Born in Shanghai, raised in Houston, and currently living in Berlin, American violinist and composer Luke Hsu (ARAM - Associate at the Royal Academy of Music) has an artistic philosophy that eschews borders. Believing in the power of art to transcend the boundaries of one’s lived experience, he draws on his passions for history, culture, and folk music in crafting his interpretations, and champions music of our time as enthusiastically as that of the past. Luke’s performances have been critically praised around the world, most recently by the critics from his Warsaw Philharmonic debut as “playing with perfect technique” and from Seen and Heard International as “jaw-dropping.” Highlights of his 2026 season include debuts at the Muziekgebouw and Concertgebouw.
Luke maintains an active performing schedule as a soloist and a chamber musician. Currently, he is bringing the complete Paganini 24 Caprices to halls across Europe and the US, garnering critical acclaim everywhere. He has appeared as a soloist at Carnegie Hall, Wigmore Hall, Elbphilharmonie, Windsor Castle, Kennedy Center, Herkulessaal, Philharmonie Berlin, BOZAR, and many others. He has soloed with numerous renowned orchestras from around the world, and worked closely with eminent conductors such as Leonard Slatkin, Pascal Verrot, Nikolaj Znaider, Hugh Wolff, Cristian Macelaru and Jean-Jacques Kantarow. He has also played for royalty around the world including His Royal Highness The Duke of Edinburgh Prince Edward and Her Majesty Queen Mathilde of Belgium.
In addition to his solo appearances, Luke is a devoted and passionate chamber musician. With four other Berlin-based musicians, Luke is a founding member of Tonhain Kollektiv, an exciting chamber music society based in Berlin. He is also a founding member of the Goethe Quartet. In addition, he has collaborated with luminaries such as Itamar Golan, Cho-Liang Lin, Gil Shaham, Marc-Andre Hamelin, Peter Frankl, and Colin Carr. His festival appearances include Verbier, Gstaad, Presteigne, Romsey, La Jolla SummerFest, Wieniawski, Music@Menlo, and Yellow Barn. Luke is also regularly invited to Prussia Cove Open Chamber Music.
A laureate of the Queen Elisabeth competition, Luke has won prizes at many of the most prestigious violin competitions in the world. He won the Bronze Medal, the Bach Prize, and the Mozart Sonata Prize at the 10th Quadrennial International Violin Competition of Indianapolis and the 1st prize at the ISANGYUN Competition. Luke has been consistently lauded for his interpretations of Mozart, receiving another special prize for them at the Wieniawski Competition. His other major prizes have come from the Nielsen, Wieniawski, Michael Hill, and Paganini competitions.
As a teacher, Luke gives frequent masterclasses at the Royal Academy of Music in London. He was recently selected as an Associate of the Royal Academy of Music (ARAM) for his significant contributions to the music profession. He currently plays on a rare violin made by Francesco Gobetti, circa 1710.
Violinist Ann Miller creates programs that invite audiences to discover new sound worlds and experience time in unexpected ways. Her performances emphasize color, texture, and nuance, drawing listeners into immersive musical experiences where performers and audiences exchange energy in the moment. Her recital programs reflect this spirit of exploration, pairing contemporary voices such as Kaija Saariaho and Reena Esmail with masterworks by Ravel, Ysaÿe, Barber, and Beethoven.
As a soloist and chamber musician, Miller has performed internationally with appearances including the Filarmonica de Stat Dinu Lipatti in Romania, the Ahwahnee Hotel in Yosemite National Park, the Roaring Hooves Music Festival in Mongolia, and the Chamber Music America National Conference in New York City.
Described by Strings magazine as offering "splendid playing," Miller and her colleagues in Trio 180 have commissioned and premiered fourteen new works. To celebrate the ensemble's twentieth anniversary, the trio commissioned five composers—including Richard Einhorn, Reinaldo Moya, and Dorothy Chang—to create works inspired by the triangle, the concept behind the ensemble's name. Beyond performance, Trio 180 develops customized residencies for presenters, students, and communities and has collaborated with composers and musicologists on interdisciplinary projects exploring feminist perspectives and the creative process.
Miller is particularly drawn to the immediacy of live performance—the heightened focus, spontaneity, and emotional vulnerability that arise when performers and audiences experience music together in real time. Her current projects include performances of works by Beethoven, Kaija Saariaho, and Amanda Maier, as well as presentations on Breaking Bad Habits: Tools for Helping String Students Build Healthy Techniques.
Recognized for her capitvating spirit and “ability to move from soft and sultry to all around smiles” - Dame Myra Hess Concert Series, violist Arianna Smith, emerged as a vibrant young artist at prestigious venues such as the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., the Walt Disney Hall in Los Angeles, Symphony Center and Harris Theater in Chicago, as well as the Chicago Cultural Center in a live broadcast from the Preston Bradley Hall on the National Public Radio (NPR). After several years on the American stage, she moved to France to continue her musical evolution and has since been invited to perform at the Philharmonie de Paris, the Paris National Opera, Salle Gaveau, Salle Cortot, the studio 104 from Radio France and the Flagey and Bozar in Brussels.
In the United States, you can hear Arianna’s performances featured on National Public Radio’s “From the Top,” WFMT’s “Live from WFMT” and “Introductions,” as well as KUSC’s “Sundays Live Program from LACMA.” She has equally been featured on the French radio show, “Générations France Musique” in solo and chamber appearances. As an avid chamber musician, Arianna has performed with world-renowned artists such as Steven Isserlis, Christian Tetzlaff, Vadim Repin, the Ébene Quartet, James Galway, Emmanuel Pahud, Arnold Steinhardt, and Paul Coletti. As a soloist she has participated in festivals such as the Verbier Academy, the Perlman Music Program, Krzyzowa International festival, and the Kronberg Academy.
Arianna founded the award-winning Mona Quartet in 2018, which was an all-female quartet focused on highlighting female composers. She spent two years as artist-in-residence at the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel andVilla Musica Rheinland-Pfalzafter the obtention of her masters degree from the Paris Conservatory of Music and Dance with Jean Sulem and one year in the National Paris Opera Academy. Preceding her move to Europe in 2014, she received her bachelor’s degree from the Colburn School of music in Los Angeles under the tutelage of Paul Coletti. Arianna began her journey in Chicago with the incredible pedagogues Roland and Almita Vamos and their assistant, Marko Dreher, whom she considers her musical family.
Praised for his “tone that moves effortlessly between elegance and fire” (Westfälische Nachrichten), cellist Rainer Crosett is quickly establishing himself as one of the most creative and versatile musicians of his generation. Equally at home as a soloist, chamber musician, and orchestral leader, he appears on the most renowned stages throughout Europe and North America, including Wigmore Hall, Carnegie Hall, the Concertgebouw, and the Elbphilharmonie Hamburg.
After winning the Pierre Fournier Award in London, Rainer made his recital debut at Wigmore Hall and his concerto debut with the Philharmonia Orchestra of London. As recipient of the American Recital Debut Award, given in memory of Lynn Harrell, he makes his New York recital debut at Carnegie’s Weill Hall in Spring 2026. His recent concerto appearances also include a debut with the Houston Symphony.
A passionate chamber musician, Rainer has performed at the Rheingau Musik Festival, Yellow Barn, Ravinia, Grachtenfestival, Romsey Chamber Music Festival, HearAndNow Festival Amsterdam, Miesbach Kammermusikfestival, Zürich Chamber Music Society, Prussia Cove Open Chamber Music, Éole en Musiques, Mayfest Cornell, Music@Menlo, and La Jolla SummerFest, among others. He has collaborated with renowned artists such as Robert Levin, the Neue Vocalsolisten Stuttgart, the Parker Quartet, Anthony Marwood, Donald and Vivian Weilerstein, and Kim Kashkashian. Recent recitals include performances at Manchester’s Bridgewater Hall, Oxford May Music, the Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concerts in Chicago, and the Roman River Festival. Also in demand as an orchestral leader, he regularly appears as guest principal cellist with Amsterdam Sinfonietta, the Oslo Philharmonic, and the Dresdner Philharmonie.
Rainer is deeply committed to contemporary music and interdisciplinary projects. He has worked closely with leading composers including Jörg Widmann, Chaya Czernowin, and Lei Liang, and as cellist of the Goethe String Quartet, he has commissioned new works from Eun Young Lee, William Cooper, and Reinaldo Moya, and served as Artist-in-Residence at Yellow Barn. He is also co-founder of Tonhain Kollektiv, a Berlin-based chamber music society acclaimed for its inventive programming. With Tonhain, Rainer has explored music’s relationship to technology through the opening season Machine Counterpoint, and art as protest through the second season, RESIST! The Sound of Defiance.
An enthusiastic educator, he has given masterclasses at London’s Royal Academy of Music, the International Cello Institute, the University of California – Irvine, and Amsterdam’s HearAndNow Festival.
Rainer holds an M.M. from New England Conservatory and an A.B. magna cum laude in Philosophy from Harvard, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa as a junior and named a John Harvard Scholar. Also during his time at Harvard, he was the recipient of the Lucy Allen Paton Prize, the Thomas T. Hoopes Prize, and an Artist Development Fellowship. He later earned an Artist Diploma at USC Thornton School of Music and pursued further graduate studies at the Universität der Künste Berlin, supported by a Frank Huntington Beebe Fund Grant. His principal mentors include Jens Peter Maintz, Ralph Kirshbaum, Paul Katz, and Mark Churchill, with additional guidance from David Geringas, Frans Helmerson, Steven Isserlis, Yo-Yo Ma, Laurence Lesser, Bernard Greenhouse, and Gary Hoffman.
Beyond his musical career, Rainer is a dedicated advocate for human rights and social change, particularly in North Korea. He has worked with Citizens' Alliance for North Korean Human Rights in Seoul and presented fundraising concerts in both the U.S. and South Korea to support humanitarian projects.
Recognized by Musical America as one of the most innovative people in classical music, clarinetist Benjamin Mitchell is the founder and president of the Kaleidoscope Chamber Orchestra. Originally from California and currently based in Dublin Ireland, Benjamin maintains an active performing and teaching career while leading Kaleidoscope’s artistic planning, fundraising, marketing, and other administrative needs. Benjamin’s work has also been praised by ABC News, KUSC Radio, Los Angeles Times, Performance Today, San Francisco Classical Voice, Symphony Magazine, and the Washington Post.
In addition to performing in major venues such as Carnegie Hall, Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Tonhalle Zürich, Walt Disney Concert Hall, and Wigmore Hall, Benjamin has performed regularly at the Lucerne Festival for over a decade, working with composers including George Benjamin, Liza Lim, Matthias Pintscher, Unsuk Chin, and Pierre Boulez. Benjamin co-curated Lucerne’s inaugural Forward Festival, performed in the Lucerne Festival Contemporary Orchestra, and served on the faculty of the Lucerne Festival Academy. Benjamin has also collaborated with other organizations including the Aspen Music Festival, Donaueschinger Musiktage, Eighth Blackbird, Ensemble intercontemporain, Enso String Quartet, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Houston Symphony, Nash Ensemble, National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland, Riot Ensemble, Royal Opera House, and the Thy Kammermusik Festival.
To provide new opportunities for composers, Benjamin organized Kaleidoscope’s call for scores, which received thousands of applications from composers in over 90 countries and created the world’s largest open access library of contemporary music in partnership with UCLA Library. Benjamin has also worked to expand the classical music repertoire with commissions from composers including Adam Schoenberg, Alyssa Weinberg, Anna Clyne, Augusta Read Thomas, Chiayu Hsu, Christopher Cerrone, Danny Clay, Donald Crocket, Emma O’Halloran, Gabriella Smith, Hannah Lash, Julia Adolphe, Krists Auznieks, Libby Larsen, Melinda Wagner, Natalie Dietterich, Pamela Z, Peter Shin, Viet Cuong, and Will Healy.
Benjamin received his bachelor’s degree from the University of California at Los Angeles and holds graduate degrees from Rice University, Indiana University, Zürcher Hochschule der Künste, University of Southern California, and the Royal Academy of Music. Benjamin is also a certified teacher of the Alexander Technique and has taught privately and through workshops at the Colburn School, Lucerne Festival Academy, Oberlin Conservatory, Technische Universität Berlin, University of the Pacific, University of Southern California, and the University of Wisconsin at Eau Claire.
Raised in British Columbia and California’s Bay Area, pianist Andrew Zhou has been noted for his “great sensitivity” and “luminous technique” (Anaclase), as well as performances of “extraordinary energy” whose “sonic range and expressive power stun under his steely fingers” (ResMusica). He is the second-prize laureate at the Concours International de Piano d’Orléans, where he garnered four special awards. Mr. Zhou works closely with today’s leading composers, including Unsuk Chin, Liza Lim, and Walter Zimmermann, having performed significant national premieres of their works. He has also been the dedicatee and first performer of countless works by a generation of young composers. Appearances in major venues include the KKL (Switzerland), Tongyeong Concert Hall (Korea), and the Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord (Paris) and commissioning grants have been awarded by the Arts Council of Ireland and the Fromm Foundation.
Polymathic in temperament, Mr. Zhou composes, improvises, and opines on sundry topics intersecting the musical, social, and literary, frequently on Zhouology, his Substack newsletter. Alongside contemporary works, he specializes in late 19th-/early 20th-century French music, much of which is neglected today. He is a fierce proponent of recovering historically erased works, while his performances make the most experimental and complex scores accessible to audiences. He is a core member of New York-based PinkNoise and the half of the piano duo HereNowHear, which commissions boundary-breaking repertoire in orbit of Stockhausen’s Mantra. Recent albums include “sedgeflowers | MANTRA” and “Présences Lointaines” (Solstice). From 2021 to 2023, he curated and coached as a Contemporary Leader for the Lucerne Festival Academy (Switzerland).
Mr. Zhou is Assistant Teaching Professor at Syracuse University and teaches at Cornell University. Primary teachers include Xak Bjerken, Bruce Brubaker, and Thomas Schultz, alongside influential work with Teresa Dybvig, Françoise Thinat, Pierre-Laurent Aimard, and Tamara Stefanovich. A graduate of Stanford University, New England Conservatory, and Cornell, where he earned his doctorate, he has studied nine languages (and speaks six to varying degrees of adeptness). Called a “surrealophile” in Natan Last’s Across the Universe, a history of crosswords, his puzzles have appeared in the New York Times.
Taiwanese-American pianist Yvonne Chen performs across the US as a solo recitalist, chamber music collaborator, and orchestral musician. Recent collaborators and presenters include the Grand Teton Music Festival, Houston Symphony Orchestra, WindSync, MUSIQA, Monarch Chamber Players, River Oaks Chamber Orchestra, Music in Context, DACAMERA, and Houston Chamber Choir. In Houston, upon receiving the 2017 Presser Graduate Music Award at Rice University, she co-founded Loop38, whose concerts have been featured in Houstonia Magazine, Houston CityBook, Arts and Culture TX, and the Houston Chronicle.
Originally from the Washington, DC area, Chen received degrees in piano performance from the Juilliard School and graduated with a doctoral degree from Rice University's Shepherd School of Music in December 2019. Chen is co-founder of Pipe and Key, a piano-organ duo with organist Yuri McCoy, and has been on the piano faculty of St. John's School since 2017.
Bobby Ge* (b. 1996) is an American-born, Shanghai-raised composer and media artist whose work engages with themes of communication, home, and hybridity. Described as “expressive and gripping” (Financial Times), “wondrously subtle… shimmeringly lovely” (Joshua Kosman), and “exciting, frenzied, unpredictable” (CityNews CBR), his work is filled with glittery textures and restless motion, often undergirded by a wry sense of humor.
Winner of the Barlow Prize, Ge has completed a diverse array of projects ranging from experimental short films to large-scale orchestral commissions. Major works include a violin concerto for Keila Wakao and the Albany Symphony, a surrealist, multimedia work for Alarm Will Sound, a song for soprano, ensemble, and electronics premiered by Mind on Fire, and a saxophone concertino for the US Navy Band.
The 2026-27 season sees several notable highlights, including a new work for the Orchestra of St. Luke’s as a DeGaetano Fellow, a performance by Alarm Will Sound at the legendary Beethovenfest Bonn, the premiere of an electroacoustic work for pianist Eunbi Kim, the premiere of a new chamber work for fivebyfive, and new string quartets for the Orange Road Quartet and the Ulysses Quartet. Further projects include new works for So Percussion, Longleash, Pathos Trio, and the Bergamot Quartet. Past engagements include performances with the San Francisco Ballet Orchestra, Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra, the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, the New England Philharmonic, the US Army Band, ~nois, icarus Quartet, the Second Ending Ensemble, violinist Clara Kim, Sputter Box, Modern Medieval Voices, Third Angle New Music, Mycelium New Music, and the Aruna Quartet.
In previous years, Ge has received fellowships from the MATA Festival, the Bang on a Can Summer Festival, the Minnesota Orchestra Composer Institute, and Copland House’s CULTIVATE program. He was the 2025-26 Sound Investment Composer-in-Residence of the Reno Chamber Orchestra, the 2023 Composer of the Year of the Sioux City Symphony, the inaugural recipient of the San Francisco Ballet’s Legacy Orchestral Composition Prize, the grand prize winner of the New York Youth Symphony’s Jon Deak First Music Commission, a winner of the Kaleidoscope Chamber Orchestra’s call for scores, and a winner of the Charles Ives Music Festival’s call for scores. Ge has received further recognition including two ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Awards (2024/26), a Society of Composers, Inc. Commission, a New Music USA Creator Development Grant, and the Ettelson Award. He was the recipient of a Copland House Residency and has held additional residencies at the Atlantic Center for the Arts, Millay Arts, and the Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts.
Ge is an avid collaborator and has had the good fortune of sharing his work with a growing list of presenters that ranges from the unorthodox - the Space Telescope Science Institute, the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, NJ Audubon - to the cutting edge of new music, including Beth Morrison Projects, the Attacca Quartet, Tribeca New Music, Music from Copland House, Khemia Ensemble, Tesla Quartet, Blackbox Ensemble, JACK Quartet, and the Kintsugi Quintet. His experimental short film You Have Entered the Public Domain has screened at film festivals including the Festival L'Europe autour de l'Europe, Focus Wales, Golden State Film Festival, and the Short. Sweet. Film Festival. A dedicated educator, Ge believes firmly in the value of the arts as an expressive and uniting force, and he has collaborated with numerous educational ensembles including the New York Youth Symphony, the Seattle Youth Symphony Orchestra, the Westside Chamber Players, and the St. Olaf Band.
He is currently pursuing his Ph.D at Princeton University, and holds degrees from the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University (M.M.) and the University of California, Berkeley (B.A.). His primary teachers include Donnacha Dennehy, Nathalie Joachim, Juri Seo, Dan Trueman, Tyondai Braxton, Kevin Puts, Harold Meltzer, and Cindy Cox.
*A note on pronunciation: please read Ge as ‘Jee’ in performance contexts. For those who are curious, though, the original Chinese - 戈 - is pronounced ‘G-uh’ with a hard G.
Christopher Thompson (He/Him/His), also known as “Master Christopher”, is a multi-disciplined performer-composer who creates innovative ways to blur the distinction between genres by merging contemporary art music, jazz, and percussion, with notated rap. He released his debut album “Music Desegregation”, which featured nine unique works spanning a plethora of musical styles and instruments while collaborating with over thirty artists and musicians. Performing in venues like the John Coltrane International Jazz and Blues festival in High Point NC, the Percussive Arts Society International Convention in Indianapolis, the Eurovision Song Contest in Dusseldorf Germany, and writing for ensembles like Alarm Will Sound, International Contemporary Ensemble, Bergamot Quartet, and the Cold Steel Drumline, he continually expounds on the porous limits of genre and creates intercultural music.
Originally from Greensboro, NC, Chris is now based in Philadelphia, PA. He is pursuing a Doctor of Musical Arts in Music Composition at the Peabody Conservatory of Johns Hopkins University. He also serves as Lecturer of Music for the City University of New York at Kingsborough Community College in Brooklyn. Chris previously taught as the director of percussion studies at High Point University, where he led a comprehensive percussion program. At HPU, Mr. Thompson directed the Panther Pulse Drumline and was the assistant conductor of the Wind Ensemble.
Thompson is passionate about community engagement and inclusive opportunities for music performance. He is the founder and director of Motivational Arts, Performance, and Sound (M.A.P.S.), a company that teaches vision through an inspirational performance of the arts. As a Motivational Performer, he presents an inspirational message in various community settings and encourages underrepresented groups to realize their dreams while experiencing a high level of the arts.
A proud Alumnus of an HBCU, Chris earned his bachelor’s degree from North Carolina A&T State University. There he marched for the Blue and Gold Marching Machine and served as Drum Captain for the internationally acclaimed Cold Steel Drumline. Chris also holds a master’s degree in Percussion Performance and a post-baccalaureate certificate in Jazz Studies from the University of North Carolina Greensboro School of Music, where he served as Principal Percussionist for the University Symphony Orchestra.
Christopher Thompson currently serves on the board of the Alliance of Black Orchestral Percussionists, is a member of the Percussive Arts Society New Music/Research committee, and is an Endorsed Artist for Marimba One and Black Swamp Percussion.
DAI WEI is originally from China. Her musical journey navigates in the spaces between East and West, classical and pop, electronic and acoustic, innovation and tradition. Her music often challenges the practice of labeling and delves into the untold narratives of social issues and obscured historical events from various communities, creating works with contemporary resonance and reflecting an introspection on how these multidimensional conflicts and tensions can create and inhabit worlds of their own. Being an experimental vocalist, she performs in the manner of Khoomei throat singing in her compositions, filtered through different experiences and backgrounds as a calling that transcends genres, races, and labels.
Described as “impassioned” by The New York Times, “with a striking humanity” by The Washington Post, and "incredibly creative and dynamic" by the Utah Symphony Orchestra, she was featured in The Washington Post’s “22 for 22’: Composers and Performers to Watch this year.” Dai Wei was awarded the CANOA Commission (Composing a New Orchestra Audience) from the American Composer Orchestra Underwood New Music Reading. Her piece for chamber orchestra, multi-channel voices, and electronics, Invisible Portals, co-commissioned by American Composers Orchestra, Michigan Philharmonic, Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, and River Oaks Chamber Orchestra, premiered at Carnegie Hall in March 2022, conducted by Marin Alsop.
Recent events include a multimedia work commissioned by Kronos Quartet and pipa virtuoso Wu Man for their 50th Anniversary Celebration, and two works for the Albany Symphony. Dai Wei is currently serving as Composer-in-Residence for Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra’s 2024-2025 Sound Investment Composer.
Her music has been commissioned and performed by ensembles including Minnesota Orchestra, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Utah Symphony Orchestra, New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, West Virginia Symphony Orchestra, Albany Symphony, Reno Philharmonic, Opéra Orchestre National Montpellier, the Philharmonia Orchestra, Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia, Curtis Symphony Orchestra, Bang on a Can, Alarm Will Sound, and Aizuri String Quartet. Her music has been broadcast by WRTI, Performance Today, WHYY, Shanghai Dragon Television, Radio Television Hong Kong, and Qinghai Television.
Dai Wei is currently pursuing her doctorate in Music Composition at Princeton University, where she holds a 2024-25 Procter Honorific Fellowship. She holds an Artist Diploma from the Curtis Institute of Music. After she finished her B.A. in Music Composition at the Xinghai Conservatory of Music in China, she came to the United States and earned an M.M. in Music Composition at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.