Lourdes has been blessed with amazing performance opportunities playing for celebrities, ambassadors, and on world-class stages. Most notably, last summer she was one of three cellists asked to play at the Kennedy Center for John Williams' 90th Birthday Party Dinner attended by Stephen Spielberg and David Rubenstein, Chairman of the National Symphony Orchestra (NSO) Board. In 2018, she played for the Aspen Institute's Project Play Summit's Private Dinner featuring Kobe Bryant. She has given concerts at the Embassies of Colombia, Argentina, and Brazil, played for private events for former Congresswoman Connie Morella, and at the US Senate to help promote the arts. 

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Her more recent performances range from playing at Carnegie Hall to a Handel's Messiah Concert in Pennsylvania where she played alongside David Chan, the Concertmaster of the Metropolitan Opera and Violin Professor at Juilliard. While a student at Oberlin Conservatory, Lourdes's quartet performed for Latin American ambassadors and high ranking government officials at the Inter-American Defense Board. They performed at Central Union Mission homeless shelter in DC and her quartet hosted a fundraiser concert for the Children's Inn of the National Institute of Health. 

In high school, Lourdes was an NSO Youth Fellow at the Kennedy Center where she performed several times in the NSO's Concert Hall and on the Millennium Stage. On behalf of the Kennedy Center's NSO in your Neighborhood Community Outreach Program, she brought music to DC schools. Among other opportunities, she played in a master class for world-famous Cello Soloist Alban Gerhardt. As part of The Capitol Symphonic Youth Orchestra, Lourdes performed in front of 17,00 people as the Principal Cellist at the Microsoft Inspire International Convention. 

Lourdes is now the Founder and Director of StringTime where she is fulfilling her dream of running a beginner strings camp that will inspire kids to learn to make beautiful music. She continues to teach privately both cello and piano while also studying cello with NSO Principal Cellist David Hardy and learning to play the Viola da Gamba with John Moran, the Historical Performance Chair at Peabody Conservatory.  

Emera has performed in renowned concert halls around the world including Carnegie Hall, David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center, Severance Hall, and the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing. She has served as the concertmaster for the Cleveland Institute of Music Orchestra and has won numerous solo and chamber competitions. 

Last November, she appeared by invitation as a featured soloist with the Cleveland Pops Orchestra, performing in Severance Hall to a sold-out audience. In the summer of 2015, Emera went on a multi-week tour to China and Hong Kong with the National Youth Orchestra of the USA. In 2021, the Cleveland Institute of Music sponsored her string quartet on a multi-state tour with Si-Yan Li and Phil Setzer.

Emera holds a Bachelor’s and a Master's Degree in Violin Performance from the Cleveland Institute of Music, where she studied with Stephen Rose, principal second violinist of the Cleveland Orchestra. This year, she was selected as a Substitute Violinist for the prestigious New World Symphony Orchestra. Emera is passionate about spreading her love for violin and especially chamber music. She has taught privately for years and has coached small ensemble masterclasses. 

Caitlyn is on a full ride violin scholarship at Mercer University’s Robert McDuffie Center for Strings where she studies with David Kim (Concertmaster of the Philadelphia Orchestra), Robert McDuffie (Grammy-nominated violinist), and Amy Schwartz-Moretti (award-winning chamber musician). 

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She has performed alongside The Piano Guys at the National Theater and with her string quartet at a private dinner for the Supreme Court Justices. She was a National Symphony Orchestra Youth Fellow where she performed multiple times on the Kennedy Center’s Millennium Stage. In 2019, She won the American Youth Philharmonic Orchestra Concerto Competition and performed as a soloist with the orchestra. 

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​Her passion lies in providing young musicians with the tools necessary to express themselves. She has developed the elementary strings program at First Presbyterian Day school and has a vibrant private studio of her own. 

Grace is currently pursuing her Master's Degree in Violin Performance from Stony Brook University, where she studies with renowned professor Phil Setzer of the Emerson String Quartet. She completed her undergraduate studies at Oberlin Conservatory on the Dean’s Scholarship. where she studied with Sibbi Bernhardsson. She was finalist in the Oberlin Conservatory Senior Concerto Competition, the school's most prestigious competition. 

At eleven years old, Grace was accepted into the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts, a highly competitive high school conservatory, where she then studied until graduating high school. She won the Greater New Orleans Youth Orchestra Concerto Competition and the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts Chamber Festival Competition. Grace has spent her summers studying at Boston University Tanglewood Institute, Madeline Island Chamber Music Festival, Green Mountain Chamber Music Festival, Interlochen Music Festival, Interharmony International Music Festival, and Philadelphia Music International Festival.

She has also performed in masterclasses for world-class violinists including Maurcio Fuks, Ronald Copes, and Rachel Barton Pine. She has studied viola with Kirsten Docter, former violist in the Cavani String Quartet. She has taught group class through the Northern Ohio Youth Orchestra and privately to non-music majors at Oberlin College.

Violinist Sarah Berger is passionate about orchestral performance and contemporary music. She is the newly appointed Principal Second Violin of the Fairfax Symphony Orchestra, and her previous leading positions include Concertmaster of Spoleto Festival USA, Concertmaster of Eastman Philharmonia, and Concertmaster of Brevard Music Center Orchestra. Sarah has frequently substituted with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, Alexandria Symphony, New World Symphony, and Colorado Symphony Orchestra, among which she has performed with soloists such as Augustin Hadelich, Renée Fleming, Alisa Weilerstein, and Jeremy Denk, and Joshua Bell.

As a fellow at Spoleto Festival USA, Sarah played in the world premiere of the Pulitzer Prize-winning opera, Omar, and sat Principal Second for the North American premiere of Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s AION. She has also premiered pieces with Mannes American Composers Ensemble, Eastman’s Ossia, Festival Napa Valley, and most recently, she performed chamber music alongside Eliot Fisk at the opening concert of Skaneateles Festival. Sarah has played in master classes with Augustin Hadelich, Andres Cardenes, Rachel Barton Pine, and Itamar Zorman. 

Sarah teaches private lessons at Opal Music Studio in Old Town Alexandria and leads strings classes through D.C. Music Academy. She works with the non-profit organization, A Musical Heart, which brings live music to patients in hospice. Sarah received her M.M. from Mannes School of Music, The New School, where she studied with Lewis Kaplan. 

She studied with Renée Jolles and received her B.M. from Eastman School of Music in 2018, graduating with the prestigious Performer’s Certificate.

Having his international solo debut at the age of 12, violinist/conductor Sasha Kandybin has been praised as a performer with “soulful bliss and charisma”, Cremona Nazionale. As a winner of numerous competitions including the Cremona International Violin Competition and the New Jersey Intergenerational Orchestra Competition, among others, he also performed Samuel Barber’s Violin Concerto with the Manhattan School of Music Philharmonic Orchestra as a winner of their concerto competition.

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Sasha has always been passionately involved in chamber music performance having participated and performed in prestigious chamber music festivals including the Manchester Music Festival as a fellowship performer. In 2019 he attended the NAC Young Artists Program working and performing intensely with Pinchas Zukerman. He also participated in the Music@Menlo chamber music festival where he performed with musicians of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. Throughout his undergraduate years at the Cleveland Institute of Music, Sasha was part of the Advanced String Quartet Seminar in the Elara Quartet, where they were invited to the prestigious McGill International String Quartet Academy as well as the Juilliard String Quartet seminar and performance series. During his high school years, Sasha received weekly tutelage and collaborated with the Emerson and Escher String Quartets. At MSM, he was part of an award winning piano quintet and performed at Carnegie Hall.

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As an orchestral performer, Sasha has been invited as a fellow to the Aspen Music Festival and the Music in the Mountains festival where he was concertmaster of the chamber orchestra. His role as a concertmaster extends throughout many ensembles including the Manhattan School of Music Symphony and Philharmonic, and Rice University’s Symphony Orchestra. Sasha was also concertmaster for NJYS when they won the Summa Cum Laude International Orchestral Competition, performing Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade, and Beethoven’s Coriolan Overture without a conductor. He has performed in venues throughout the world such as David Geffen Hall, New Jersey Performing Arts Center, all three stages of Carnegie Hall, Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington D.C., Smetana Hall in Prague, the Musikverein in Vienna, the Konzerthaus in Vienna, Bela Bartok Hall in Budapest, and many others.

Also an accomplished and aspiring conductor, Sasha studied orchestral conducting and orchestration with Jonathan Strasser at the Manhattan School of Music Pre-college, and served as an assistant conductor to the Pre-college Symphony under Nell Flanders. He continued his experience with mentorship and tutelage from Larry Rachleff and Donald Schleicher at Rice University, conducting in workshops with them throughout the country. In the summer of 2022, Sasha received a Festival Prize at the Monteux Festival for conducting a performance of Tchaikovsky’s Sixth Symphony.

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Sasha attended Rice University where he received a masters in violin performance studying with Paul Kantor, and received his bachelor degree in violin performance from the Cleveland Institute of Music where he studied with William Preucil, then concertmaster of The Cleveland Orchestra followed by Phil Setzer of the Emerson String Quartet and Jessica Lee of TCO as well.

Violist Claire Zogaib is currently pursuing graduate studies at the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University. Having grown up in Cleveland, OH, Claire received her Bachelor’s of Music from the Cleveland Institute of Music, where she met her husband, bassist Michael Zogaib. During her time in Cleveland, Claire collaborated as a chamber musician with the Cavani Quartet and members of the Cleveland Orchestra. A lover of contemporary music, Claire has premiered music of several composers, including performing with the CIM New Music Ensemble. In recent summers, Claire has been a fellow at the Aspen Music Festival and School. In 2016, she was a guest performer on NPR’s From The Top as a member of the Cleveland based Cecilia Octet. She is also a six time 2nd prizewinner of the Ohio Viola Society Competition. Claire is grateful to have learned from wonderful teachers including James Dunham, Jeffrey Irvine, Lynne Ramsey, Peter Slowik, and Laura Shuster.

Cellist Lydia Rhea is currently pursuing her graduate studies at Juilliard under Natasha Brofsky. She previously completed her Bachelor of Music degree at the Cleveland Institute of Music with Dr. Melissa Kraut where she received the Speilman Memorial Award for an exceptional cellist and the Kaplow Prize for Uncommon Creativity.

As a soloist, Lydia has performed with the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra and appeared on NPR’s From theTop with jazz pianist Fred Hersch, where she performed one of his original compositions in Boston’s Jordan Hall. In 2023, Lydia served as a member of the quartet-in-residence at the European American Musical Alliance Summer Institute in Paris. She previously attended the Sitka International Cello Seminar in Sitka, Alaska, in 2021 and 2022 where she studied intensively with renowned concert cellist Zuill Bailey on scholarship as the Gloria Miner Fellow. In 2019, Rhea was the youngest participant at the Festival de Ecoles d’Art Américaines de Fontainebleau where she was awarded the Prix Ravel Premier Prix and the Prix du Château de Fontainebleau.

Lydia, who has performed throughout the U.S. and Europe, is the Operations Manager of the Online Solo Strings Intensive and cofounder of the organization Hearing Home, dedicated to welcoming refugees and asylum seekers in New York City. You can learn more about her at @lydia_cello on Instagram. 

Sarah is a member of the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra. She received her Undergraduate and Master’s Performance degrees at Cleveland Institute of Music, as well as a minor in Suzuki Pedagogy and a Suzuki teaching certification. Sarah began studies at the age of four and was later trained in the Precollege division at the Manhattan School of Music. 

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In 2019, she won the “Getting To Carnegie” competition, where she not only had the opportunity to perform in Carnegie Hall, but also won a trip to the US Virgin Islands to give a concert tour. Sarah has also won prizes in the New York Music Competition, Tennessee Cello Workshop Competition, the Tuesday Musical Scholarship Competition, the Cleveland Cello Society Concerto Competition, and the Island Symphony Orchestra Young Artist Competition. Sarah performed as a soloist with the South Shore Symphony in New York.

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In 2021, Sarah released her debut album called “Hymns of Grace," a project that she worked on with her friends during the pandemic lockdown. She maintains a private studio of her own where she brings together her Suzuki training and performance experience to train the next generation of young cellists. 

Tatum Hodgson recently graduated from CIM and will be starting her graduate studies at the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University, studying with Desmond Hoebig.  Prior to starting her Bachelor of Music degree, Tatum Hodgson accumulated a breadth of chamber, orchestral, and solo experience as a freelance musician in Los Angeles. She was principal cellist in Claremont Young Musicians Orchestra (CYMO) and held a position in the American Youth Symphony. Tatum won CYMO’s concerto competition, performing Tchaikovsky’s Rococo Variations on their 30th anniversary concert. She also won the baroque concerto competition at Indiana University’s String Academy and performed with orchestra on the final gala. Tatum has won first place in ASTA solo recital, MTAC’s VOCE, and Satori Strings competitions, among others.

She has attended music programs all over the U.S. and Internationally. Most recently, she won a fellowship position with Aspen Music Festival and School, Britt Festival Orchestra and the AIMS opera orchestra in Graz, Austria. Tatum was in the Advanced String Quartet program at CIM and won first place at Glass City Chamber Music Competition with her quartet. She teaches privately and plays for The Cleveland Ballet Orchestra, Canton symphony, and other regional orchestras in the Cleveland area.
 

Tatum has had extensive training in cello pedagogy with Tanya Carey, Abbey Hansen, and Carey Beth Hocket. She teaches private cello lessons with a focus on excellence and fun. In her private studio, Tatum is passionate about sharing her love for learning, following Suzuki’s philosophy that every child can learn at a high ability given excellent training. Tatum is dedicated to life-long professional development in her performance career as well as teaching methods so that she can provide the highest-level training to her students.

Lake Stiles is an accomplished guitarist and composer. He has performed at the Kennedy Center (Washington, DC), Veles e Vents (Valencia, ES), Epcot at Walt Disney World (Bay Lake, FL), and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (Cleveland, OH).

He plays regularly in orchestra pits for musicals. His most recent shows are Head Over Heels, The Addams Family, Little Shop of Horrors, Shrek The Musical, The Wedding Singer, Bye Bye Birdie, Seussical, Newsies, and Zombie Prom.

He holds a Bachelors of Music with a minor in Music Technology from Berklee College of Music and a Certificate in Audio Recording and Production from Sonoma State University.

Alejandro Villareal is a musician, educator, and multi-instrumentalist in Northern Virginia. Alejandro has a love for performing and teaching music, he has played countless recitals, social gatherings, restaurants, concert halls and weddings throughout the Philadelphia, New York, and DMV areas. As a private instructor, his goal is to share his knowledge and utilize his experience as a musician to curate an individual teaching approach for each and every student, at any age. Alejandro holds a bachelor’s degree in Jazz Studies from Temple University.