Mackinac Keys

Join us in christening the newly acquired Yamaha grand piano in the Center for the Arts, a generous gift of Dennert Ware. Please note this is a ticketed event. Tickets may be purchased at the door or here (online) in advance.

American pianist William Wolfram was a silver medalist at both the William Kapell and the Naumburg International Piano Competitions and a bronze medalist at the prestigious Tchaikovsky Piano Competition in Moscow.

His concerto debut with the Pittsburgh Symphony under the baton of Leonard Slatkin was the first in a long succession of appearances and career relationships with numerous American conductors and orchestras. He has also appeared with the San Francisco, Saint Louis, Indianapolis, Seattle and New Jersey symphonies, the Buffalo Philharmonic, the National Symphony Orchestra (Washington D.C.), the Baltimore Symphony, the Colorado Symphony, the Rochester Philharmonic, the Nashville Symphony, the Oregon Symphony, the Utah Symphony, the San Diego Symphony, the Edmonton Symphony, the Columbus Symphony, the Florida Orchestra, and the Grand Teton and San Luis Obispo Mozart festival orchestras, among many others. He enjoys regular and ongoing close associations with the Dallas Symphony, the Milwaukee Symphony, the Phoenix Symphony and the Minnesota Orchestra as well as the musicians of the New York Philharmonic for chamber concerts in the United States.

Internationally recognized conductors with whom he has worked include Osmo Vanska, Andrew Litton, Jerzy Semkow, Mark Wigglesworth, Jeffrey Tate, Vladimir Spivakov, Michael Christie, Gerard Schwarz, Carlos Miguel Prieto, Jeffrey Kahane, James Judd, Roberto Minczuk, Stefan Sanderling, JoAnn Falletta, James Paul, Carlos Kalmar, Hans Vonk, Joseph Silverstein, Jens Nygaard, Yan Pascal Tortelier and Vasily Petrenko.

Abroad, Wolfram has appeared with the BBC Symphony Orchestra of London, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, the RTE Symphony Orchestra of Ireland (Dublin), the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, the Bergen Philharmonic (Norway), the Beethovenhalle Orchestra Bonn, the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra and many others.

Wolfram has extensive experience in the recording studio. He has recorded four titles on the Naxos label in his series of Franz Liszt Opera Transcriptions and two other chamber music titles for Naxos with violinist Philippe Quint (music of Miklos Rosza and John Corigliano). Also for Naxos he has recorded the music of Earl Kim with piano and orchestra - the RTE National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland behind him. For the Albany label, he recorded the piano concertos of Edward Collins with Marin Alsop and the Royal Scottish National Orchestra.

As educator and teacher, Mr Wolfram is a long-standing member of the piano faculty of the Eastern Music Festival in North Carolina, and a regular featured guest at the Colorado College Music Festival in Colorado Springs, Colorado. He also teaches a performance class at the acclaimed Manhattan School of Music.

A graduate of The Juilliard School, William Wolfram resides in New York City with his wife and two daughters and is a Yamaha artist.

A modern player with a “signature sound” and distinctive style of playing, cellist Mark Kosower embodies the concept of the complete musician performing as concerto soloist with symphony orchestras, in solo recitals and with pianist Jee-Won Oh, and as a much admired and sought-after chamber musician. He is Principal Cello of the Cleveland Orchestra, a scholar and teacher of cello at the Cleveland Institute of Music, and the Kent/Blossom Music Festival. Mark’s performance repertoire and discography are testaments to a deep devotion, not only to frequently heard repertoire such as Tchaikovsky’s Rococo Variations and concertos of Haydn, Walton, Elgar and Dvořák but, significantly, to less well-known concertos of Alberto Ginastera, Miklos Rozsa, Frederich Gulda and Victor Herbert. Mr. Kosower has recorded for the Ambitus, Delos, Naxos International and VAI labels, including as the first cellist to record the complete music for solo cello of Alberto Ginastera (Naxos). He was described as a “powerful advocate of Ginastera’s art” by MusicWeb International, and Strings Magazine noted of his Hungarian music album (also with Naxos) that “the music allows Kosower to showcase his stunning virtuosity, passionate intensity, and elegant phrasing.”

Mark Kosower’s 2018/2019 performances feature Beethoven’s Triple Concerto with the ProMusica Chamber Orchestra (Ohio) and music director/conductor David Danzmayr, Ginastera Cello Concerto No. 2 with the Cleveland Orchestra and conductor Gustavo Gimeno and two cello gems, Dovřák’s Rondo, Op. 94 and Victor Herbert’s Cello Concerto with the Canton Symphony.

Highlights for 2017/2018 included the Dvořák Cello Concerto with the Peninsula Music Festival, the Haydn Cello Concerto No. 2 with the Blue Water Chamber Orchestra and a return engagement with the North Shore Chamber Music Festival, performing Shostakovich’s Piano Trio No. 2 and Brahms’ String Sextet, Op.18.

Mark Kosower began cello studies with his father who, upon hearing 1 and ½-year-old Mark sing the melodies his father was practicing, recognized Mark’s natural musical talent and gave him his first cello. Important academic and life-long influences were Janos Starker who invited him to study at Indiana University and Joel Krosnick with whom he studied at The Juilliard School. He is a former member of Chamber Music Two, a two-year residency program of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. His many honors include an Avery Fisher Career Grant, a SONY Grant and was top prize winner in both the Rostropovich and Pablo Casals International Cello Competitions, including special prizes at both competitions for the best interpretation of the newly commissioned works by Marco Stroppa and Cristobal Halffter. Mark was also  Grand Prize winner of both the Irving Klein International String Competition and the WAMSO Competition of the Minnesota Orchestra.

Kosower is known for varied traditional and contemporary repertoire such as Haydn C Major Concerto which he has performed with Jorge Mester and the Orquesta Filarmónica Boca del Rio in Mexico, and with the Columbus Symphony conducted by Robert Moody; Strauss’s Don Quixote which he has performed with the Indianapolis Symphony conducted by Andrey Boreyko; The Dvořák Concerto which he has performed with Tito Muñoz and the Phoenix Symphony; the Brahms’s Double Concerto which he has performed with violinist William Preucil and Franz Welser-Möst conducting the Cleveland Orchestra at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts in Miami; Ernst Bloch’s Schelomo with Stefan Sanderling and the Toledo Symphony; Victor Herbert’s Concerto No. 2 which he has performed with the Dayton Philharmonic; and Tchaikovsky’s Rococo Variations with JoAnn Falletta and the Buffalo Philharmonic. His recordings include Eberhard Klemmstein’s Cello Concerto with the Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Victor Herbert Cello Concertos with JoAnn Falletta and Belfast’s Ulster Orchestra for Naxos International (2016).

With the Cleveland Orchestra, Kosower has appeared with Nicholas McGegan conducting Haydn C Major Concerto at the Blossom Music Festival, Sir Andrew Davis conducting Strauss’s Don Quixote, Bramwell Tovey conducting the Samuel Barber Concerto, Herbert Blomstedt conducting the Dvořák Concerto, and Ton Koopman conducting Boccherini’s Concerto in D Major G.479.

Other orchestral appearances have included the symphony orchestras of Detroit, Florida, Grand Rapids, Houston, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oregon, Phoenix, Seattle, Syracuse, Virginia, the Ravinia Festival, San Jose’s Symphony Silicon Valley and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, and recitals at the Kennedy Center, Aspen Music Festival, Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, the National Gallery of Art and on the Great Performer’s Series at Lincoln Center.

In past seasons he has appeared internationally as soloist with the Rotterdam Philharmonic, the Orchestre de Paris, the Hong Kong Philharmonic, the China National Symphony Orchestra in Beijing, the National Symphony Orchestra of Taiwan, the Brazilian Symphony Orchestra, the Orquestra Filarmonica de Minas Gerais in Brazil, and the Orquestra Sinfonica de Venezuela, as well as solo performances at the Chatelet in Paris, the Alte Oper in Frankfurt, the Hong Kong Cultural Centre, and the Teatro Municipal in Rio de Janeiro.

Mark Kosower is a frequent guest at chamber music festivals including the Santa Fe, the Eastern Music, the North Shore Chamber Music, the Pacific Music (of Japan), Breckenridge Music Festival, and Colorado’s Strings Music festivals, among others.

In addition to his busy performing career, Mark is also a dedicated teacher. He is on the cello faculty at the Cleveland Institute of Music and the Kent/Blossom Music Festival. His previous posts include solo cellist of the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra in Germany (f2006-2010), and Professor of Cello and Chamber Music at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music (2005-2007). Kosower has given masterclasses around the world.

Principal clarinetist of the San Antonio Symphony and Principal clarinetist of the ProMusica Chamber Orchestra (Columbus, OH), Ilya Shterenberg balances a busy career as an orchestral musician, chamber music performer, and a soloist. Hailed by the press: “He possesses that miraculous gift of an innate musical sense…music seemed to flow toward the infinite, as if divinely ordained”, he has been featured as a soloist performing standard works by Mozart, Weber, Rossini, Debussy, as well as rarely heard clarinet concertos by Krommer and Kurpinsky, as well as the American premiere of Richard Strauss’s Serenadefor Clarinet and Chamber Orchestra.

He has been featured as Principal clarinetist with Cincinnati and Seattle Symphonies, and has collaborated with some of the most notable conductors of our time, including Roger Norrington, Seiji Ozawa, Dennis Russell Davies, Herbert Blomstedt, Daniel Barenboim, George Solti, Pierre Boulez and others.

Away from the orchestras, Ilya is very active as chamber musician, festival performer, and educator. He is a member of Olmos Ensemble, a chamber group made up of principal woodwind players from the San Antonio Symphony. His summer appearances have included the Colorado Music Festival and Britt Festival, as well as the Piccolo Spoleto Festival – USA. As an educator, he has been a faculty member of the College of Charleston, the University of Texas San Antonio, and UT Austin.

A native of Ukraine, Ilya began his music education at the Kosenko Music College, in Zhitomir, city of his birth. After his immigration to the United States in 1989, he received an Artist Certificate diploma from the Meadows School of the Arts, Southern Methodist University, after which he did further study at DePaul University in Chicago. His principal teachers have included Larry Combs, Stephen Girko, and Charles Neidich.

Mr. Shterenberg’s performances have been heard on National Public Radio stations throughout the country as well as Chicago’s WFMT nationwide classical music network. He performs frequently as a recitalist and chamber music artist with Cactus Pear Music Festival and the North Shore Chamber Music Festival.

Ilya is a Buffet Group USA performing artist.

Praised “The Supernatural Child of Music” (Xinhua News, SMG Shanghai television, Family Education Times, and others), Chinese-born pianist Chaojun Yang has impressed her audience around the world with her versatility and sensitivity on the piano, performing all genres of music from pre-Baroque to 21st century. Since the age of four, Chaojun’s performing career has brought her across Shanghai—her native city — France, Australia, Croatia, Britain, the Philippines, North Korea, Poland, the USA, Canada, Germany and other countries. She has received awards from numerous competitions such as first place in Shanghai Student Arts Festival Young Artists Competition, first place in the Morningside Music Bridge Chamber Music Competition in Calgary, Canada, top prize in the North American Round of Hastings International Competition, first prize in the Pearl River Kayserburg National Youth Piano Competition, where she was awarded a free piano of their latest model. In 2012, her piano trio won the silver medal in the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition. She was also awarded prestigious Jack Kent Cooke Young Artist Award in May 2013, when graduating from Interlochen Arts Academy. In addition, Chaojun has won the concerto competitions in Shanghai Conservatory (Dean Prize winner), Interlochen Arts Academy, and the Bard College-Conservatory of Music. Yang is received her masters degree in piano performance at The Juilliard School, and is currently pursuing doctoral work at Eastman School of Music.