The Melbourne Chamber Music Society is excited to announce a fundraising event at the home of Cliff and Sarah Bragdon, 228 Loggerhead Dr. in Melbourne Beach. The event will take place from 3-5 pm on Sunday February 26, 2017. Wine and light hor dourves will be served and several items will be available for bidding via a silent auction. Tickets are limited to just 60 total so don’t delay!
Of course the highlight will be the music! We are thrilled about the musicians who will be playing for us. Here are some brief bio’s on them:
Ayako Yonetani, DMA, violinist and violist, was born in Kobe, Japan, where, at the age of five, she began violin studies with the famous Saburo Sumi. Since winning the Japan National competition at age nine, She quickly ascended to the top ranks of Japan’s violinists.
Yonetani received her Bachelors, Masters, and Doctoral degrees from the Juilliard School where she studied with Hyo Kang and the late Dorothy DeLay, world-renowned violin pedagogue, who taught such artists as Perlman, Midori, Cho-Liang Lin, Gil Shaham and Sarah Chang. Since 1989 she has assisted the late Dorothy DeLay at the Juilliard pre-college division and at the Aspen Music Festival and School. She held the Issac Stern concertmaster chair of the Academy Orchestra at the Aspen Music Festival and School in 2001 and 2002.
After Yonetani moved to the US in 1982, she has appeared frequently as a recitalist in major cities such as New York, San Francisco, Atlanta, Chicago, Minneapolis and Orlando. Since 1998, she has performed over 300 concerts including 100 international concerts on three continents. These appearances included numerous solo recitals, solos with orchestras, chamber music and ensemble performances. These concerts took place in prestigious venues such as Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, Salzburg’s Mozarteum, Vienna’s Musikverrein, Tokyo’s Kioi Hall, Slovak Republic’s Dome Umenia, Dresden’s Semperoper, and Astana City Hall in Kazakhstan.
Cellist Si-Yan Darren Li made his professional debut at the age of nine and has gone on to an active career as recitalist, chamber musician, and teacher. He has appeared at Carnegie Hall’s Stern Auditorium, Weill Recital Hall, Alice Tully Hall, Merkin Hall, the 92nd Street Y, Kennedy Center, Victoria Concert Hall in Singapore, Izumi Hall in Osaka, Kitara Concert Hall in Sapporo, National Concert Hall in Taipei, and the Basilica de San Lorenzo in Florence.
Mr. Li has received top prizes in numerous prestigious competitions, including the Tchaikovsky International Competition in Moscow, the Young Concert Artists International Auditions in New York, and the Young Artists Competition of Mann Center for the Performing Arts in Philadelphia. He was also a recipient of the “American Masterpieces” grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.
Pianist Sally Cook holds a B.M. degree in music performance from the University of Alabama and a M.M degree in music performance from the American Conservatory of Music in Chicago. Mrs. Cook is currently on the faculty of the Eastern Florida State College where she teaches studio piano as well as keyboard harmony. She is highly regarded as an accompanist throughout Central Florida and also maintains a private piano studio in Malabar.
