Nita Baxani has performed in U.S. National Tours as well as at venues across the United States and Europe as a soloist in operas, oratorio, musical theatre, and world–premiere works. Along with having a Master of Music degree in Vocal Performance from the Manhattan School of Music, Ms. Baxani has a Doctorate in Music and Music Education from Columbia University and is an avid supporter of music and arts education. She is the Chair of the Early Childhood Creative Arts Program at the Colburn Community School of Performing Arts and Assistant Professor of Music at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona. 

Anthony Cardella is an award-winning performer and composer who has won regional, national, and international piano competitions and has recently appeared in concert halls across the United States as well as in Spain, Italy, France, Serbia, Hungary, and Turkey. A Wisconsin native, Mr. Cardella moved to Los Angeles in 2019 after completing his undergraduate studies at the Lawrence Conservatory of Music. Since then, he has been performing, teaching, and collaborating in the Los Angeles area while teaching at Occidental College and the Colburn School and completing his Doctor of Musical Arts at the USC Thornton School of Music. 

Pianist Rose Chen earned her Doctor of Musical Arts degree with full scholarship and the Outstanding Graduate award from the USC Thornton School of Music in 2010. She performs annually with the International Villa-Lobos Chamber Music Festival in the United States and Brazil, presenting Latin American classical and contemporary works. Her recent projects include two albums, Brazilian Landscapes, featuring chamber music by living Latin American composers, and Mille Morte, with David Muller, former principal bassoonist of the Mexico City Philharmonic. Ms. Chen also premiered Suite Adeline for solo piano by techno pioneer Bruce Haack and curates programs for Black History Month and Pride Month at Holy Nativity Episcopal Church, where she is Music Director. She joined the Colburn Community School of Performing Arts in 2023 and is on the faculty at Cypress College, teaching music theory and popular music. 

Minhye Choi, a South Korean pianist, is recognized for her work as a collaborative pianist at the Colburn School, where she studied under Fabio Bidini. She earned her master’s degree from the Conservatory of Music and Dance in Cologne and her bachelor’s from the Hanns Eisler Conservatory in Berlin. Ms. Choi has performed widely across Europe, Korea, and the United States, with solo recitals at venues such as Schumann Haus and Mendelssohn Remise, and has collaborated with renowned artists including Clive Greensmith and Martin Chalifour. She is also a two-time recipient of the Amron-Sutherland Grant for Young Pianists at the Colburn School. 

Clement Chow is a cellist who began his musical journey in a musical family, initially studying piano before transitioning to cello for its rich sound. He studied under renowned teachers at Rice University and the Cleveland Institute of Music and attended prestigious summer music festivals such as Aspen and Schleswig Holstein. He has worked with distinguished soloists, string quartets, and conductors, and currently serves as Principal Cellist with the Riverside Philharmonic while also performing with the Redlands and San Bernardino Symphonies. 

Teresa de Jong Pombo has performed throughout Europe, South America, and the United States in solo, ensemble, and concerto appearances. She is Director of the Colburn Honors Piano Seminar, coaches for Junior Chamber Music, and is on the faculties of Montecito International Music Festival and InterHarmony International Music Festival. A Fulbright Scholar, she earned the Konzertfach Diplom at the Vienna Hochschule für Musik in Austria, after graduating summa cum laude from USC with Bachelor and Master of Music degrees in Piano Performance. Her students have been prizewinners in national and international competitions, and have been accepted into prestigious music schools across the country. 

Adrian Dunn is a trailblazing singer, conductor, and Emmy Award–winning composer reshaping American music. His PBS special Emancipation, with The Adrian Dunn Singers and RIZE Orchestra, surpassed 1 million streams and earned four Grammy pre-nominations, followed by Wonderful: A Soulful Celebration in 2024. He debuted at Carnegie Hall in 2024 and internationally at Austria’s Klangwolke Festival. Mr. Dunn composed the score for Disney+/Hulu’s Sacred Soil and music for WWE WrestleMania 35. A MacArthur grant recipient, he is Director of Choirs and voice faculty at the Colburn School in Los Angeles. 

Samuel Fischer, violinist, has performed as a soloist across the United States, Europe, and Asia with orchestras like the Charleston Symphony, Hollywood Chamber Orchestra, and Symphony New Hampshire. He is concertmaster of the Desert Symphony, Opera Santa Barbara, Redlands Symphony, and Riverside Philharmonic. Mr. Fischer has recorded extensively for film, TV, and video games and performed with renowned chamber musicians including Anne Akiko-Meyers and Lynn Harrell. He holds a Bachelor of Music from USC and a Master of Music degree from the Juilliard School. A passionate educator, Mr. Fischer teaches at the University of Redlands, the Colburn Community School of Performing Arts, Idyllwild Arts Summer Program, and Montecito International Music Festival. 

Alex Granger has been heard across North America and Europe, most recently performing with the Webern Quartet in the Netherlands, Austria, and Germany, including a short residency at the Arnold Schoenberg Center in Vienna. Additionally, the quartet was invited to record the four Schoenberg quartets with the Belgian label Etcetera, which will release the album in Europe on October 15, along with a partnership with Naxos in the United States. Mr. Granger’s chamber music performances have been featured on NPR and in the New Yorker, and he has recorded on major labels such as Warner Classics.  

Southern California native Samuel Grodin is enjoying an increasingly busy career as a solo and collaborative pianist. A prizewinner in the Ibiza and Seattle International Piano Competitions, Mr. Grodin has performed throughout the United States and Europe. He holds degrees from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and the USC Thornton School of Music, where he was winner of the Keyboard Department’s award for Outstanding D.M.A. Graduate in Piano. In addition to his work at the Colburn School, Mr. Grodin is a member of the piano faculty at the Bob Cole Conservatory of Music at California State University, Long Beach. 

Henry Gronnier was a founding member and the First Violinist of the Rossetti String Quartet. Early musical studies took place at the Conservatoire in his native town of Saint Quentin, France, where he was awarded the Premier Prix in both piano and violin. His teachers included Madeleine Thuillier Deverge, Michèle Auclair, Nell Gotkovsky, Sally Thomas & Zino Francescatti. Mr. Gronnier was an Associate Professor of Violin and Director of Chamber Music at the University of Southern California (USC), Thornton School of Music until spring 2014. He is the chair of the string department and on the faculty at the Music Academy and Colburn School of Performing Arts in Los Angeles. 

Hailed an “exquisitely subtle pianist” by The New York Times, Iris Hsu Shiotsuki has performed across the United States, Canada, Netherlands, Finland, Italy, and Spain. She has served as Professor of Piano Pedagogy at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music; piano minor faculty at the Juilliard School; staff pianist for the New England Conservatory and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT); and collaborative faculty at the Heifetz International Music Institute. Dr. Shiotsuki holds a Doctor of Musical Arts in piano performance from the Peabody Conservatory and Master of Music in piano performance from the Juilliard School, where she studied with Boris Slutsky, Matti Raekallio, Leon Fleisher, and Robert McDonald. She is currently the full-time staff pianist at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona. 

Dr. Keum Hwa Cha, violinist and violist, has worked with maestros David Effron, the late Robert Shaw, and the late Stanisław Skrowaczewski, and has collaborated with the Marcus Roberts Trio, Béla Fleck, and Time for Three. She has performed with the Cornell Contemporary Chamber Players, the Binghamton Philharmonic, and the Seoul Tutti Ensemble, and has appeared at festivals including Kneisel Hall and the Philadelphia International Music Festival. She earned degrees from the New England Conservatory and the Eastman School of Music and later completed an Artist Certificate at SMU. Ms. Cha joined the Colburn School in 2023 after teaching at Idaho State University, Pepperdine, and Cal Lutheran. 

Violinist Joan Kwuon, whom The New York Times describes as “fiery, intensely musical, and impassioned,” enjoys a multifaceted career as performer and pedagogue. Appearing as soloist with international orchestras including the London Symphony Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, NHK Symphony Tokyo, Seattle Symphony, Rochester Philharmonic, Beijing Symphony, BBC Orchestra, and as recitalist at the Library of Congress, Lincoln Center, Kimmel Center, Metropolitan Museum, and Ravinia. Ms. Kwuon joined the Colburn School Music Academy and Community School of Performing Arts violin faculty in 2019. She has taught at the Juilliard School and Cleveland Institute of Music, where she served as Head of Violin. During the summer, she is Artist Faculty at Montecito Festival and Borromeo Festival Switzerland. 

Taiwanese pianist Yu-Ting Peng is an active collaborative pianist, performer and teacher in Los Angeles. She has won several awards including grand prize in the Duo Competition at the Music Academy and first prize at the CSUN Concerto Competition. As a collaborative pianist, Ms. Peng frequently performs in recitals including with Bing Wang, Catherine Karoly, and Taeguk Mun. During the summer seasons, she serves as a staff pianist at well-known music festivals including Meadowmount School of Music, Sounding Point, American Viola Society, and Chamber Music Northwest Young Artist Institute. She has also attended summer festivals as a fellow or student including Music Academy of the West, Bowdoin International Music Festival, Montecito International Music Festival, and the John Perry Academy of Music. Throughout her musical career, she has trained under well-known professors including John Perry, Alan Smith, Kevin Fitz-Gerald, Bernadene Blaha, and Dmitry Rachmanov. Ms. Peng completed her Doctorate of Musical Arts and graduated as Outstanding Graduate in the Keyboard Collaborative Arts program from the University of Southern California Thornton School of Music. Ms. Peng currently works as a collaborative pianist at the Thornton School of Music and Colburn School in Los Angeles.  

Violinist Moni Simeonov is Director of String Studies at California State University, Long Beach, and the founder of Quartet Intensive, Bulgaria’s first chamber music academy. He has also taught at the Interlochen Summer Festival, Singapore Violin Festival, Atlantic Music Festival, and Hawaii Chamber Music Festival. Dedicated to community engagement, Mr. Simeonov has brought music to Syrian refugee camps, hospitals in Sri Lanka, and underserved communities across the Americas. He has performed and coached internationally, with recordings archived by PBS, NPR, NHK, and Bulgarian National TV. 

Dr. Chelsea Tanner, flutist and educator, teaches at the Colburn Community School of Performing Arts and serves as Head of the Flute Platform at tonebase.co. She specializes in mindset coaching for musicians, helping students overcome performance anxiety. Dr. Tanner has previously taught at SUNY Potsdam and Penn State University. She earned her Doctor of Musical Arts from the University of Texas at Austin. Dr. Tanner has performed at the Aspen Music Festival and National Repertory Orchestra. A Haynes Artist, she plays on a 14-karat gold Haynes flute. Her teachers include Jeanne Baxtresser and Katherine Borst Jones. 

Praised as “sparkling” by The New York Times, pianist Hui Wu recently recorded for the Raiford Rogers Modern Ballet and in the music documentary Music for the Ocean project by composer and violinist Chad Cannon. Currently, Ms. Hui serves as piano faculty at the Colburn Community School of Performing Arts, Moorpark College, and Cal Lutheran University. She studied at the Juilliard School for her bachelor’s and master’s degrees with full scholarship and completed her doctorate at USC. Her first album, part of the complete Philip Glass piano works, is scheduled for release with Parma in 2026. 

Kenton Youngstrom is active as a recording artist, producer, composer, arranger, and educator, and his eclectic career has taken him around the world, performing in classical, jazz and rock concerts in Europe, the Far East, Canada, Mexico, and throughout the United States. His compositions and arrangements have been featured on film, television, and recordings. His critically acclaimed solo guitar debut, “Voices of the Collection, Vols. 1 & 2,” featuring 55 classical pieces performed on 55 world-class instruments, is available on all streaming platforms and on his own artist channel on YouTube. Mr. Youngstrom joined the distinguished faculty of the Colburn School of Performing Arts in 1979. 

Canadian pianist Micah Yui, born in Japan to Korean parents, has been praised by the Los Angeles Times for her “blazing enthusiasm, power, and technical assurance.” She made her solo recital debut at age 10 and her orchestral debut at 13, launching a performance career that has taken her to stages in Zurich, Tokyo, New York, Toronto, and Copenhagen. 

A dedicated educator, Ms. Yui is passionate about nurturing the next generation of musicians. Her students have won major competitions and gone on to study at top conservatories. She has held teaching positions at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto, the Peabody Institute, and the Music Institute of Chicago, and has appeared as a guest artist at festivals including the Heifetz Institute, Montecito International Music Festival, SongFest, the Ravinia Steans Institute, and directed Banff Centre’s “Art of Piano” program. Ms. Yui currently serves on the piano and chamber music faculty at the Colburn School in Los Angeles, where she teaches in both the Music Academy and Community School. She is the founder of Colburn’s Piano Camp Intensive (ages 9–13) and co-director of the Colburn–Tonebase Piano Seminar for advanced high school pianists. She is also a frequent adjudicator at competitions such as the Esther Honens and Palm Springs International Piano Competitions. Ms. Yui holds degrees from the Juilliard School, the Royal Conservatory of Music, University of Toronto, and Peabody Conservatory, where she studied with Bella Davidovich and Leon Fleisher.