ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Violinist Yuyu Ikeda debuted at the age of ten with the Bellflower Symphony Orchestra. Currently based in New York, she performs with groups such as the New York Classical Players, Princeton Symphony Orchestra, and New World Symphony. In 2022-23, she served as concertmaster for the Pacific Music Festival Orchestra and assistant concertmaster for Juilliard Orchestra. Yuyu is also an active chamber musician, appearing at Juilliard’s 37th Annual Focus Festival and Merkin Hall’s Circle Winds concert. A dedicated educator, she has taught for Juilliard’s Music Advancement Program and the 2023 Artists Program Chamber Music Festival. She also regularly programs outreach concerts with Concerts in Motion and Project Music Heals Us. Yuyu holds degrees from Juilliard and Oberlin Conservatory, and is currently pursuing a Professional Performance Diploma at Manhattan School of Music. Alongside her violin studies, she also holds a Bachelors in biology from Oberlin College.
Cellist, Sonna Kim began studying the cello at the age of 9, enrolling at Juilliard Pre-College under Channing Robbins three years later. She has performed as soloist with orchestras in the US and Europe, including several performances of the Brahms Double Concerto on a tour of Hungary and Romania. She was the Geraldine R. Dodge Fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center, where she studied chamber music with Yo-Yo Ma and performed under the batons of Leonard Bernstein, Michael Tilson Thomas, Roger Norrington, and Marin Alsop, and is an alum of the Eastern, Bowdoin, Casalmaggiore, Estherwood, and other music festivals. She regularly performs chamber and contemporary music in New York City, and appears frequently at Carnegie Hall and Alice Tully Hall as a freelance orchestral player. She studied at the Juilliard School with Channing Robbins and Ardyth Alton, and at New England Conservatory with Lawrence Lesser. She is also a graduate of Princeton, MIT and Parsons.
Pianist & music arranger, Alexander A. Wu joined the elite roster of Yamaha performing artists in 2010. The Washington Post praised, “Wu’s exuberant etudes on Gershwin songs and the dreamy Ellington’s Reflections in D – sounded assured and settled….he is uncommonly attractive and entertaining.” Mr. Wu performs on the international stages as a soloist, music arranger and collaborative chamber player, also engaging audiences with his inspired “concert with commentary” programs, in Europe, Asia and South America. Recently, Mr. Wu has given concerts and master classes that include the Millennium Stage at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Smithsonian Institute Museums, National Gallery of Art, Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, 92NY, Merkin Concert Hall, Armor Hall at Wave Hill, Bargemusic, Bard College, Mannes College-The New School, Hofstra University, Trinity Church Wall Street, Florida Atlantic University and Musikfest (PA). Mr. Wu’s discography, available on cdbaby.com and iTunes.com, includes; his two solo cds - Bach to the Future: Classical & Jazz Piano and Rhythm Road across the Americas, a piano four-hand broadway to classical cd - Four Hand Band, a crossover chamber jazz band cd -ZigZag Quartet and the much anticipated all George Gershwin piano solo cd to be released in spring 2025. Mr. Wu is on the piano and chamber music faculty at Third Street Music School in the East Village and the artistic director and founder of the LLC Project —Going the Distance Players in New York City. For more please visit www.chamber-music.org/member/alexanderawu