L. A. Musical Salon

Lyris Quartet

Saturday, April 3, 2010

LYRIS QUARTET

Lyris brings together maturity, experience, and love of chamber music to focus on the vast and exciting quartet repertoire.

This season, the Lyris Quartet will be featured at the Long Beach Opera as well as the South Bay Chamber Music Series, Sundays Live at LACMA, and the Los Angeles Musical Salon.  They will also make their debut in Spain this fall.

ALYSSA PARK, violin

Alyssa Park established an enviable international reputation at age sixteen for being the youngest prizewinner in the history of the Tchaikovsky International Competition.  In addition to being awarded the bronze medal in 1990, she was also honored by the jury for being the most promising talent, most artistic performer, most interesting personality, and for displaying the best mastery of the instrument.

Ms. Park has made numerous recital and orchestral appearances in this country since her professional debut at age eleven with the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra.  Her New York City debut recital at Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall was critically acclaimed by The New York Times for "an unusually strong technique and a youthful sense of music-making."  Other notable credits include the Ravinia Festival's Rising Star Series, Kennedy Center Recital Series, Oregon Bach Festival, and Rockefeller University in New York City.

Performing extensively every season throughout Europe, Ms. Park made her European debut in 1991 with Sir Colin Davis and the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra.  Soon after she made appearances with the Lausanne Chamber Orchestra, the Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra, and the Czech Philharmonic. 

Her performance with the Austrian Radio Symphony at Vienna's Musikverein was featured in a live radio and television broadcast throughout Europe.  Ms. Park has toured Germany with the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra, the Czech Philharmonic, the Barcelona Orchestra, Mitteldeutsche Rundfunk at the Leipzig Gewandhaus, the Hamburg Philharmonic, and in Spain, Switzerland and Austria with the Cincinnati Symphony.  She also appeared as soloist with the orchestras of Sydney, Adelaide, and Tasmania, Australia.

Ms. Park’s recent seasons included performances in Asia with the Korean Broadcasting Symphony, Japan Philharmonic, and the Singapore Symphony.  She was also featured with the Berlin Radio Orchestra, Frankfurt Radio Orchestra, Lisbon Symphony, Salzburger Kammerphilharmonie, and the Munich Philharmonic; and made her debut at Italy’s Ravello Festival and Holland’s Royal Concertgebouw.

An avid chamber musician as well, Ms. Park has been a frequent guest at major festivals including Ludwigsburg, Schleswig-Holstein, Weilburg, Passau, Frankfurt, Montpellier, France, the Brahms festival in Madrid, Beethoven Festival in Bonn, Prague Summer Festival, and Oregon Festival of American Music.

Ms. Park was a winner of the Aspen Music Festival's concerto competition in 1988, and returned in 1996 to teach.  She was a student at the University of Cincinnati's College Conservatory of Music.  Her teachers were Kurt Sassmanshaus and Dorothy DeLay.  She now resides in Los Angeles.

SHALINI VIJAYAN, violin

Shalini Vijayan, deemed “ a vibrant violinist” by Mark Swed of the Los Angeles Times is an established performer and collaborator on both coasts.  A native of California, she studied in New York as a scholarship student at the Manhattan School of Music, where she received her B.M. and M.M. degrees under the tutelage of Ariana Bronne and Lucie Robert.

As an advocate for modern music, Ms. Vijayan was a founding member and is Principal Second Violin of Kristjan Jarvi’s Absolute Ensemble, having recorded several albums with them including 2001 Grammy nominee, Absolution.  As a part of Absolute, she has performed throughout the United States and Europe, most notably in London's Barbican Hall and the Konzerthaus in Vienna.  The group has premiered works by John Zorn, Daniel Schnyder, Ezequiel Vinao and Charles Coleman, among others, and has worked closely with soloists such as Thomas Hampson, Simone Dinnerstein and Napoleon Murphy Brock.

A member of the New World Symphony in Miami Beach, Florida, from 1998-2001, she served as concertmaster for Michael Tilson Thomas, John Adams, Reinbert de Leeuw and Oliver Knussen. She was also concertmaster for the world premiere performances and recording of Steven Mackey's Tuck and Roll for RCA records in 2000.

In Los Angeles, Ms. Vijayan is featured regularly with Grammy Award-winning Southwest Chamber Music and can be heard on their Complete Chamber Works of Carlos Chávez, Vol. 3.  She is one half of the duo 61/4, with percussionist Lynn Vartan, which will be featured on the Southwest Chamber Music season this January.  She will also be a soloist for the world premiere of Chinary Ung’s Spiral XII at Disney Hall with the Los Angeles Master Chorale this November.

Currently, Ms. Vijayan is a member of the Pacific Symphony Orchestra as well as Principal Second Violin of the Opera Pacific Orchestra.  She has been on the faculty of the Sequoia Chamber Music Workshop in Arcata, California, since 2003.

LUKE MAURER, viola

Violist Luke Maurer, a native of Santa Barbara, California, began his musical studies on the violin with his father. He received his B.M. and M.M. degrees in viola performance from the USC Thornton School of Music, studying with Donald McInnes and Ralph Fielding.

Mr. Maurer performs extensively throughout Southern California as an orchestral and chamber musician.  He is a member of the Pacific Symphony and performs regularly with the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

Timothy Loo, “a commanding young cellist who contributed to a fervent performance of Tchaikowsky’s Rococo Variations…” Alan Rich, LA Weekly, currently resides in Los Angeles.  He is a co-founder and principal cellist of Mladi, LA’s conductorless chamber orchestra.  Mr. Loo also performs with New West Symphony, Los Angeles Opera Orchestra, and the California E.A.R. Unit.

Mr. Loo has participated in master classes with Joel Krosnick, Andrew Shulman, Bernhard Greenhouse and David Geringas at the Leonard Rose Competition, Ronald Leonard, Tsyoshi Tsutsumi, the Vermeer Quartet, and the Juilliard Quartet.

His orchestral training began in 1992 with the American Youth Symphony and Young Musician's Foundation Debut Orchestra.  In 1998, he won a position in the Philharmonie der Nationen in Hamburg, Germany.  

In 2000, Mr. Loo was awarded an Advanced Studies Certificate with Ronald Leonard at the USC Thornton School of Music; and has studied with Barbara Wirth, Rowena Hammill, Andrew Cook, Hans Jorgen Jensen, and Ronald Leonard.

“ (Loo)…a more rapturous player …(performed) Debussy’s neo-classical cello sonata. The fire and ice of the cello and piano seemed just about right.” -- Mark Swed, Los Angeles Times