organization that offers live-music experiences to young children through local venues with easy access in hopes of cultivating classical music audiences of the future.

While still a student, Ms. Bestmann was the youngest participant with the New York Philharmonic’s Conductor Table hosted by Kurt Masur. She was the Music Director of Tainan Teacher’s College Orchestra (Taiwan) and worked with many youth orchestras in the New York area including the Children’s Orchestra Society and Hoff-Barthelson Orchestra. Ms. Bestmann’s most recent appearance include guest conducting the Yonkers Philharmonic Orchestra.

As the winner of the 1998 Mannes Concerto Competition, Ms. Bestmann made her solo debut performing with the Mannes Orchestra under the baton of John Mauceri. She participated in festivals such as the International Musician’s Seminar in Prussia Cove, England and the Mozarteum International Sommerakademie in Salzburg, Austria. She served as principal violist of the New England Symphonic Ensemble which was frequently directed by acclaimed composer and conductor John Rutter. As a chamber music enthusiast, Ms. Bestmann is a member of the Solace Piano Quartet and performed with members of the New Jersey Symphony in numerous concerts.

Ms. Bestmann holds a Bachelor of Music in Orchestral Conducting, a Master of Music and a Professional Studies Diploma in Viola Performance, all from Mannes School of Music. Her primary teachers include violists Karen Ritscher and Thomas Reibl, violinist Albert Markov, chamber music coaches Felix Galamir, Daniel Phillips and Todd Phillips and conductor Michael Charry.

Ms. Bestmann recently relocated to St. Paul, MN from New York with her husband and two daughters. She is currently a faculty member at the University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire, MacPhail Center for Music and freelances with ensembles in the Twin Cities area including the Minnesota Orchestra and Minnesota Opera.

Antigoni Goni

The Greek guitarist Antigoni Goni is a British council, Royal Academy and Juilliard School scholar. Notably, she studied with Julian Bream, Sharon Isbin, Oscar Ghiglia, John Mills, and Evangelos Assimakopoulos. As the founder of Classical Guitar magazine Maurice J. Summerfield hasput it, Antigoni Goni is today an internationally acclaimed soloist and recording artist, sought after pedagogue and festival organizer, whose artistry and expertise is in great demand internationally.

Her long list of competition and awards includes the prestigious Julian Bream prize (assigned by Julian Bream himself and received from Lady Diana), and the 1st prize and NAXOS prize of the 1995 Guitar Foundation of America Competition (GFA). The latter launched her international career as concert and recording artist.

Antigoni Goni is the founder of the Guitar Department at the Juilliard Pre-College Division at the Juilliard School in New York City (USA) that she chaired and taught for 10 years. She also was adjunct professor at Columbia University (New York City, USA), honorary Associate Professor (ARAM) at the Royal Academy of Music in London, and member of the Board of Advisors of the Guitar Foundation of America.

Since 2005 Antigoni Goni is the head of the Guitar Department at the Koninklijk Conservatorium in Brussels (KCB). In this capacity she organized a large number of successful international events. In 2015 she was nominated “professor of the year” and was presented with the “Madame de la Hault” prize. Between 2013 and 2018 she was member of the Artistic Committee (Artistieke Raad) of the conservatory.

In 2007 Antigoni Goni founded the Volterra Project, Summer Guitar Institute, a successful international workshop that Classical Guitar Magazine has defined “Groundbreaking” and has become an internationally undisputed point of reference in the field of the classical guitar.

Since the 65-concert tour following the 1st prize at the Guitar Foundation of America Competition in 1995, Antigoni Goni has played in practically every guitar society and guitar series all over North America and Canada as well as many prominent guitar Festivals in Europe and Russia, South America and the Far East.

Some of her career’s highlights include her 1993 New York debut at Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall, her 1995 appearance at the “Bolshoi” Hall of the Moscow Conservatory (thus becoming the first guitarist since Andres Segovia to perform in that hall), her 2002 London Debut at Wigmore Hall and her 2005 appearance at the Odeon of Herodes Atticus, the magnificent amphitheater under the Acropolis of Athens: a unique and outstanding honor for a native Greek.

The long list of her performances includes yearly tours in USA (in over 15 States) and Canada, and tours in Japan, Malaysia, and several concerts in a variety of locations in Russia where she returned many times performing solo or with orchestras from Novosibirsk to Kazan and from Moscow to St Petersburg. Music festivals, Guitar societies, Summer Workshops, Subscription series all over the world have become her artistic office.

Finally, her many European tours brought her in a very wide array of locations, including, most recently to play a concert on the beautiful stage of King’s Pace in London in celebration of the 100 years of John W. Duarte.

Piano

Julie Gosswiller

One of Julie Gosswiller’s greatest passions in life is making music with other musicians, and for that she is in high demand. Ms. Gosswiller has collaborated with many of her colleagues at Montana State University and with renowned musicians such as Adam Barnett Hart of the Escher String Quartet, the Ahn Trio, Dallas Brass, and more.

For more than 17 years Ms. Gosswiller and soprano Elizabeth Croy have performed art song together throughout Montana and the United States. The two have been featured twice on the Emmy Award Winning Series 11th and Grant with Eric Funk.

Eric Funk wrote of Julie’s playing:

“Her technique is only dwarfed by her expressiveness and deep interpretation of the music. I have enjoyed hearing her performances numerous times over many years and can attest to her incomparable artistry.”

Ms. Gosswiller and Mrs. Croy won numerous awards in the Cybersing Competition, including the Nancy Babcock Award for Best Pianist, and were one of ten teams chosen nationally to participate in the Cleveland Art Song Festival. They continue to promote art song in venues around Montana.

Ms. Gosswiller’s other passion is teaching at Montana State University, where she received the President’s Excellence in Teaching Award. Her university students have won the Montana State University Concerto competition, and her private students have won the Montana Music Teachers Association Competition at the elementary, junior, and senior levels.

Her students have also won honors at the regional level and gold medals in Musicfest Northwest. A sought-after clinician, Ms. Gosswiller and her students have presented at the Montana Music Teachers Association Fall Festival. Her students have also presented nationally at the Conference for Undergraduate Research.

Ms. Gosswiller earned a master’s degree in piano performance from the University of Colorado, where she studied with Angela Cheng, Robert Spillman, and Doris Lehnert. She paid her way through school on an accompanying assistantship and went on to be a student coach accompanist at the Aspen Music Festival. There she served as rehearsal pianist for voice faculty, in addition to her work with peers. After graduating, she served as pianist for Colorado Children’s Chorale on regional tours and for sold out shows in Boetcher Concert Hall in Denver before moving to Bozeman, MT with her family.

In her spare time Ms. Gosswiller enjoys cross-country skiing, telemarking, fly fishing, and backpacking in the mountains of Montana with her husband, two sons, and dogs.

Elizabeth Joy Roe

Pianist ELIZABETH JOY ROE has been hailed “brilliant” (The New York Times), “an artist to be taken seriously” (The Chicago Tribune), “impressive” (BBC Radio), “incisive, lyrical and tender” (BBC Music Magazine), “sublime” (Classical Ear), “a mature, fascinating interpreter and an artist of intelligence, insight, and a genuine grace” (The Southampton Press), and “electrifying” (The Dallas Morning News), and she was named one of the classical music world’s “Six on the Rise: Young Artists to Watch” by Symphony Magazine. The recipient of the prestigious William Petschek Piano Debut Recital Award, she has appeared as orchestral soloist, recitalist, and collaborative musician at major venues worldwide, including Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, the Kennedy Center, the Seoul Arts Center, the National Performing Arts Center (Beijing), the Ravinia Festival (Chicago), Salle Cortot (Paris), Teatro Argentino (Buenos Aires), the Esplanade (Singapore), the Adrienne Arsht Center (Miami), the Banff Centre (Canada), and the Festspiele Mecklenburg-Vorpommern (Germany).

Elizabeth’s multifaceted career includes performance broadcasts on the BBC, KBS, NPR, and PBS; new music premieres; and a diverse range of artistic projects and collaborations. A recording artist for Decca Classics, she has recorded the complete Nocturnes by John Field in one of 2016’s most noteworthy releases, and her previous album was a critically acclaimed coupling of the Britten and Barber Piano Concertos with the London Symphony Orchestra and conductor Emil Tabakov. Her discography also comprises a solo album, Images Poetiques (Universal Classics / DG), and four piano duo albums which have spent dozens of weeks at the top of the Billboard classical charts. Additional career highlights include the PBS broadcast of “Jazz & the Philharmonic” (in which she performed alongside jazz legends Bobby McFerrin, Chick Corea, and others); the Carnegie Hall premiere of Messiaen’s Visions de l’Amen for the composer’s centennial celebration, hosted by Pierre Boulez; performance presentations for the United Nations and at various international leadership symposia, including the EG Conference, Chicago Ideas Week, and La Ciudad de las Ideas; an artistic residency sponsored by the U.S. Embassy in Argentina; editions for Alfred Music; directorial and mentorship projects with the National YoungArts Foundation; and an active role as Artistic Curator for the Joye in Aiken Festival.

As a collaborative musician, Elizabeth has collaborated with an array of esteemed artists, including conductor Leonard Slatkin, violinist Daniel Hope, violist Richard O’Neill, cellist Ralph Kirshbaum, the Parker Quartet, and jazz pianist Shelly Berg. She is a member of the NYC-based chamber music collective Decoda (Affiliate Ensemble of Carnegie Hall) and Trio Ariadne (ensemble-in-residence at the Green Music Center) and one half of the groundbreaking Anderson & Roe Piano Duo, whose concerts, compositions, and Emmy-nominated music videos (viewed by millions on YouTube) have captivated audiences around the globe.

Elizabeth made her concerto debut at age 15 with the Chicago Philharmonic, eliciting critical acclaim from The Chicago Tribune’s John Von Rhein: “Elizabeth Joy Roe supplied scintillation in the Grieg [Concerto] … A lot of pianists play the Grieg but not many adults twice the age of Miss Roe could make this familiar score sing so poetically or with such spontaneity.” She has since appeared with the symphony orchestras of St. Louis, San Francisco, Milwaukee, Indianapolis, Boulder, Calgary, Hartford, Tucson, Santa Fe, Shreveport, Waco, Winnipeg, Chautauqua, Corpus Christi, Lubbock, Ars Viva, Seongnam, and Juilliard; the Indianapolis and Milwaukee Chamber Orchestras; the Chicago Sinfonietta; and members of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, among others. In 2003, she stepped in on short notice to replace the late John Browning for subscription performances of the Barber Piano Concerto (Browning’s signature work) with the Delaware Symphony Orchestra; The Delaware News Journal pronounced her pianism as “astonishing” and “stunning.”

Committed to arts advocacy, Elizabeth was one of the inaugural fellows of The Academy—a program of Carnegie Hall, The Juilliard School, and The Weill Music Institute (now under the new appellation of Ensemble Connect). As part of this professional fellowship, she performed regularly at Carnegie Hall with Ensemble ACJW, taught at PS 131Q in Queens, and co-directed the Children’s Music Campaign NYC. In recognition of her educational and leadership endeavors, she was awarded the McGraw-Hill Companies’ Robert Sherman Award for Music Education and Community Outreach. She has also held faculty positions at Smith College as Visiting Artist and Lecturer in Music and at Sonoma State University as Weill Hall Artist-in-Residence.

A Chicago native, Elizabeth was 13 years old when she won the grand prize at the IBLA International Piano Competition in Italy. Throughout her career she has received honors from the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts, the Music for Youth Foundation, and the National Association for Professional Asian Women. She earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees from The Juilliard School as a full scholarship student, graduating with Scholastic Distinction for her thesis on representations of music in the fiction of Thomas Mann, Marcel Proust, and E.M. Forster. A Steinway Artist and Soros Fellow, Elizabeth’s mission is to connect with others through the inspiration, joy and essential humanity of music.

Angella Ahn

Ahn Trio

Greg Anderson

Anderson and Roe

Attacca Quartet

Kinan Azmeh

Chi-Chi Bestmann

Immanuel Davis

Antigoni Goni

Julie Gosswiller

Käthe Jarka

Ilse-Mari Lee

Michele Levin

Elizabeth Joy Roe

Sara Stalnaker

WindSync

Peter Zazofsky

Violin & Artistic Director

Angella Ahn

Ahn Trio

Greg Anderson

Anderson and Roe

String Quartet

Attacca Quartet

Kinan Azmeh

Viola

Chi-Chi Bestmann

Flute

Immanuel Davis

Antigoni Goni

Piano

Julie Gosswiller

Cello

Käthe Jarka

Cello

Ilse-Mari Lee

Piano and Composer

Michele Levin

Elizabeth Joy Roe

Cello

Sara Stalnaker

WindSync

Violin

Peter Zazofsky