2026 Guest Artists

Alexander Kobrin · Asiya Korepanova · Jeffrey Langford · Agnes Maurer · Simon Maurer · Ning Mu · Joanne Polk · American String Quartet

“He surrendered neither the smoothness nor the dynamic fluidity that the modern piano allows, and he gave his sense of fantasy free rein, and creating an almost confessional spirit ." — The New York Times Called the “Van Cliburn of today” by the BBC, pianist Alexander Kobrin has placed himself at the forefront of today's performing musicians. His prize winning performances have been praised for their brilliant technique, musicality, and emotional engagement with the audience. The New York Times has written that Mr. Kobrin was a “fastidious guide” to Schumann’s “otherworldly visions, pointing out hunters, flowers, haunted corners and friendly bowers, all captured in richly characterized vignettes.” “This was a performance that will be revered and remembered as a landmark of the regeneration of exceptional classical music in Central New York.”-critic wrote after Mr. Kobrin’s performance of Second Piano Concerto by Johannes Brahms with Syracuse Symphony in Syracuse,NY.

In 2005, Mr. Kobrin was awarded the Nancy Lee and Perry R. Bass Gold Medal at the Twelfth Van Cliburn International Piano Competition in Fort Worth, TX. His numerous successes in competitions also include top prizes at the Busoni International Piano Competition (First Prize), Hamamatsu International Piano Competition (Top Prize), Scottish International Piano Competition in Glasgow (First Prize)

Mr. Kobrin has performed with many of the world’s great orchestras including the New York Philharmonic, Tokyo Philharmonic, Russian National Orchestra, Belgrade Philharmonic, English Chamber Orchestra, Orchestra Verdi, Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, Moscow Philharmonic, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Dallas Symphony, Berliner Symphony, Chicago Sinfonietta, Swedish Radio Symphony, Birmingham Symphony, Warsaw Philharmonic and the BBC Symphony Orchestra. He has collaborated with such conductors as Mikhail Pletnev, Mikhail Jurovsky, Mark Elder, Vassiliy Sinaisky, James Conlon, Claus Peter Flor, Alexander Lazarev, Vassiliy Petrenko and Yuri Bashmet.

He has appeared in recital at major halls worldwide, including Carnegie Zankel Hall and Avery Fisher Hall in New York, the Kennedy Centre in Washington, Albert Hall and Wigmore Hall in London, Louvre Auditorium,Salle Gaveau and Salle Cortot in Paris, Munich Herkulesaal and Berliner Filarmonia Hall in Germany, the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatoire, Sheung Wan Civic Centre in Hong Kong, as well as Sala Verdi in Milan and many others. Other past performances have included recitals at Bass Hall for the Cliburn Series, the Washington Performing Arts Society, La Roque d'Antheron, the Ravinia Festival, the Beethoven Easter Festival, Busoni Festival , the renowned Klavier-Festival Ruhr, the Festival Musique dans le Grésivaudan ,the International Keyboard Institute & Festival, annual concert tours in Japan, China and Taiwan.

Though widely acclaimed as a performer, Mr. Kobrin’s teaching has been an inspiration to many students through his passion for music. From 2003 to 2010 he served on the faculty of the Russian State Gnessin’s Academy of Music. In 2010 Alexander Kobrin was named the L. Rexford Distinguished Chair in Piano at the Schwob School of Music at Columbus State University, and since 2013 until 2017 has been a member of the celebrated Artist Faculty of New York University’s Steinhardt School. In July 2017, Mr.Kobrin has joined the faculty of the renowned Eastman School of Music in Rochster,NY. Mr. Kobrin has also given masterclasses in Europe and Asia, the International Piano Series and at the Conservatories of Japan and China.
Mr. Kobrin has been a jury member for many international piano competitions, including the Busoni International Piano Competition in Bolzano,Hamamatsu International Piano Competion, the Blüthner International Piano Competition in Vienna, E-Competition in Fairbanks, AK and the Neuhaus International Piano Festival in Moscow.

Mr. Kobrin has released recordings on the Harmonia Mundi, Quartz, and Centaur labels, covering a wide swath of the piano literature. His Schumann album,released on Centaur Records has been included into top-5 albums of the year in 2015 by Fanfare Magazine. Gramophone Magazine raved about his Cliburn Competition release on Harmonia Mundi, writing that “in [Rachmaninoff’s] Second Sonata (played in the 1931 revision), despite fire-storms of virtuosity, there is always room for everything to tell and Kobrin achieves a hypnotic sense of the music’s dark necromancy.”

Mr. Kobrin was born in 1980 in Moscow. At the age of five, he was enrolled in the world-famous Gnessin Special School of Music after which he attended the prestigious Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatoire. His teachers have included renowned professors Tatiana Zelikman and Lev Naumov.

The pianist who performed the complete Rachmaninoff solo piano works within the composer’s 150th-anniversary year in 2023, Asiya Korepanova is a pianistic powerhouse hailed as a "tremendously gifted pianist who exhibits a singular affinity for Rachmaninoff’s Russian romantic idiom and possesses the blazing technique to fully realize his distinctive scores" (South Florida Classical Review), who is also highly recognized as a composer, visual artist, and poet.

A herald of an enormous repertoire encompassing over 60 piano concertos and solo works ranging from early Baroque period to music of living composers, Asiya is a quintessential completist. She finds unique joy in performing complete collections of works such as the 24 Liszt Etudes or the entire Well-Tempered Clavier by Bach. Her emotionally charged and colorfully nuanced performances have gained her the admiration of audiences and resulted in many repeat engagements.

Asiya, a pianist and composer, draws her musical inspiration from the legacy of Dmitry Shostakovich, having studied composition under his direct disciple, Albert Leman. She is the author of original works in multiple genres and instrumentations. Her historic solo piano transcriptions of Richard Strauss’ 'Ein Heldenleben', Rachmaninoff's Cello Sonata, Tchaikovsky's 'Manfred' Symphony,  Mussorgsky's 'Songs and Dances of Death' have placed her among today’s formidable transcribers. The most recent composition events include the world premiere recording of Asiya’s concerto for alto saxophone and piano, Poéme, performed by Thomas Giles and Liana Pailodze Harron; the publication of her transcription of Rachmaninoff's cello sonata; the premiere of her Piano Quintet ‘I marvel at the sky’, commissioned by the Third Dimension Music Festival; and the premiere of Con Brio for two pianos, performed with her duo partner Ilya Kazantsev as a part of the Dranoff Two Piano Foundation series. 

An avid chamber musician, Asiya collaborates with a wide array of musicians. Her partners include David Shifrin, the Hermitage Piano Trio, Milena Pajaro-van de Stadt, Rodney Marsalis, Julian Schwarz, Irina Muresanu, and Alexander Fiterstein. She regularly performs as part of the '88 by 20' piano duo with her friend and former classmate, Grammy-nominated pianist Ilya Kazantsev. 

Uninhibited in her artistic expression, Asiya is also sought after her work as a visual artist and poet.  Her uncompromising dedication to the arts have culminated in several projects featuring original poetry and visual art that serve as interpretive commentary for a particular cycle of piano works. These cycles include Liszt’s Transcendental Etudes, Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier, Tchaikovsky’s 18 Morceaux, Op. 72, and, most recently, Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition. Asiya's live performances of these compositions have astounded audiences and organizers alike.

Caring about the development of society, in 2017 Asiya founded Music for Minds, a non-profit organization that brings classical performances into classrooms and creates music festivals featuring unique programming. From 2017 through 2019, Asiya directed her brainchild 'Festival Baltimore,' a two-week chamber music series and summer academy dedicated to the performance and study of complete cycles, one of Music for Mind's projects. Her new concert series, 'Flatiron Festival', premiered in June 2025 in New York City and scheduled to continue in 2026.

Born in Izhevsk, Russia, to a musical family, Asiya began learning the piano at 4 years old from her mother Soreya, her first piano teacher. At the age of 6, she was taught to read music in orchestral clefs by her father Sergey, an exemplary composer, and started composing her own music. At 9, she made her orchestral debut, playing Mozart Concerto No. 8 with her own cadenza, and gave her first full philharmonic recital. Simultaneously, she began studying composition with Albert Leman, the chair of Moscow Conservatory's composition department and a student of Dmitry Shostakovich, continuing working with him until his passing in 1998. That short period has influenced all future aspects of her musical and artistic development.

Asiya is an avid advocate for new music. In Russia, she premiered three piano concertos by Vladislav Kazenin and Shamil Timerbulatov, performing with the Svetlanov Symphony Orchestra, the Saint Petersburg Capella Symphony Orchestra, the Ural Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Tatarstan National Symphony Orchestra. In the U.S., she has premiered various works by Michael Daugherty, Thomas Sleeper, and Orlando Garcia, among others. Throughout her early years in Russia, Asiya received various awards for her prodigious abilities. These include the Russian Federation Presidential Award for Exceptional Achievement in the Arts, the National Award from the Republic of Udmurtia (2002), the Germany Berliner Salon Award (2003), the Russia Youth Triumph Award (2005), and the title of Honored Artist of Udmurtia (2009). 

In 2012, Asiya moved to the United States at the invitation of renowned pianist and maestro Santiago Rodriguez, to earn a Doctoral degree under his guidance at the University of Miami. Later that year, she was awarded the Gold Medal at the Nena Wideman International Piano Competition—an achievement that proved invaluable in establishing her concertizing career in the U.S. In 2017, she added a University of Miami Artist Diploma degree to her portfolio, having earned it in the studios of Kevin Kenner and Tian Ying. Asiya has since continued to garner national attention with performances at the Stern Auditorium at Carnegie Hall, the Phillips Collection, the Newport Classical Festival, Miami International Piano Festival, San Francisco International Piano Festival, and many other notable series, symphony orchestras, and festivals throughout the country. She has been featured on CNN, NPR stations, WFMT, and WETA. In 2025-26 season, Asiya makes her debut at the Tippet Rise Art Center, returns to the San Francisco Piano Festival and Friends of Chamber Music of Miami series; premieres Amy Beach piano concerto in Argentina, making her debut with Buenos Aires Philharmonic; debuts with  Alabama Symphony and Abilene Philharmonic; tours with the Balourdet Quartet and records her debut album with Reference Recording label. In June 2026, she directs the second season of her  Flatiron Festival, a two-week chamber series on Manhattan, NYC. She also anticipates the releases of scores of her compositions: the Poéme for alto saxophone and piano, Con Brio for two pianos, and Triptych for clarinet and piano, as well as her transcriptions for piano solo: Manfred Symphony by Peter Tchaikovsky, Songs and Dances of Death by Mussorgsky, and various works by Chopin, Berg, Tchaikovsky, Fauré, and Bach.

Asiya and her husband Dmitry reside in a forest-rich Boston suburb, where she can practice or listen to music anytime without driving the neighbors crazy. She is an avid runner and hiker, a devoted procrastinator, and  a vocal advocate for a clean lifestyle.

Jeffrey Langford is recently retired from his position as Chair and Professor of Music History and as Associate Dean for Doctoral Studies at Manhattan School of Music.    

Dr. Langford is the author of several books including Berlioz: A Guide to Research (Garland Publishing), Evenings at the Opera: An Exploration of the Basic Repertoire (Amadeus Press), History of the Symphony: The Grand Genre (Routledge Press), and his latest book, Opera: A History of the Impossible Genre (also published by Routledge).  He has also published numerous articles in journals such as Musical Quarterly, Music and Letters, The Journal of Musicology, and others on interdisciplinary connections in Berlioz’s music. A special interest of Dr. Langford and has been the literary aspects of Italian and French opera in the nineteenth century with special emphasis on text setting in the French operas of Verdi. 

Dr. Langford has presented pre-concert lectures at the Metropolitan Opera for the past 15 years, has appeared as a guest lecturer at the New York Philharmonic, and has written program notes for the Great Performers Series at Lincoln Center.  During past summers he has served as Administrative Director of Manhattan in the Mountains, a summer chamber music festival held in conjunction with the Catskill Mountain Foundation in Hunter, New York.

AGNÈS MAURER, violist, is a native of France, where she studied the violin privately.  At the age of sixteen, she joined the Ensemble Instrumental Andrée Colson, a professional chamber orchestra. In the United States she studied with Karen Tuttle at Peabody Conservatory, Kim Kashkashian at New School of Music and Geoffrey Michaels.  

She teaches violin and viola at her home studio in New Ringgold, PA

Ms. Maurer is principal violist with the Pennsylvania Sinfonia Orchestra, and the Lehigh University Choral Arts. She is a member of the Allentown Symphony Orchestra (she was its Principal Violist for 17 seasons, deciding to retire from that position in Spring 2024), Satori, Bach Choir of Bethlehem, and the Gabriel Chamber Ensemble (now in its 35th season). She is also co-founder and executive director of the Ensemble.

Her solo appearances include performances of Stamitz, Handel-Casadesus, and Telemann Viola Concerti, “Harold in Italy” by Berlioz, Hindemith “Trauermusik” and Mozart Symphonie Concertante for violin, viola and orchestra with Schuylkill Symphony Orchestra, Musica Sacra Atlanta, Pennsylvania Sinfonia Orchestra Bloomsburg Chamber Orchestra and others.

Simon Maurer, Violinist (modern and baroque), Violist, Conductor

Simon Maurer grew up in Switzerland in a family of six children, all of whom became professional musicians. He studied music at the Conservatory in Biel, and continued his violin studies in the U.S. with Geoffrey Michaels at Swarthmore College and Joyce Robbins at the State University of New York at Stoneybrook.

For 19 years Mr. Maurer was the conductor of the Orchestra at VMAC, a festival in Lyndonville VT, exploring symphonic repertoire and works with choir in summer workshops. From 2005 to 2011 he conducted the Sinfonia Youth Orchestra at the Pennsylvania Music Academy, Lancaster Pa. Mr. Maurer has conducted district Festival Orchestras on numerous occasions in Pennsylvania.

He currently is the music director of Sunday Sinfonia Orchestra based in Lancaster, PA.

Mr. Maurer is an accomplished musician performing chamber music and solo concerts throughout the eastern United States, Europe and China. He is currently Concertmaster of the Anthracite Philharmonic and Assistant Concertmaster of the Pennsylvania Sinfonia. He has performed as soloist in France and Switzerland with the St. Jean Orchestra of Geneva, Switzerland, receiving rave reviews. Solo performances in the US include Schuylkill Symphony Orchestra, Bloomsburg Chamber Orchestra, Louden Symphony in Maryland, Pennsylvania Sinfonia and Valley Vivaldi.

A founding member of Gabriel Chamber Ensemble, www.gabrielensemble.org, he is the artistic director of the ensemble. He has performed with the ensemble for over 24 years.                                                           

He plays violin and viola in Trio Clavino with members Xun Pan, piano and Doris Hall Gulati, clarinet. The Trio has toured China and Europe on numerous occasions. They just returned from a tour to Belgium, Germany and Switzerland in March 2014.

Mr. Maurer has studied baroque violin with Elizabeth Fields, and enjoys performing music from that period on his restored baroque violin. He has performed with Hedi Salanki, Steven Silverman, harpsichordists, Nina Falk and Linda Kistler, baroque violinists, Rainer Beckman, recorder, Donna Fournier, viol and many others.                                                          

Mr. Maurer also ventures in the practice of jazz and free style improvisation. He has been a featured soloist in Philadelphia area jazz clubs, has performed at “Jazzfest” in Schuylkill County. He has recorded numerous projects with folk singers and rock groups: Maggie Pierce and EJ; Zen for Primates, and others.                                                           

Mr. Maurer teaches violin, viola and cello in his private studios in Schuylkill County and in Lancaster.                                                           

Simon lives on a converted 20 acre YMCA camp, where he built his own 2000 square foot concert hall and enjoys the outdoors. Tennis is the preferred exercise. He has three lovely granddaughters!

Violist Ning Mu has received numerous awards for Musical Excellence in China and in US. He had his bachelor degree from Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing and Master degree from Rutgers University under the Fellowship of Ken Boxley Foundation. His teacher included Mr. Michael Tree of renowned Guarneri Quartet.

He has performed in the chamber music in Carnegie Weill Recital Hall and Alice Tully Hall. He has also performed chamber Music recitals with renowned violinist Arnold Steinhardt of Guarneri Quartet and many others. He has given master classes and chamber recitals at the National Center for the Performing Arts in Beijing and China Conservatory of Music.

Ning is a formal faculty member of Pennsylvania Academy of Music and Adjunct professor of Franklin and Marshall College. He is currently the principal viola of Riverside Symphonia and Bravura Philharmonic Orchestra.

Pianist Joanne Polk was catapulted into the public eye with her recordings of the complete piano works of American composer Amy Beach (1867-1944) on the Arabesque Recordings label.  Ms. Polk celebrated the centennial of Beach’s Piano Concerto by giving the work its London premiere with the English Chamber Orchestra at the Barbican Center under the baton of Paul Goodwin.  A few days later, Ms. Polk performed the Piano Concerto with the Women’s Philharmonic in San Francisco with conductor Apo Hsu in a performance described as “brilliant” by critic Joshua Kosman of the San Francisco Chronicle.  He went on to describe Ms. Polk’s performance as, “an enormously vital, imaginative reading.  Her playing was expansive in the opening movement, brittle and keen in the delightful scherzo.  She brought a light touch to the foreshortened slow movement and fearless technical penache to the showy conclusion.” 

The first recording in the Beach series, by the still waters, received the 1998 INDIE award for best solo recording.  Empress of Night, the fifth volume of Ms. Polk’s survey of Beach’s piano works, includes the Piano Concerto with the English Chamber Orchestra, Paul Goodwin conducting.  The sixth volume of the series, Morning Glories, joins Ms. Polk with the Lark Quartet in three outstanding chamber music works by Amy Beach.  Two all-Beach performances at Merkin Concert Hall in New York City, which featured Joanne Polk and the Lark Quartet, were applauded by the New York Times, as they deemed Polk’s performances “polished and assured.”  American Record Guide reported, “Polk and the Larks played their hearts out.  We in the audience shouted ourselves hoarse with gratitude.”

Prior to recording the complete piano music of Amy Beach, Ms. Polk recorded Completely Clara: Lieder by Clara Wieck Schumann, her debut CD for Arabesque Recording, featuring Metropolitan Opera soprano Korliss Uecker.  This CD was selected as a “Best of the Year” recording by The Seattle Times and was featured on Performance Today on New York Public Radio.  Ms. Polk’s CD for Albany Records, Callisto, features the solo piano music of Judith Lang Zaimont.  Her CD titled Songs of Amy Beach, recorded with baritone Patrick Mason for Bridge Records, was nominated for a Grammy Award.  Ms. Polk’s two-CD set of solo piano music by Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel, Songs for Pianoforte, was released on the Newport Classic label.  Ms. Polk’s solo piano CD, titled Fanny and Felix Mendelssohn, was released on the Bridge Records label. 

In 2014, Ms. Polk’s CD titled The Flatterer, solo piano music of French Romantic composer Cécile Chaminade, was released on the Steinway & Sons Label.  The CD was a “Pick of the Week” on New York’s classical radio station WQXR and debuted at #1 on the Classical Billboard Chart.  In 2017, Joanne Polk’s CD, Gershwin & Wild, was released on the Steinway & Sons Label and features Earl Wild’s transcriptions of Gershwin songs, as well as Wild’s Piano Sonata.  American Record Guide called Ms. Polk’s playing on this CD, “plush and dreamily attractive…” 

In 2014, Joanne Polk was named one of Musical America’s Top 30 Professionals of the Year in an article titled, “Profiles in Courage.”  Ms. Polk’s profile focused on her work promoting the music of women composers.

Ms. Polk received her Bachelor of Music and Master of Music Degrees from The Juilliard School, and her Doctor of Musical Arts Degree from Manhattan School of Music.  She has given master classes at many summer festivals and universities across the country, and in 2018 completed a five-city, three-week concert and master class tour of Taiwan and China.   

In 2019, two of Ms. Polk’s CDs, Felix and Fanny Mendelssohn and The Flatterer: Solo Piano Music by Cécile Chaminade, were included on New York City’s classical radio station WQXR’s Essential Piano Recordings.

In February 2020, Ms. Polk’s CD Louise Farrenc Etudes and Variations for Solo Piano, was released on the Steinway & Sons Label.  In December 2020, Ms. Polk’s Farrenc CD was on The New York Times “Best Classical Music of 2020” list: 

"The music of Louise Farrenc, professor of piano at the Paris Conservatory for three decades after 1842, has been taped before, but never quite so well as in Joanne Polk’s sample of her solo piano music..." -- New York Times [Best Classical Music of 2020]

Ms. Polk’s 2023 recording titled The Silence Between the Notes: Louise Farrenc Solo Piano Music Volume 2, was released on September 1, 2023, on the Steinway & Sons Label 

In December 2023 and January 2024, Ms. Polk traveled to China on an 8-city concert and master class tour.  In July 2024, Ms. Polk performed recitals and masterclasses at the University of Guadalajara in Mexico.   

In September 2024, Ms. Polk’s second volume of solo piano music by Cécile Chaminade, titled Nostalgia, was released on the Steinway & Sons Label.

American Record Guide January/February 2025 review of Nostalgia: “Polk has championed female composers all through her admirable discography. She has brought a wealth of great and enjoyable music to our attention, most of which has lived in relative obscurity since it was written. It would all be for naught if not for the exceptional musical insight and flawless piano technique she brings to these works.

It is so good to hear world-class pianists like Polk choose a recital of Chaminade music and play it with all of the seriousness one would expect if the program were music by European male composers of the time.”

To find out more about Ms. Polk, please visit her website at www.joannepolkpianist.com.

Ms. Polk is a member of the piano faculty of Manhattan School of Music and is an exclusive Steinway artist. 

“…luxurious, beautifully sculpted performances”

— THE NEW YORK TIMES 

 Internationally recognized as one of the world's finest quartets, the American String Quartet has spent decades honing the luxurious sound for which it is famous. The Quartet celebrated its 45th anniversary in 2019, and, in its years of touring, has performed in all fifty states and has appeared in the most important concert halls worldwide. The group’s presentations of the complete quartets of Beethoven, Schubert, Schoenberg, Bartók, and Mozart have won widespread critical acclaim, and their MusicMasters Complete Mozart String Quartets, performed on a matched quartet set of instruments by Stradivarius, are widely considered to have set the standard for this repertoire.  

Recent seasons featured performances of the Quartet’s major project together with the National Book Award-winning author Phil Klay and the poet Tom Sleigh, which offers a groundbreaking program combining music and readings that examines the effects of war. The Quartet also collaborated with the renowned author Salman Rushdie in a work for narrator and quartet by the film composer Paul Cantelon built around Rushdie’s novel The Enchantress of Florence. These tremendously imaginative collaborations cement the American String Quartet’s reputation as one of the most adventurous and fearless string quartets performing today, as comfortable with the groundbreaking as with the traditional. 

The Quartet's diverse activities have also included numerous international radio and television broadcasts, including a recent recording for the BBC; tours of Asia; and performances with the New York City Ballet, the Montreal Symphony, and the Philadelphia Orchestra. Recent highlights include performances of an all-sextet program with Roberto and Andrès Díaz, many tours of South America, and performances of the complete Beethoven cycle of string quartets at the Cervantes Festival in Mexico and the Tel Aviv Museum in Israel.  

The American’s additional extensive discography can be heard on the Albany, CRI, MusicMasters, Musical Heritage Society, Nonesuch, and RCA labels. Most recently the group released "Schubert's Echo," which pairs Schubert's monumental last quartet with works bearing its influence by Second Viennese masters Alban Berg and Anton Webern. This repertoire posits that the creative line from the First to the Second Viennese Schools is continuous – and evident when these works are heard in the context of each other.  

As champions of new music, the American has given numerous premieres, including George Tsontakis’s Quartet No. 7.5, “Maverick,” Richard Danielpour's Quartet No. 4, and Curt Cacioppo's a distant voice calling. The premiere of Robert Sirota’s American Pilgrimage was performed around the U.S. in the cities the work celebrates. The Quartet premiered Tobias Picker’s String Quartet No. 2 in New York City in celebration of the 90th anniversary of the Manhattan School of Music.  

Formed when its original members were students at The Juilliard School, the American String Quartet’s career began with the group winning both the Coleman Competition and the Naumburg Award in the same year.  Resident quartet at the Aspen Music Festival since 1974 and at the Manhattan School of Music in New York since 1984, the American has also served as resident quartet at the Taos School of Music, the Peabody Conservatory, and the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition.