Live from Jones Hall: Schubert’s Octet

Acclaimed as “a wonderfully talented violinist…whose sound and technique go well beyond her years,” violinist, Yoonshin Song was born in South Korea, where she began her musical studies at age 5. Making her solo debut with the Seoul Philharmonic at age 11, she has since built a successful performing career throughout Korea, the United States, and Europe. In April 2019, the Houston Symphony named Yoonshin as its new concertmaster beginning in August 2019. From 2012 to 2019, she was the concertmaster of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, where she has enjoyed close collaborations with inspiring guest artists such as Gil Shaham, Joshua Bell, and Jamie Laredo.

Yoonshin has earned many prestigious prizes throughout her career, including top prize awards in the Lipizer International Violin Competition in Italy; the Lipinski & Wieniawski International Violin Competition in Poland; the Henry Marteau International Violin Competition in Germany; and first prize at the Stradivarius International Competition in the United States. In her native South Korea, Yoonshin has won virtually all of the major violin competitions.

As a soloist, she has performed with many orchestras around the world, including the Houston Symphony, the Detroit Symphony, the Utah Symphony, the New Mexico Philharmonic Orchestra,the Bayreuth Festival Orchestra, the Paul Constantinescu Philharmonic Orchestra, the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra, and the KBS Philharmonic Orchestra. She has appeared as a soloist and chamber musician in numerous music festivals, including the Marlboro, Deer Valley, Great Lakes, and Aspen music festivals in the United States; the Miyazaki Chamber Music Festival in Japan; and the Verbier, Lucerne, and Bayreuth festivals in Europe. Her engagements as a soloist throughout next season include concertos by Beethoven, Mozart, Shostakovich, and Bruch.

MuChen (Jessica) Hsieh, from Taiwan, joined the Houston Symphony as principal second violin in 2017. Prior to her appointment in Houston, she worked with conductors including Thomas Adès, Charles Dutoit, Larry Rachleff, David Robertson, Joshua Weilerstein, and Hugh Wolff. She studied with Kathleen Winkler at the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University, and Malcolm Lowe and Masuko Ushioda at the New England Conservatory.

Hsieh regularly performs recitals, chamber music concerts, and in orchestras in the United States and Taiwan. Her festival performances include New York String Orchestra, Sarasota Festival Orchestra, and Music Academy of the West Festival Orchestra. Hsieh has served as concertmaster of the Shepherd School Symphony Orchestra on numerous occasions, including for the orchestra’s 2016 tour to Carnegie Hall. She has also performed with the New York Philharmonic as a Zarin Mehta Global Academy Fellow.

An avid chamber musician, she has collaborated with James Dunham, Jon Kimura Parker, Kathleen Winkler, and Larry Wheeler. When Hsieh is home in Taiwan, she enjoys organizing chamber music concerts with friends. She also has a passion for coaching and leading local orchestra concerts during the summer in Taiwan with the concertmaster of the National Taiwan Symphony Orchestra, Ray-Chou Chang.

Aside from playing violin, Hsieh enjoys cooking and baking with friends, jogging, or dreaming about getting a dog.

Joan DerHovsepian, viola, became a member of the Houston Symphony in 1999 after serving two seasons as Principal Viola of the Charleston Symphony Orchestra in South Carolina. She is an instructor at Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music and was a member of the prize-winning Everest String Quartet, which performed throughout the United States and Canada. She performs each summer at the Grand Teton Music Festival in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and at the Peninsula Music Festival in Door County, Wisconsin.

Cellist Brinton Averil Smith continues to win rave reviews for virtuosic performances with musical ideals rooted in the golden age of string playing. His debut recording of Miklós Rózsa’s Cello Concerto with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra won widespread international critical acclaim, with Gramophone praising Smith as a “hugely eloquent, impassioned soloist,” and his recording of the chamber music of Fauré with Gil Shaham was chosen by numerous critics as one of the year’s best albums. A passionate advocate of compelling unfamiliar repertoire, Smith recently gave the North American premieres of rediscovered works of Jean Sibelius and Alexander Zemlinsky. Smith’s performances, hailed as “stunningly beautiful” by the American Record Guide, have been broadcast on CBS’s Sunday Morning and on the radio throughout the United States, including American Public Media’s Performance Today and SymphonyCast.

Smith has appeared regularly as a soloist with the Houston Symphony since joining the orchestra as Principal Cellist in 2005. Prior to this appointment, he was the first musician chosen by Lorin Maazel to join the New York Philharmonic and was Principal Cellist of the San Diego and Fort Worth Symphonies. As a chamber musician, Smith has collaborated with artists including Yo-Yo Ma, Gil Shaham, Cho-Liang Lin, James Ehnes, Lynn Harrell, Sarah Chang, Dawn Upshaw, and members of the Beaux Arts Trio and the Guarneri, Emerson, Juilliard, Cleveland, and Berg quartets. Smith is also a faculty member of the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University and Aspen Music Festival.

The son of a mathematician and a pianist, Smith was admitted to Arizona State University at age 10, where he took courses in mathematics, music, and German. At age 17, Smith completed a Bachelor of Arts in Mathematics. He then became a student of Eleonore Schoenfeld at the University of Southern California, where he was also a teaching assistant in the mathematics department, and completed work for a Master of Arts in Mathematics at age 19. He subsequently studied with the renowned cellist Zara Nelsova at The Juilliard School, where he received a Doctor of Musical Arts, disserting on the playing of Emanuel Feuermann. Smith resides in Houston with his wife, pianist Evelyn Chen, their daughter, Calista, and two slightly evil, but kind-hearted dogs. For further information, please visit www.brintonaverilsmith.com

Robin Kesselman was appointed Principal Bass of the Houston Symphony by Music Director Andrés Orozco-Estrada in 2014. He has performed as Guest Principal Bass with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra and Israel Philharmonic, travelled internationally with the Philadelphia Orchestra and Los Angeles Philharmonic, and appeared with the National, Atlanta, and Baltimore Symphonies.

Kesselman frequently performs as a soloist and chamber musician and presents recital programs and masterclasses at various universities across the country. He has appeared as soloist with the Houston Symphony in subscription performances of the Koussevitzky Concerto for Double Bass, and he was featured in Krzysztof Penderecki’s Duo Concertante during the composer’s Carnegie Hall residency in collaboration with the Curtis Institute. Recent festival engagements include leading the bass sections of the Grand Teton, Mainly Mozart, and Arizona Musicfest festival orchestras. He has also served as faculty for the National Youth Orchestra of the United States of America, Curtis Institute’s Summerfest, the Richard Davis Bass Conference, and the summer residency of the Filarmónica Joven de Colombia.

Kesselman holds a Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Southern California and an Artist Diploma from the Curtis Institute of Music. His primary teachers have included David Allen Moore, Harold Robinson, Edgar Meyer, Paul Ellison, Chris Hanulik, and Virginia Dixon.

Mark Nuccio began his position as principal clarinet with the Houston Symphony in the 2016–17 season after 17 years with the New York Philharmonic. He also serves as clarinet faculties at both Northwestern University in Chicago and the University of Houston’s Moores School of Music. Nuccio joined the New York Philharmonic in 1999 as Associate Principal and Solo E-flat Clarinetist and served as Acting principal Clarinet with the New York Philharmonic from 2009 to 2013. Prior to his tenure in New York, he held positions with orchestras in Pittsburgh, Denver, Savannah, and Florida, working with distinguished conductors such as Lorin Maazel, Kurt Masur, Mariss Jansons, Riccardo Muti, Zubin Mehta, Erich Leinsdorf, Bernard Haitink, Claudio Abbado, Riccardo Chailly, André Previn, Christoph von Dohnányi, and Gustavo Dudamel. A Colorado native, Nuccio was recently awarded the Distinguished Alumni Award from his alma mater, the University of Northern Colorado. He also holds a master’s degree from Northwestern University where he studied with renowned pedagogue Robert Marcellus.

Principal bassoonist Rian Craypo has been with the Houston Symphony since 2007. Born in Virginia, she moved to Texas at 10 months of age and grew up east of Austin in a small intentional community.

After studying at the University of Texas at Austin with Kristin Wolfe Jensen, she attended Rice University, where she received her master’s degree under former Houston Symphony Principal Bassoon Benjamin Kamins.

In 2001, she was awarded a Federation of German/American Clubs Scholarship, which led to a year of study and performances in Germany and was a finalist in the Gillet-Fox International Bassoon Competition in both 2004 and 2006. Rian serves on the board of MOTHS (Musicians of the Houston Symphony) which presents Houston Symphony musicians several times a year in intimate and engaging chamber settings. Rian is also the author of a book about bassoon reed making, published in 2017. She and her husband Sean have three children.

Hailed as “one of today’s superstars of the international brass scene,” William VerMeulen leads a varied musical life of soloist, orchestral principal, chamber musician, master teacher, and music publisher. VerMeulen has been principal horn of the Houston Symphony since 1990 and has performed as a guest principal horn with the Chicago Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Cincinnati Symphony, St. Louis Symphony, Pittsburgh Symphony, and St. Paul Chamber Orchestra. Prior to joining the Houston Symphony, he was employed with the orchestras of Columbus, Honolulu, and Kansas City.

VerMeulen has been an artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and participates as a performer and on faculty with the finest music festivals and chamber music presenters, among which include the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Aspen Music Festival, Music@Menlo, Banff Centre, Da Camera of Houston, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Joshua Bell and Friends, Tanglewood, Sarasota Music Festival, Strings Music Festival, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Orcas Island Chamber Music Festival, New World Symphony, Domaine Forget, Chamber Music Northwest, and the Sun Valley Summer Symphony where he also serves as principal horn.

VerMeulen has performed to critical acclaim on four continents as a soloist and chamber musician and is a popular artist at International Horn Society Symposiums where he was a member of the advisory council. He serves as a board member of the International Horn Competition of America. Along with the dozens of orchestral recordings in his discography are numerous solo and chamber recordings, including the complete Mozart Horn Concerti with Christoph Eschenbach and the Houston Symphony, Texas Horns featuring the Dallas and Houston horn sections, and “The Christmas Horn” which features VerMeulen combined with his students from Rice University, conducted by Dale Clevenger. He has recorded live the Brahms Trio op. 40, Mozart Quintet K. 407, Beethoven Septet, Ravel Tombeau de Couperin for wind quintet, Schubert Octet, Spohr Nonet, Ligeti Bagatelles, and the Bach Brandenburg Concerto No. 1. A champion of new music, VerMeulen has had numerous pieces written for him including concerti by esteemed American composers Samuel Adler, Pierre Jalbert, Tony DiLorenzo, and the horn cantata “Canticum Sacrum” by Robert Bradshaw. He recorded the Canto XI by Samuel Adler for a CD called First Chairs. Among his awards and honors, VerMeulen received first prize at the 1980 International Horn Society Soloist Competition and the Shapiro Award for Most Outstanding Brass Player at the Tanglewood Festival.

Regarded as one of the most influential horn teachers of all time, VerMeulen is a professor of horn at the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University and brass artist-in-residence at the Royal Conservatory of Music’s Glenn Gould School. His students perform in numerous major orchestras throughout the world including the New York Philharmonic, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Israel Philharmonic, Canadian Brass, Cleveland Orchestra, and the San Francisco, Cincinnati, Montreal, St. Louis, Toronto, Detroit, Dallas, and Houston Symphonies. Over 250 positions of employment have been offered to his students. In 1985, he was invited to the White House to receive a Distinguished Teacher of America Certificate of Excellence from President Reagan and the White House Commission on Presidential Scholars.

VerMeulen received his training from Dale Clevenger at Northwestern University and the Interlochen Arts Academy and is founder and president of VerMeulen Music, L.L.C., which offers music and products for horn players worldwide at www.vermeulenmusic.com

VerMeulen is married to Houston Opera and Ballet violinist Sylvia VerMeulen, and they have two lovely children, Michael and Nicole. In his rare free time, he enjoys having good friends over to share in his passion for fine cooking and wine.