Our 2009/2010 Season
March 14, 2010
Jennifer Stumm, viola
First Prize, 2006 Concert Artists Guild International Competition
Violist Jennifer Stumm is internationally recognized as a musical innovator and dynamic advocate for her instrument. Ms Stumm is the winner of three major competitions: Concert Artist Guild in 2006, where she took First Prize as the first solo violist in the nearly 60-year history of the Competition; and the William Primrose and Geneva Competitions in 2005. Also in 2005, Ms Stumm was honored with an award from the Vriendenkrans of Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw.
Hailed as “outstanding” by The Strad, Ms Stumm began the 2008-09 season with recitals on New York’s downtown River-to-River Festiva’s Summer Stars series and Chicago’s Dame Myra Hess series. As a concerto soloist, she teams up with violinist Michi Wiancko for performances of Mozart’s Sinfonia Concertante with the Dupage (IL) Symphony and Bangor (ME) Symphony.
Recent appearances of note include debuts at Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, the famed “Grachten” Festival in Amsterdam, the Kennedy Center (on the Washington Performing Arts Society series) and the Ravinia Festival’s Rising Stars Series, as well as appearances at Wigmore Hall in London, the International Viola Congress (in Montreal and Arizona) and the Kilkenny Festival in Ireland.
Jennifer Stumm is violist of the acclaimed London-based Aronowitz Ensemble, resident New Generation Artists at the BBC, and is a regular participant at the International Musicians Seminar at Prussia Cove, both in Cornwall, England, and on tour. Her collaborative partners have included members of the Beaux Arts Trio, Guarneri, Vermeer and Alban Berg Quartets, the period ensemble L’Archibudelli and pianist Christopher O’Riley. She regularly performs at prominent festivals such as Marlboro, Verbier, Spoleto and Aldeburgh.
A native of Atlanta, Jennifer Stumm began viola studies at the age of eight in her school’s orchestra programs. Ms Stumm holds a Bachelors of Music degree from Philadelphia’s Curtis Institute, as a student of Karen Tuttle. She also earned a Masters of Music degree at the Juilliard School. Currently, she divides her time between musical commitments in the US and Europe, where her recent mentors have been Violist Nobuko Imai and cellist Steven Isserlis.
Tom Poster, piano
Born in 1981, Tom studied with Joan Havill at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, where he held a Postgraduate Fellowship, and at King’s College, Cambridge, where he gained a Double First in Music.
Since his London concerto debut at the age of 13, Tom has appeared in a wide-ranging concerto repertoire of 30 major works, with orchestras and conductors including the BBC Philharmonic/Yan Pascal Tortelier; China National Symphony/En Shao; St Petersburg State Capella Philharmonic; and European Union Chamber Orchestra. He has given solo recitals at concert halls and festivals throughout the UK, in Bonn, Hamburg, Leipzig, Lugano, Paris and the Channel Islands, and on several occasions at the Spoleto Festival, by personal invitation of the late Gian Carlo Menotti.
In 2007, Tom won First Prize in the Scottish International Piano Competition, where he also received the prize for the best performance of the especially commissioned work by Judith Weir. Earlier competition successes included winning the keyboard sections of the Royal-Seas League and BBC Young Musician of the Year Competitions in 2000. Tom has broadcast extensively on BBC Radio 3 and on international radio and TV stations, and has recorded works by Thomas Adès for EMI.
More at www.tomposter.co.uk