TAS is fortunate to host members of the Chicago Symphony on campus on Thursday, January 24at 4:00PM. Distinguished musicians from the Chicago Symphony will teach master classes on instrumental technique and repertoire to upper school students. Other members of the Chicago Symphony will present an interactive question and answer forum on their educational and professional careers.
Community members are invited to observe the master classes and attend the presentation. Please read below for locations and biographies. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity to spend time with musicians of such exceptional caliber and to further understand the lives of professional musicians and their career pathways.
Yuan-Qing Yu, Assistant Concertmaster
Master Class 4:00-5:15PM
Room 3C48
J. Lawrie Bloom, Principal Clarinet
Master Class 4:00-5:15PM
Room 3C60
John Hagstrom, Trumpet
Oto Carillo, Horn
Cynthia Yeh, Principal Percussion
Question and Answer Forum and Master Class 4:00-5:15PM
Room 3C49
Biographies
Yuan-Qing Yu
Violin
Assistant Concertmaster
Yuan-Qing Yu joined the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in 1995. A year later, Daniel Barenboim appointed her assistant concertmaster. An international award-winning violinist, she leads an active life as a soloist, chamber musician, teacher and advocate for the Orchestra.
A native of Shanghai, China, Yuan-Qing Yu won the Chinese Nationwide Violin Competition at the age of 17. The following year, she captured second prize in the Menuhin International Violin Competition. She was awarded the grand prize in the Holland Music Sessions World Concert Tour Competition two years later. She also took third grand prize in the Jacques Thibaud International Competition in Paris.
Yuan-Qing Yu has given numerous critically acclaimed performances as featured soloist with the CSO, the Monte Carlo and Radio France philharmonics and the London City Orchestra. She has performed concertos under Christoph von Dohnányi, Sir Yehudi Menuhin and James DePreist, among others. She also has appeared in recital throughout the U.S. and Europe. An active chamber musician, Yuan-Qing Yu has collaborated with Daniel Barenboim, Pinchas Zukerman, Menahem Pressler, Lang Lang and Yo-Yo Ma. Locally, she can be seen and heard regularly throughout the city in various venues. Her performance of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons is available for download at beyondthescore.org/video_vivaldi.html.
Yuan-Qing Yu is on the faculty of Roosevelt University in Chicago and Valparaiso University in Indiana.
Yuan-Qing Yu and her CSO colleagues founded Civitas Ensemble, a nonprofit organization, in 2011. Please visit yuanqingyu.com and civitasensemble.org for more information.
J. Lawrie Bloom
Clarinet
Bass Clarinet
J. Lawrie Bloom has been heard in chamber, orchestral and concerto appearances on soprano, basset and bass clarinets. He began studying piano at the age of 4 and switched to clarinet at 9. He continued studies at the Columbus Boychoir School, and at that time came under the clarinet guidance of Roger McKinney. He later studied with Anthony Gigliotti.
Founder and artistic co-director of the Chesapeake Chamber Music Festival and the Chesapeake Chamber Music Competition, Bloom frequently performs on the Northwestern University Winter Chamber Festival and both the Chicago Symphony Orchestra chamber and MusicNOW series. During the 2011/12 season he presented two U.S. premieres of works of Thea Musgrave, first her Autumn Sonata, a bass clarinet concerto, with the CSO, with Suzanna Målkki conducting, then at the Chesapeake Chamber Music Festival he performed her "mini clarinet concerto" Towards the Blue.
Bloom is a founding member of the Chicago based chamber group the Civitas Ensemble. He has performed at the Ambler, Grand Teton, Ravinia, Skaneateles, Spoleto and Mostly Mozart festivals. He toured with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, and he has collaborated with the Chester, Chicago Symphony and Mendelssohn string quartets; the Chicago Chamber Musicians; and members of the Ridge, Orion and Vermeer string quartets. He often has been heard live on WFMT and the Australian Broadcasting Company.
In 1980, Sir Georg Solti invited Bloom to join the CSO on clarinet and solo bass clarinet. He previously held similar appointments with the Phoenix Symphony, the orchestra of the Lyric Opera of Chicago, Vancouver Symphony and Cincinnati Symphony.
Bloom is a senior lecturer in clarinet at Northwestern University. He has presented master classes all over the world, and he also is an artist performer for clarinet makers Buffet Group USA and the reed company RICO International.
John Hagstrom
Trumpet
John Hagstrom has been a member of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra's trumpet section since 1996, when he won the audition for fourth trumpet. A year later, he won the second trumpet position, carrying on the tradition of brass section teamwork for which the CSO is famous. Previously, he was principal trumpet of the Wichita Symphony Orchestra in Kansas, and served as assistant professor of trumpet at Wichita State University.
Hagstrom is passionate in his support of music education, and helped to initiate Dream Out Loud, a music education advocacy partnership between the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Association and the Yamaha Corporation of America. Dream Out Loud offers a variety of resources created for elementary through high school students, their teachers, and parents, designed to support every student'’s interest in playing an instrument, and providing encouragement through times of challenge. To learn more about Dream Out Loud, visit cso.org/dreamoutloud.
John Hagstrom has also worked extensively with Yamaha to create several professional trumpet designs in their Chicago Artist Model Series that include top selling Bb and C trumpets. Since its introduction in 2004, the Chicago Artist Model C Trumpet has been the instrument played most often by players winning orchestral positions in major U.S. orchestras. Due to its phenomenal commercial and artistic success worldwide, in 2006 Yamaha selected the Chicago Artist Model C Trumpet to be their 10 millionth instrument ever produced.
A native Chicagoan, Hagstrom grew up listening to the CSO. Five years of study at the Eastman School of Music were followed by six years in "The President's Own" United States Marine Band in Washington, D.C., where he spent three of those years as principal trumpet. His many solo appearances with the band included four national concert tours and the Camp David wedding of (Sr.) President Bush's daughter, Dorothy. Recordings featuring John Hagstrom include his performance of the Bellini Oboe Concerto& and the Sachse Concertino with the Chicago Brass Choir, and can also be heard as lead trumpet on Daniel Barenboim's recording on the Teldec label entitled Tribute to Ellington.
In June of 2006 his first solo CD (with the DePaul University Wind ensemble under the direction of Donald DeRoche) was released on the Albany Records label, about which Time Out Chicago said: "You'd never guess he was a mild-mannered second trumpeter from the hair-raising high notes... or from the way he seamlessly unfurls long lines..." (TimeOut.com)
Oto Carrillo
Horn
Oto Carrillo was appointed to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra horn section by Daniel Barenboim in 2000. A native of Guatemala, Carrillo grew up in Chicago, admiring the CSO and its wonderful horn section while receiving a bachelor’s degree in music performance from DePaul University and master’s degree in both music performance and musicology from Northwestern University. His teachers were Jon Boen, principal horn of the Lyric Opera of Chicago and Gail Williams, former associate principal of the CSO. After graduating, he won positions with the Memphis and Cedar Rapids orchestras, and he was able to continue playing in Chicago for two seasons as a member of the Civic Orchestra, coached by Dale Clevenger. He also has performed with the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Metropolitana Orchestra of Lisbon, Portugal as well as having had featured roles in Chicago-based ensembles such as the Chicago Sinfonietta, Music of the Baroque, Chicago Philharmonic and Lyric Opera of Chicago. In addition, Carrillo has played in various summer festivals with such orchestras as the National Repertory Orchestra, National Orchestral Institute, Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra, Grant Park Orchestra, Mostly Mozart Festival in Woodstock, Illinois and Grand Teton Music Festival Orchestra. Prior to his appointment to the CSO, Carrillo held positions in the South Bend and Southwest Michigan Symphony Orchestras.
Carrillo has collaborated with numerous chamber groups such as the Chicago Chamber Musicians, musicians from the MusicNow series, and he was a member of the Millar Brass Ensemble whose performances have been recorded on the Delos and Koss labels. In addition, Carrillo has been a soloist with various groups in and outside the Chicago area performing works by Bach, Strauss and Mozart, as well as giving the Chicago premiere of Augusta Read Thomas’ Silver Chants the Litanies for horn and chamber orchestra. He has collaborated with his colleagues in the CSO horn section to perform Schumann’s Concertstucke For Four Horns with the Chicago Youth Symphony, the Civic Orchestra and most recently, the CSO.
As an instructor, Carrillo has given many master classes at various institutions. Currently, he is on faculty at DePaul University and the Symphony Orchestra Academy of the Pacific (SOAP), a unique summer training program for aspiring young orchestral musicians set in British Columbia.
Outside of playing horn, Carrillo enjoys savoring and occasionally brewing excellent craft beer, woodworking, playing sports of all types especially basketball and the company of his wife Sarah, a freelance trumpet player, and their two brass playing children, Lucas and Isabelle.
Cynthia Yeh
Percussion
Principal Percussion
Cynthia Yeh joined the Chicago Symphony Orchestra as principal percussionist in June 2007. She previously served as principal percussionist for the San Diego Symphony Orchestra from 2004 to 2007.
Born in Taipei, Taiwan, Cynthia Yeh received a bachelor of music performance degree from the University of British Columbia and a master of music performance degree from Temple University in Philadelphia, where she studied with Alan Abel. She has received grants and awards from the Canada Council Grant for the Arts, British Columbia Arts Council, Sir Ernest MacMillan Memorial Foundation Award and Charles Owen Memorial Scholarship (1998).
Yeh has been featured as a soloist on Chicago’s WFMT program Live from Levin Studio. She regularly performs with the CSO’s MusicNOW ensemble as well as with various chamber ensembles throughout Chicago. She has given master classes and clinics all over the United States and Canada, including the Percussive Arts Society International Convention, Northwestern University, New World Symphony, Indiana University, Peabody Conservatory, University of Michigan and the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto. In 2009, Yeh served on the faculty at the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo, Japan and will be judging the OSM Standard Life Competition in Montreal this fall.