Alexis Pia Gerlach

alexis.gerlach@gmail.com

Cellist Alexis Pia Gerlach enjoys an active career as a soloist and chamber musician. Recent solo performances include recitals at the La Jolla Chamber Music Society and the Caramoor Festival, and concerto appearances with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s and the Charleston and Fort Worth Symphony Orchestras. Her recordings of the Rachmaninoff and Franck Sonatas with pianist Fabio Bidini are released on the Encore Performance label. Ms. Gerlach has appeared as a guest artist at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Bargemusic, and numerous festivals including Marlboro, Caramoor and Aspen. Ms. Gerlach performs as a member of Trio Solisti with violinist Maria Bachmann and pianist Jon Klibonoff, with performances last year including appearances on the Great Performers Series at Lincoln Center, the Washington Performing Arts Society at The Kennedy Center and at Weill Hall. Their recordings of Brahms Trios and the Pulitzer Prize winning “Tempest Fantasy” by Paul Moravec have been met by critical acclaim. Born in New York City, Ms. Gerlach studied with Aldo Parisot at Yale University and The Juilliard School.

Ara Gregorian

araviolin@aol.com

Violinist and Violist Ara Gregorian is equally accomplished as a soloist, recitalist, and chamber musician. He has appeared in New York’s Carnegie Hall, Avery Fisher Hall, Alice Tully Hall, and Merkin Hall, and has performed as soloist with the Boston Pops and Shanghai Symphony Orchestras as well as with numerous orchestras throughout the United States. Mr. Gregorian is the founder and Artistic Director of the Four Seasons Chamber Music Festival of Eastern North Carolina and has appeared at the Santa Fe, El Paso, Skaneateles, Cactus Pear, Wintergreen, and Garth Newel festivals. He made his recital debut in 1996 at Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall and has also performed as a recitalist at Detroit’s Henry Ford Centennial Library and Harvard University’s Payne Hall. Mr. Gregorian studied with Joseph Fuchs, Harvey Shapiro, and Robert Mann at The Juilliard School where he received his Bachelor and Master of Music degrees. He has been a member of the violin and viola faculty at East Carolina University since 1998, and currently resides in Greenville, NC, and New York City.

Zvi Plesser

zvoo@aol.com

Israeli cellist Zvi Plesser enjoys an active career as soloist, chamber music player and teacher. As soloist he has performed with leading orchestras, among them the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, the Israel Chamber Orchestra, the National Symphony Orchestra and The Academy of St Martin in the Fields, under conductors Zubin Mehta, Sir Nevile Marriner and Sergiu Comissiona. He was a member of the Huberman String Quartet and is a founding member of Concertante. He has participated in many festivals, including the Marlboro Festival, the Cervantino Festival in Mexico, the Jerusalem International Chamber Music Festival, Kuhmo Festival in Finland and the Montpellier Festival in France. Mr. Plesser is a graduate of The Juilliard School as a student of Zara Nelsova. His principal teachers have included Zvi Harel in Israel and David Soyer in the United States. Mr. Plesser has taught at the North Carolina School of the Arts and is currently on the faculty of the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance.

Ittai Shapira

www.ittaishapira.com

Israeli violinist Ittai Shapira's recent appearances have included solo performances with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s at Carnegie Hall, the BBC Concert Orchestra, London Philharmonia, Detroit Symphony, Russian Philharmonic, Shanghai Symphony, the Czech National Symphony, the Polish Chamber Orchestra, the Cape Town Philharmonic, Lucerne Symphonyand Jerusalem Symphony, as well as touring with the English Chamber Orchestra and Yuri Bashmet. He has premiered works by Berio, Bunch, Rechtman, Heath and Shulamit Ran and Avner Dorman. Festival appearances include Aspen, Ravinia, and Schleswig-Holstein. Along with his colleague Hagai Shaham, Mr. Shapira is the co-founder of the Ilona Feher Foundation for the nurturing and promotion of young Israeli violinists. After studying with Ms. Feher in Israel, he studied with Dorothy DeLay and Robert Mann at The Juilliard School. Mr. Shapira has recorded for Meridian, Quartz, EMI Classics, and Sony/BMG Sanctuary Classics. A dedicate of over 15 concertos, Special premieres include a concerto for violin, narrator and orchestra by Glen Roven with Brooke Shields (released by Sony/BMG and performed at Carnegie Hall with the American Symphony and Glenn Close), and RAGTIMES for violin and orchestra by John Novacek.

Highlights of his 09-10 season includes a performances of his own music on tour with the Key West Symphony in Florida, Belgrade Philharmonic and China; A tour of Scandinavia with the Oulo Sinfonia, the Jerusalem Symphony and Bogota Philharmonic and the release of his first concerto for violin and orchestra.

Rachel Shapiro

rsviola@aol.com

Violist Rachel Shapiro is an accomplished chamber musician and experienced Teaching Artist. Ms. Shapiro is currently in her tenth year as a senior teaching artist for the New York Philharmonic School Partnership Program. In 2007, she was the recipient of the The Halee and David Baldwin Teaching Artist Chair, awarded to one senior teaching artist each year to further their artistic development. She is also a Concert Mentor for The Academy, a Program of Carnegie Hall, The Juilliard School and the Weill Music Institute. In 2008 and 2009, Ms. Shapiro worked as both a performer and consultant to create a week of interactive concerts for the Four Seasons Chamber Music Festival, Children’s Residency, at Eastern Carolina University. Most recently her work as a teaching artist brought her to Israel, leading a seminar on interactive concerts at the International String Seminar at Mizra. As Outreach Coordinator for Concertante, Ms. Shapiro creates original curriculum and interactive concerts for a wide range of age ranges, from elementary to adult, which she leads across the countryMs. Shapiro is a co-founder of MishMash Music Company LLC, which presents non-traditional, audience interactive concerts for adult audiences. Most recently MishMash was performed at the Rato Bangala School in Kathmandu, Nepal, where Ms. Shapiro was a guest teacher and trainer in the summer months. Ms. Shapiro’s chamber music performances include appearances with The Daedalus Quartet, The Avalon Quartet and The Jerusalem Trio. She has been a regular performer at The Next Generation Festival, and other festival appearances include The K'far Blum Chamber Music Festival, The Ravinia Institute for Young Artists, Aspen, Mozarteum Summer Academy, and IMS Prussia Cove. Ms. Shapiro received her Bachelors of Music degree from The Juilliard School in 1999, and her Masters of Music in 2000. Ms. Shapiro continued her post- graduate work in 2002 in Berlin, Germany with the support of a Frank Huntington Beebe Grant, where she was the only American student under the tutelage of Tabea Zimmermann.

Find out more at www.rsviola.com.

Xiao-Dong Wang

wangxd@concertante.org

Violinist Xiao-Dong Wang entered the Shanghai Conservatory of Music at the age of ten. Mr. Wang won the First Prize in the Menuhin International Violin Competition and the First Prize in the Wieniawski-Lipinski International Violin Competition at the ages of thirteen and fifteen. He was brought to the attention of Dorothy DeLay of The Juilliard School who arranged for him to begin a four-year scholarship beginning in 1986. Mr. Wang has soloed with orchestras around the world, including the Royal Philharmonic in London, the London Mozart Players, Adelaide, Perth, Queensland Symphony Orchestras, Sydney Opera Orchestra. He has recorded the Bartok Concerto No.2 and Szymanowski Concerto No.1 for Polygram records. He has also appeared performing on both violin and viola in chamber music concerts at Lincoln Center, Kennedy Center, Aspen, Ravinia and in many other festival and musical events worldwide.