Elizabeth Chang

Elizabeth Chang, violinist, enjoys a dynamic career as performer, teacher, and arts administrator. She is currently Professor of Violin at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and a faculty member of the Pre-College Division of the Juilliard School, and previously served on the faculties of Rutgers and New York University.

Throughout her career, Ms. Chang has embraced leadership roles in the arts community. In September 2021, she was appointed Artistic Director of Green Mountain Chamber Music Festival, one of the pre-eminent summer study programs for string players. She is also founder and director/co-director of the Lighthouse Chamber Players, Five College New Music Festival, and the UMass Amherst Bach Festival and Symposium, among other projects. She has an active chamber music career, collaborating with some of the most prominent artists in the field, and has appeared as soloist, chamber musician, and master class teacher in South America, Europe, and Asia.

In 2024, Ms. Chang released the critically acclaimed CD Sonatas and Myths: Works by Szymanowsi, Dohnanyi and Bartok with pianist Steven Beck on Bridge Records. A native New Yorker, Ms. Chang is a graduate of Harvard University and was the recipient of the Presidential Scholar in the Arts Award. She was a student of Louise Behrend, Joseph Fuchs, Roman Totenberg, Max Rostal, Leon Kirchner, and Luise Vosgerchian.

Ann Ellsworth 

Called “outrageous” and “splendidly projected” by the New York Times, Ann Ellsworth is a versatile soloist, collaborative, and recording artist. Her creative approach to interpretation and shameless repurposing of music from all periods and styles has earned her some notoriety in multiple countries. The Huffington Post called her premiere of a piece for Alphorn, “meticulously planned and executed…as fresh and exalted as Alpine air.”

Her three solos, “EUPHORIA,” “Rain Coming,” “Late Night Thoughts,” “Leningrad” and “Fugue State” are adventurous but cohesive mix tapes of new works, previously unrecorded works, works which arguably should still be in progress, and arrangements of works for horn in mixed ensembles. Her sound world has been called “dream-like,” “other planetary,” and “musically dangerous” by her colleagues.

Ann has toured internationally as a member of Kristjan Jarve’s Absolute Ensemble, the Manhattan Brass, the Danish Esbjerg Ensemble, and numerous other musical and artistic configurations. As an artist-in-residence at the Lang College of the New School, she led many groundbreaking interdisciplinary events involving improvisation, dance, videography, and landscape architecture. An advocate of new music, Ann was a founding member of the New Music and Culture Symposium and loves working with composers and premiering new works.

She has performed with such popular artists as Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles, and Diana Ross and can be heard on numerous television theme songs, commercials, and movie soundtracks. Ann Ellsworth attended the Eastman and Juilliard Schools, with further study in Oslo and St. Petersburg, Russia. She is a former member of the Phoenix Symphony and has held faculty positions at numerous schools in the New York City area, including Stony Brook, The CUNY Graduate Center, and New York University. Born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, Ann Ellsworth is currently an Associate Professor of Horn at Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin.

Sylvia Wang

A native of Penang, Malaysia, Sylvia Wang has presented solo and collaborative performances throughout the Americas, Europe, and the Far East. She has recorded for the Newport Classic label and Boston Records, and contemporary American music for Northeastern and CRI labels. She has been the winner and finalist in various competitions, including the Royal Overseas League Festival in London, an AVANTI award leading to a debut in London’s Purcell Room, the Yellow Springs Chamber Music Competition, and the J.S. Bach International Piano Competition. Recent activities include guest classes at the Hong Kong Academy of Performing Arts and Hong Kong Baptist University, the Yong Siew Toh Conservatory in Singapore, guest judging at the University of Michigan and the Peabody Conservatory, and a six-city concert tour of China. She has also been a guest at the Chautauqua Institution, Sydney Conservatorium of Music, and the University of Western Australia in Perth. She acknowledges her debt to David Burge at the Eastman School of Music and Hamish Milne and Dennis Murdoch at the Royal Academy of Music, which she attended as an Associated Board scholar. In recognition of “distinction in the field”, the Academy awarded her an honorary Associate of the Royal Academy of Music.