Sunday, April 26, 2026, at 4 pm

Program

JIJI is an adventurous guitarist known for her virtuosity and command of diverse repertoire. Equally at home with both acoustic and electric guitar, her concert programs range from traditional and contemporary classical to free improvisation. In recent seasons, JIJI has presented solo recitals at Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall; Lincoln Center; 92nd Street Y; Caramoor; Green Music Center; and the National Art Gallery, among other distinguished venues. Her performances have been featured on PBS (On Stage at Curtis), NPR’s From the Top, WHYY-TV, FOX 4-TV, Munchies (the Vice Channel), The Not So Late Show (Channel 6, Kansas), and Hong Kong broadcast station RTHK’s The Works. In 2016, she became the first guitarist in 30 years to secure first prize in the Concert Artists Guild Competition.

JIJI has premiered solo and chamber works by a diverse range of musical artists, including David Lang, Steven Mackey, Michael Gilbertson, Paul Lansky, Natalie Dietterich, Hilary Purrington, Shelley Washington, Kate Moore, Chris Rountree, Gulli Björnsson, and Molly Joyce. JIJI’s recent chamber and ensemble performances include appearances with the New York Philharmonic’s Nightcap Series; Cuarteto Latinoamericano; the Verona Quartet; Wildup; Duo Linu; and violinist Danbi Um , among others. She has also appeared as a soloist with the American Composers Orchestra; Kansas City Symphony; Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra; Sinfonietta Riga; the Augusta Symphony; the Duluth Symphony Orchestra; New West Symphony; New York Youth Symphony; Southwest Michigan Symphony; and more. Over the last five years, JIJI has premiered four major concertos by composers Natalie Dietterich (LIGHT, BELOVED, 2018), Hilary Purrington (Harp of Nerves, 2019), Krists Auznieks (Apvārsnis Kamolā, 2021), and Steven Mackey (Aluminum Flowers, 2024).

She is an Associate Professor of Guitar at Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, and has presented master classes and workshops extensively, including at the Peabody Institute, Yale University, and Dublin’s National Concert Hall, among many others.

Danbi Um is a Menuhin International Violin Competition Silver Medalist and winner of the prestigious 2018 Salon de Virtuosi Career Grant. She showcases her artistry in concertos, solo recitals, and in collaboration with distinguished chamber musicians.

Ms. Um’s recent and upcoming engagements include appearances with the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia (Kimmel Center), Ridgewood Symphony, and her Washington D.C. recital debut at the Phillips Collection.

An avid chamber musician, Ms. Um returns to Chamber Music San Francisco, the Society of Four Arts in Palm Beach, Chamber Music Society of Fort Worth, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center for both national and international tours. Ms. Um’s chamber music collaborators have included Anthony Marwood, Vadim Gluzman, Pamela Frank, Cho-Liang Lin, Paul Neubauer, Frans Helmerson, David Finckel, David Shifrin, Wu Han, and Gilbert Kalish. A recording artist for Avie Records, Ms.Um’s debut album, Much Ado: Romantic Violin Masterworks, was released worldwide in fall of 2023.

In 2018, Ms. Um made her New York recital debut at Lincoln Center presented by the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. After winning the 2014 Music Academy of the West Competition, Ms. Um made her concerto debut in the Walton Violin Concerto with the Festival Orchestra, conducted by Joshua Weilerstein.

Born in 1990 in Seoul, South Korea, Ms. Um began violin lessons at the age of three. In 2000, she moved to the United States to study at the Curtis Institute of Music, where she earned a Bachelor’s degree. She also holds an Artist Diploma from Indiana University. She plays a 1683 “ex-Petschek” Nicolo Amati violin, on loan from a private collection.

Sunday, March 22, 2026, at 4 pm

Location Change

Please note the change of venue for this concert only: Wilton Presbyterian Church, 48 New Canaan Road, Wilton.

Program

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: String Quartet in G major, K387
Caroline Shaw: Plan & Elevation
Maurice Ravel: String Quartet in F

The Tesla Quartet is known the world over for their “superb capacity to find the inner heart of everything they play, regardless of era, style, or technical demand” (The International Review of Music). From cutting edge contemporary works to established masterpieces, the Tesla Quartet’s emotive and thoughtful interpretations reveal the ensemble’s deep commitment to the craft and to their ever-expanding repertoire. The quartet recognizes the power of their platform to amplify underrepresented voices and to encourage the proliferation of an equitable and just future for society as well as a hospitable climate for posterity.

The quartet performs regularly across North America and Europe, with recent highlights including their debut at New York’s Lincoln Center, a return to London’s Wigmore Hall, and performances at Stanford University’s Bing Concert Hall as winners of the prestigious John Lad Prize. Other recent international engagements include tours of Brazil, China, and South Korea. Notable festival appearances include the Banff Centre International String Quartet Festival; the Joseph Haydn String Quartet Festival at the Esterházy Palace in Fertőd, Hungary; the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festival in Germany; and the Festival Sesc de Música de Câmara in São Paulo, Brazil.

The Quartet commissioned 12 works by composers from across North America in 2020 for their online series Alternating Currents, an homage to Beethoven and a celebration of diverse voices. Tesla Quartet has also helped pioneer ImmerSphere, an immersive augmented reality virtual concert experience, bringing familiar community stages directly into the homes of concert-starved audiences. With renewed hope for a brighter future, the Tesla Quartet is focusing its efforts in the coming seasons on inspiring climate action with the commissions of several works for string quartet that touch on different aspects of the climate crisis and recovery.

The group originally formed at The Juilliard School in 2008 and quickly established itself as one of the most promising young ensembles in New York, winning Second Prize at the J.C. Arriaga Chamber Music Competition only a few months after its inception. From 2009 to 2012, the quartet held a fellowship as the Graduate String Quartet-in-Residence at the University of Colorado-Boulder, where they studied with the world-renowned Takács Quartet. They have also held fellowships at the Aspen Music Festival’s Center for Advanced Quartet Studies, the Britten-Pears Young Artist Program, and the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival.

The Tesla Quartet is Ross Snyder (violin), Michelle Lie (violin), Edwin Kaplan (viola), and Austin Fisher (cello).

Sunday, October 12, 2025

Program

Ludwig von Beethoven: Trio, Op. 11
Nino Rota (1973): Trio
Johannes Brahms: Trio, Op. 114

Upon receiving Chamber Music America’s Richard J. Bogomolny National Service Award in 2018, an award recognizing an individual who has provided historic service to the chamber music field, David Shifrin announced the formation of a new trio with the distinguished cellist Peter Wiley, and the rising star pianist Anna Polonsky. The Polonsky-Shifrin-Wiley Trio made its debut at Dumbarton Oaks in February 2019.

Pianist Anna Polonsky is widely in demand as a soloist and chamber musician. She has appeared with the Moscow Virtuosi, the Buffalo Philharmonic, the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, the Columbus Symphony Orchestra, the Memphis Symphony, the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia, the St. Luke’s Chamber Ensemble, and many others. Ms. Polonsky has collaborated with the Guarneri, Shanghai, and Juilliard Quartets, and with such musicians as Mitsuko Uchida, Yo-Yo Ma, Richard Goode, Emanuel Ax, Arnold Steinhardt, Michael Tree, and Jaime Laredo. Anna Polonsky made her solo piano debut at the age of seven at the Special Central Music School in Moscow, Russia. She emigrated to the United States in 1990 and attended high school at the Interlochen Arts Academy in Michigan. She received her Bachelor of Music diploma from The Curtis Institute of Music under the tutelage of the renowned pianist Peter Serkin, and continued her studies with Jerome Lowenthal, earning her master’s degree from the Juilliard School. In addition to performing, she serves on the piano faculty of Vassar College, and in the summer at the Marlboro and Kneisel Hall chamber music festivals.

A Yale University faculty member since 1987, clarinetist David Shifrin is artistic director of Yale’s Chamber Music Society series and Yale in New York, a concert series at Carnegie Hall. He has performed with the Chamber Music Society since 1982 and served as its artistic director from 1992 to 2004. He continues as artistic director of Chamber Music Northwest in Portland, Oregon, a post he has held since 1981. He has collaborated with the Guarneri, Tokyo, and Emerson quartets, and frequently performs with pianist André Watts. Winner of the Avery Fisher Prize, he is also the recipient of a Solo Recitalist Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. A top prize winner in competitions throughout the world, including Munich, Geneva, and San Francisco, he has held principal clarinet positions in The Cleveland Orchestra and the American Symphony under Leopold Stokowski.

Cellist Peter Wiley enjoys a prolific career as a performer and teacher. He attended the Curtis Institute at just 13 years of age, under the tutelage of David Soyer, and continued his impressive youthful accomplishments with his appointment as principal cellist of the Cincinnati Symphony at age 20, after one year in the Pittsburgh Symphony. From 1987 through 1998, Mr. Wiley was cellist of the Beaux Arts Trio, with which he performed over a thousand concerts, including appearances with many of the world’s greatest orchestras. He succeeded his mentor, David Soyer, as cellist of the Guarneri Quartet from 2001 until the quartet retired from the concert stage in 2009. Awarded an Avery Fisher Career Grant, Peter Wiley was also nominated for a Grammy Award in 1998 with the Beaux Arts Trio and in 2009 with the Guarneri Quartet. He is currently on the faculty of the Curtis Institute of Music and the Bard College Conservatory of Music.