September Prelude Chamber Music Festival of the Triangle

DATE: Sunday, September 10 2004 3 PM

SITE: Reynolds Industries Theater
Duke University, Durham

TICKETS: Combination package - Sept. 10 & Sept. 12 concerts -$30; Students, $15. Single tickets -$20, $10

(919) 821 2030 or (919) 684-4444.

PROGRAM

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

The Miró Quartet is increasingly recognized as one of America’s brightest and most exciting young chamber groups. Since winning First Prize at the 1998 Banff International String Quartet Competition and the prestigious Naumburg Chamber Music Award in 2000, the Miró Quartet has captivated audiences around the world, dazzling listeners with its youthful intensity and mature interpretations. Formed in the fall of 1995, the Quartet met with immediate success, winning the First Prize at the 50th annual Coleman Chamber Music Competition in April 1996, and the following month taking both the First and Grand prizes at the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition.

This year the quartet was appointed Faculty String Quartet at The University of Texas at Austin. Starting in September 2003, the members of the Miró Quartet –violinists Daniel Ching and Sandy Yamamoto, violist John Largess, and cellist Joshua Gindele – will teach and coach chamber music there, while continuing their active international touring schedule. With this appointment, The University of Texas at Austin joins an elite group of institutions whose faculties include a world-class string quartet.

Mayron Tsong (Assistant Professor of Music) A native of Canada, Dr. Tsong was one of the youngest musicians to complete a Performer's Diploma in Piano from the Royal Conservatory of Toronto at age 16. Since that time, she has performed across the United States, Canada, Sweden, Switzerland, China, Taiwan and Russia as a soloist and chamber musician. She has been featured as a soloist with the St. Petersburg Chamber Philharmonic (Russia), Symphony North (Houston), the Red Deer Symphony Orchestra (Canada), the Lethbridge Symphony Orchestra (Canada), and the University of Calgary Orchestra (Canada). Numerous prizes have included First Prize in the Canadian Music Competitions, the Millenium Prize for Russian Performing Arts, and the prestigious Arts B Grant, awarded by the Canada Council. In 1993, Ms. Tsong was Artist in Residence at the Banff Centre, where she was invited to give masterclasses in 2001. Also active as a teacher, clinician and adjudicator, Ms. Tsong's solo and collaborative performances have been broadcast by CBC Radio Two Calgary, Radio Canada, Montreal and WFMT Radio, Chicago. Upcoming projects include performances and recordings in Canada, Taiwan, St. Petersburg, Russia, and Chicago.

Dr. Tsong holds graduate degrees in both Piano Performance and Music Theory, and she obtained her Doctor of Musical Arts under the tutelage of John Perry at Rice University. Her dissertations discuss the piano etudes of Gyorgy Ligeti. Between 1994-1998, Ms. Tsong was a three-time recipient of The Female Doctoral Students Grant, a competition that encompasses all disciplines nationwide, awarded by the Government of Canada.

Having served on faculty at California State University in Humboldt, as Chair of the Piano Area at the University of Lethbridge, in Alberta, Canada, Ms. Tsong is currently Assistant Professor of Piano at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. In the summers, she has taught and performed at the Sequoia Chamber Music Festival in Northern California, Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp in Michigan and Young Musicians and Artists Camp in Oregon. Ms. Tsong is a member of the College Music Society, the Music Teachers National Association, the American Liszt Society, the Canadian Universities Music Society, Minorities and Women Doctoral Directory, the Canadian Music Centre, and she is an Honorary Member of the Tingshuset Music Society in Sweden.

Artist Website: Miró Quartet