Past Festivals - 2018

Award Winners

• 1st Prize $10,000 was awarded to Christopher Zandieh, 13 years old from Syosset, NY.
• 2nd Prize and $5,000 was awarded to Christian Chiu, 15 years old from Pittsburgh, PA.
• 3rd Prize and $2,500 was awarded to Pen-Luc Thiessen. McKinney, TX.

The Audience Favorite Awards for the most moving Mozart Concerto performance:

• Thursday evening's $500 award goes to Ashley Kim, Wilmette, IL.
• Friday evening's $500 award goes to Christopher Zandieh, Syosset, NY.

Meet the 2018 Young Pianist Competition Finalists

Christian Chiu

Christian Chiu, 15, attends Upper St. Clair High School in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. At the age of ten, he made his orchestral debut with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. He has been prizewinner and finalist in national and international competitions, including the MostArts Festival Piano Competition and the Arthur Fraser International Piano Competition/Southeastern Piano Festival (SEPF). He currently studies privately with Professor Natasha Snitkovsky.

Ashley Kim

Ashley, age 14, is a freshman at New Trier High School in Illinois. She currently studies piano with Brenda Huang and she started piano lessons when she was five years old. Ashley won second prize winner of the 2017 Emilio Del Rosario Concerto Competition. She was an honorable mention of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Young Artist Concerto Competition and Depaul Concerto Festival. She got 2nd place at the Sejong Music Competition senior division 2017, and 1st prize junior division 2016. She also received 1st place of the Society of American Musicians Competition 2016 intermediate division and 2015 junior division. She is the winner of the 2015 Granquist Music competition, olympic division. Ashley has received numerous awards including the Illinois State Music Teachers Association.

Besides piano, Ashley loves playing violin with her friends and her school symphony orchestra. She likes math and hanging out with friends. She also enjoys performing at retirement homes around suburbs of Chicago.

Tyler Kim

Fifteen-year-old Korean-American pianist Tyler Kim, made his concert debut at the age of ten with the Viennese International Orchestra at the Palais Ausburg in Vienna, Austria. Since then, he’s performed with various orchestras including the San Diego Symphony, Inland Valley Symphony, Alicante Philharmonic Orchestra, Temecula Valley Symphony, and Montgomery Symphony Orchestra.

Highlights of his recent accomplishments in the competitive scene include 1st place at the Blount-Slawson Young Artists Competition, 1st place at the Mondavi Center National Young Artists Competition, 1st at the MTNA California State Competition, and Alternate at the MTNA Southwest Division. Most recently Tyler won the Grand Prize at the LA Music Center’s Spotlight Competition awarding him $5,000, a full scholarship to the Aspen Music Festival, and a performance opportunity at Walt Disney Hall.

Outside of concertos, Tyler has performed several solo recitals, including two performances at Carnegie Hall, an hour-long American Cancer Society Benefit Concert on behalf of Jacob’s House, and a recital sponsored by the “Advocates of Classical Music” at La Jolla Riford Library. Tyler also enjoys participating in chamber ensembles and has performed numerous works including Dvorak Piano Quartet, Arensky Piano Trio No. 1, Beethoven’s Spring Sonata, and Brahms Piano Trio No. 1.

Tyler is a freshman at Temecula Valley High School and lives with his parents, younger sister, and dog, Happy. He’s currently studying with Myong-Joo Lee, and Fabio Bidini at the Colburn Academy in downtown Los Angeles.

Angeline Ma

Fifteen-year-old pianist Angeline Ma has been playing since the age of five and currently studies with Susan Starr. Angeline has won prizes in competitions including the Princeton Festival Piano Competition, Kennett Square Symphony Competition, Tri-County Youth Festival, International Young Artist Piano Competition in Washington D.C., Chopin International Piano Competition in Hartford, CT, and Kosciuszko Foundation Chopin Competition in Washington D.C. Angeline was a finalist in the 2017 Greenfield Competition’s Junior category with the Philadelphia Orchestra, as well as a 2017-2018 Chopin Foundation of the United States scholarship recipient. Angeline is a two-time recipient of the Vladimir & Haewon Feltsman Piano Foundation scholarship.

In 2017, Angeline gave a recital at Keneseth Israel in Elkins Park. In 2018, she performed with the Ambler Symphony Orchestra as a Menges Scholarship recipient. Angeline has also performed at the Polish Embassy in Washington, D.C. as a prizewinner in the Kosziuszko Foundation Chopin Competition. Angeline has taken masterclasses with the likes of Vladimir Feltsman, Eleanor Sokoloff, Vladimir Ovchinnikov, Tamas Ungar, Philip Kawin, Victor Rosenbaum, and Alexander Korsantia.

Angeline is from Berwyn, Pennsylvania. She is currently a sophomore at Conestoga High School and was a 2017 recipient of her school's Leadership and Service Award.

Maxine Park

Maxine Park, thirteen, is an eighth-grader at Crossroads Academy in Lyme, NH. She has been a student of Mila Filatova since age seven. Maxine has received top prizes at numerous regional and international competitions, including the Chopin International Piano Competition, Paderewski International Competition, Steinway Society of Massachusetts Piano Competition, New England Piano Teachers Association Mildred Freiberg Middle School Competition, and New Hampshire Granite State Piano Competition in both solo and duet categories.

Over the past two years, Maxine has performed as a soloist with several orchestras, including the New York Concerti Sinfonietta at Carnegie Hall's Weill Recital Hall and the Nashua Chamber Orchestra as a guest artist in the 2016-2017 season. She was invited to perform in the International Chopin Festival “Lato z Chopinem” in Busko-Zdroj, Poland in 2016 and 2018. In addition to performing multiple times at Carnegie Hall and Boston’s Symphony Hall, Maxine has performed in public master classes with Simone Dinnerstein, Emilie Naoumoff, John Perry, and Ilana Vared. She was also a performer in two videos produced by From the Top: “A Star Wars Musical Mashup” and “Fantastic Musicians and Where to Find Them.”

Outside of music, Maxine has placed in state and national math competitions and enjoys science, writing, and poetry. In 2017, she was one of 28 students in the USA named a Caroline D. Bradley Scholar and awarded a full four-year, merit-based high school scholarship. She will be attending Phillips Exeter Academy, starting this fall.

Simeon Radev

Simeon Radev was born near Boston and now lives in Orangeburg, South Carolina, where his current teachers are Dr. Alan Weinberg (piano) and Dr. William Terwilliger (violin). He gives recitals on both instruments and plays with orchestras.

Simeon Radev comes from an artistic family. His grandfather gained renown as a violinist and conductor with the Royal Symphony Orchestra in Bulgaria. At the age of seven, Simeon was admitted to study piano at the National School of Music in Bulgaria, where he stayed for two years. Simeon's passion for musical arts started with Mozart. When still seven years old, he played Faccile (first movement) at the National Palace of Culture in Sofia, a performance broadcasted on national television on Christmas Day.

His first DVD recording, at age eleven, was Bach’s D minor concerto (first movement). At fifteen Simeon made his orchestral debut playing piano (Haydn) and violin (Kabalevsky) within the same week in Columbia, South Carolina. He served as South Carolina All State Orchestra Concertmaster when he was sixteen, and when he was seventeen, the South Carolina Music Educators Association awarded him for his performance with All National Honors Orchestra.

Simeon has been a junior and senior winner of South Carolina Music Teachers Association, Music Teachers National Association, Atlanta Romantic Impressionistic Piano Competition (2014), and Young Artist Performance Competitions (2016, 2017), and Grand Prix recipient at Nessebar International Young Artists Festival (2015). He is a scholarship recipient from National Music Clubs, South Carolina Governor's School for the Arts, and Blair School of Music at Vanderbilt University.

Simeon is excited to research why music improves intelligence, happiness, and work ethic at Harvard University in the fall.

Perren-Luc Thiessen

Perren-Luc Thiessen, a 15-year-old pianist from Texas, studies with Dr. Tamás Ungár and Dr. Mary Humm. He has had private lessons and performed in Master Classes with Balazs Szokolay, Berndt Goetzke, Stanislav Ioudenitch, Antonio Pompa-Baldi, Alexander Korsantia, Natarzyna Popowa-Zydron, Fabio Bidini, and Andraz Jasinski.

Perren-Luc made his Orchestral Debut at age 12 in Italy with the Todi International Music Masters Festival and has appeared with the Padereweski Piano Academy, Round Rock Symphony, and Fort Worth Civic Symphony Orchestras. He was invited to perform with the orchestra in Moscow after winning the 2017 American Fine Arts International Concerto Competition. Additionally, he participates in the Semper International Music Festival in Völs am Schlern, Italy, the International Piano Master Classes in Katowice, Poland, and in 2017 Perren-Luc was the youngest participant in the elite Young Artists Program at Piano Texas, where he performed again in June of this year with the Round Rock Symphony. He also was one of the fifteen finalists (and the only American) chosen to perform at the Grand Piano Competition, founded by Denis Matsuev, at the Tchaikovsky Moscow Conservatory in the spring of 2018.

Significant among his International Prizes are First Prize and Award for the Best Performance of a Romantic Work in the prestigious 2017 Young Pianist of the North International Piano Competition in the United Kingdom, and Second Prize, Most Promising Young Artist, and Best Chopin Performance in the Tkaczewski International Competition in Poland. Also in 2017 he won First Prize in the Debut International Piano Competition which resulted in his 2017 Carnegie (Weill) Hall Debut Recital and a similar performance in the beautiful Ehrbar Saal in Vienna. He has won numerous First Prizes in Texas in both Concerto and Solo Competitions, including First Prize at the Texas Music Teachers Association Solo Competition, as well as First Prize in Concerto Competitions sponsored by the Fort Worth Civic Orchestra, Plano Symphony, and Lewisville Symphonies.

Perren-Luc loves reading and writing poetry and short stories, and he is an amateur barista.

Christopher Zandieh

Christopher Zandieh began his Suzuki piano studies at age 4 on Long Island, and, by age 6, enrolled at the School for Strings in NYC as a student of Marina Obukovsky. He is presently 13 years old, in his third year of study at the Juilliard School as a student of Ernest Barretta, and an 8th-grade student at South Woods Middle School in Syosset, Long Island.

Christopher had his first performance at Carnegie Hall at age 6 and returned there three years later as the Grand Prix Winner of the Concert Festival International Competition. Since then, he has had several performances also at Steinway Hall and the Bruno Walter auditorium. In October 2014, Christopher was chosen from among 100 pianists as the featured soloist to perform for world-renown pianist Lang Lang as part of the international 101 Pianists Program at the Tilles Center on Long Island. In 2016, he was the 1st prize winner of the Great Composers’ Competition, and, last year, was a semi-finalist in the Kaufman International Youth Piano Competition. This past December, Christopher was a featured soloist at the Piano Showcase in Rochester, NY, for the annual NYS School Music Association Conference. In December 2017, Christopher won the annual piano competition at Juilliard’s Pre-College Division, and, last month, performed Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 21 with the Juilliard Pre-College Symphony at Peter Jay Sharp Theater.

Christopher has participated in several masterclasses within the past few years with renown pianists, including Lydia Artymiw and Lang Lang. Besides his solo piano performances, Christopher is also a member of the Zandieh Trio, and the principal alto saxophonist at his school’s Jazz Band.

12:00 Chamber Music Series

7:30 Evening Concert Series

12:00 Chamber Music Series

7:30 Evening Concert Series

12:00 Chamber Music Series

2:00 Recital

4:00 Recital

6:00 Music Under The Stars

12:00 Chamber Music Series

7:30 Evening Concert Series

12:00 Chamber Music Series

7:30 Evening Concert Series

11:00am-2:00pm >Raku Extravaganza with Wayne Higby

7:30 Gala Concert: Festival Orchestra

Andreas Klein - Head of Jury

“A fascinating artist with all the indispensable qualities: temperament, taste, touch, tone, the four Ts of pianism…” The New York Times

Andreas Klein is widely admired as a pianist of rare sensitivity and musicality. The Washington Post has praised his “articulate and flowing pianism” while the New York Times called him “a pianist who makes silences sound like music.” About a recent Glenn Gould tribute (with the Minguet String Quartet), the Calgary Herald reported, “(Klein brings) to his performance a mature understanding...as well as a brilliant execution”, while Classical Voice of North Carolina (CVNC) was even more blunt : “Andreas Klein is a stupendous pianist...a stunning performance by any standard, and it brought the audience to its feet in a rousing ovation.”

He has performed in many of the leading houses of Europe, from Wigmore Hall in London to the Berlin Philharmonie, as well as Carnegie Hall in New York and the Kennedy Center in Washington DC, and is at home with the grandeur of playing with the Berlin Philharmonic or the vast reaches of the Ravinia Festival (where he received two standing ovations) as he is with the intimacy of Le Poisson Rouge (NYC). He has extensively toured North America, with ensembles including the Salzburg Chamber Soloists (a 20-city tour) and the Festival Strings of Lucerne (10 cities) and in South America, where he performed Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 in Peru, Chile, Argentina, Colombia, and Brazil. Some exotic places on his concert tours included Damascus and Yerevan.

Since his meteoric start in his native Germany, performing recitals and as soloist with orchestra, he eventually answered the call to go to the Juilliard School in New York. But the highly focused and musical approach to every work he performs was nurtured by one of his early teachers, the great Claudio Arrau. It is a philosophy Klein is credited with continuing.

In recent years Klein has added more forays into chamber music alongside his concerto and recital repertoire, including major projects with the Minetti Quartet and the Casals Quartet (Schumann’s Piano Quintet - US tour and Casals Festival, Puerto Rico). These collaborations have taken him to important venues such as Philadelphia’s Kimmel Center, Spivey Hall near Atlanta and the Wortham Center in Houston.

A frequent broadcaster, Klein has often appeared on WGBH Boston, WFMT Chicago, APR in ST Paul and KUHF in Houston. He was the subject of a “Musician Portrait” in Germany and his “Intermezzo with Andreas Klein” was televised by PBS. His recordings, “Piano Sonatas” and his album of music by Beethoven and Berg, have won admiring reviews (he is also an admired recording producer). And his self-composed new cadenzas for Mozart piano concertos have also won widespread praise. “Whatever the composer, whatever the project,” he says, “for me it is about being inside the music.”

More details on: www.AndreasKlein.com

Angelin Chang

Internationally acclaimed pianist Angelin Chang is the first American female pianist awarded the GRAMMY® for Best Instrumental Soloist with Orchestra. She is recognized for her sense of poetry and technical brilliance. Concertizing in Europe, Asia, Africa, North and South America, Miss Chang’s concert tours have led her to such venues as the Kennedy Center, Kimmel Center (Philadelphia), Lincoln Center, Severance Hall (Cleveland), St. Martin-in-the-Fields (London), Zelazowa Wola (Warsaw), Shanghai Grand Theatre (China), Sala Luis Ángel Arango (Bogotá), Schnittke Philharmonic Hall (Russia) and the South African Broadcasting Corporation. As the first Artist-in-Residence at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., Angelin Chang participated in the development and launching of the Arts for Everyone initiative. She has performed at the U.S. Department of State, for the United Nations Women's Organization in Nepal and for World AIDS Day in New York.

An active chamber musician, she performs regularly with the legendary violist Joseph de Pasquale, The de Pasquale String Quartet, and with members of the Philadelphia Orchestra and Cleveland Orchestra. Recordings include solo piano album, Angelin (Sabintu Records), Soaring Spirit (Albany Records) with Angelin Chang on piano and Joseph de Pasquale on viola, and Cleveland Chamber Symphony (TNC) with Angelin Chang as piano soloist and John McLaughlin Williams as conductor in Olivier Messiaen’s Oiseaux Exotiques and Dmitri Shostakovich’s Piano Concerto No. 1. Dr. Angelin Chang is Professor of Piano and Coordinator of Keyboard Studies at Cleveland State University, where she is also Professor of Law at the Cleveland-Marshall College of Law.

Anthony Pattin

Pianist Anthony Pattin gave his New York debut recital at Carnegie Hall's Weill Recital Hall in 1998. In a review of that concert, the critic for the New York Concert Review magazine called Pattin "a pianist of definite skills and strengths." Another reviewer said of his more recent New York recital "Pattin is a solid presence onstage, confident and gracious. With the ear and ability to vary tone color with constancy, his palette is a good one." Pattin is an active pianist, orchestral soloist, chamber musician, accompanist and music scholar.

Anthony Pattin has performed concerts throughout the U.S. including on the prestigious Dame Myra Hess Concert Series in Chicago. In addition to two concert tours of Japan, he has appeared in recitals throughout Europe and Central America. A prize winner in several national piano competitions, he was also a first-prize winner in the Bartok-Kabalevsky International Piano Competition held at Radford University. He was invited back the following year to serve as judge with famed Bartok protégé Gyorgy Sandor. He has appeared as soloist with the Alabama Symphony, the Toledo Symphony, the Detroit Metropolitan Orchestra, the Arkansas Symphony and most recently the Abiliene Philharmonic.

An Ohio native, he earned the Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Toledo and subsequently received the Master of Music degree from University of Michigan. In 1994 he completed the Doctor of Musical Arts degree from University of Alabama. He was Professor of Music at the University of Montevallo from 1987 to 2011. While at UM he received the Distinguished Teacher Award (2001) and the following year was named the University Scholar. Dr. Pattin is now Professor Emeritus from UM and appears frequently on the Alabama Symphony's "Concertmaster and Friends" series. Pattin has recorded six compact discs on the APT label, exhibiting a command of a wide and diverse range of repertoire.

The MostArts Festival Orchestra is an exquisite Mozart-sized orchestra comprised of first class musicians from around the world. Our FREE noon hour Sound Bite Sampler Chamber Music Series showcase our musicians performing gems of the chamber music repertoire as the audience enjoys lunch or dessert.

The Evening Concert Series features renowned soloists performing with the Festival Orchestra under the baton of Maestro Yuval Zaliouk, Steven Thomas and Lisa Lantz, in the magnificent Miller Theater. Then, top off the evening with a glass of wine at our Meet and Greet the Artists Reception following each concert.

1st Violin

• Noemi Miloradovic
• Hyeri Choi
• Blanca Cecilia González
• Sho Omagari
• Maria Im
• Gregory Durozel
• Isoa Chapman
• Lisa Lantz

2nd Violin

• Debrah Devine
• Edgar Tumajyan
• Jessica Park
• Jason Kim
• Margot Mezvinsky
• Luis Enrique Casal

Viola

• Carl Larson
• Samuel Marchan
• Steven Thomas

Cello

• Zachary Sweet
• Rintaro Wada

Bass

• Kathleen Horvath
• Spencer Phillips

Flute

• Jeanne Sperber
• Laura Campbell

Oboe

• Stuart Breczinski

Clarinet

• Camila Barrientos Ossio
• Georgiy Borisov

Bassoon

• Yuki Higashi
• Nanci Belmont

Horn

• Alan Taplin
• Terry Martens
• Claire Tuxill McKenney
• Heidi Oros

Tuba

• Dave Unland

Trombone

• Michael Poole
• David DiGennaro
• Amber Love

Trumpet

• Bruno Lourensetto
• William Arnts

Timpani

• Jerome Neuhoff

Harp

• Nancy Lendrim