Musical Celebration of Friendship, Hope & Healing

June 15, 2025 @ 4:00PM — 6:00PM Eastern Time (US & Canada) Add to Calendar

Westminster Presbyterian Church: 2080 Boulevard West Hartford, CT 06107 Get Directions

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CONCERT PROGRAM

Abime des Oiseux Oliver Messiaen
Duo for Violin and Cello Zoltan Kodaly

WORLD PREMIERE: Tama-No-Ura Taige Wang

Trio for Clarinet, Cello and Piano Andrzej Anweiler

14-year-old Taige Wang, a Young Steinway Artist and a young scholar of the Lang Lang International Music Foundation, studies piano at The Juilliard School with Yoheved Kaplinsky.

Taige started learning piano and gave his first public performance at the age of four. The next year, he performed live on China Central Television and won his first competition at the regional Steinway & Sons Competition. By the age of seven, he gave his first full solo recital by invitation of Steinway & Sons.

Since then, Taige has had numerous piano competition wins to his name, including the YAMAHA Piano E Competition, Los Angeles International Liszt Competition, Chicago International Music Competition, and Rosalyn Tureck International Bach Piano Competition, etc.

In 2023, as the youngest competitor, Taige made the quarterfinals at The Cliburn Junior Competition and was one of the three finalists at the Thomas and Evon Cooper International Piano Competition, where he performed with the world-renowned The Cleveland Orchestra.

Taige appeared on the show NPR’s From the Top in 2021 and at From The Top’s 2022 Gala, in which he was the youngest of three nationally-selected musicians. He has played at various prestigious venues, including Carnegie Hall Stern Auditorium, Nixon Presidential Library Museum, Lincoln Center, Severance Hall, and Henan Grand Theater (China).

Taige studies composition with Bruce Adolphe. As a prize-winning composer, his piano trio Chopin vs Chopin 2.0 was commissioned by the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, and he performed its debut at Alice Tully Hall on April 16, 2023.

Taige received the American President’s Volunteer Service Gold Award in 2022.

ClevelandClassical.com:
“His playing was amazing — strong, virtuosic, and appropriately mischievous.”

New York Concert Review:
“Mercurial mood changes, extreme dynamics, and elements of atonality all contribute to the difficulty of this set (William Bolcom’s Nine Bagatelles), but young Mr. Wang was up to all of it!”

Cellist, Jennifer Combs, is enjoying a musical journey full of variety serving as a chamber musician, soloist, orchestral musician, and teacher. Her extensive chamber music collaborations have included appearances with the world-renowned Chicago Chamber Musicians, the Garth Newel Music Center, the "Bang on a Can" festival at Alice Tully Hall with the Cassatt Quartet, a sold-out New Year's Celebration at Carnegie Hall with dear friends performing both of the Brahms String Sextets, as well as performances at Eastern Music Festival with violinists Miriam Fried and Franco Gulli. Ms. Combs also served for ten years as the Artistic Director of her own festival for young musicians and for adult amateur musicians held at the legendary Music Mountain in Falls Village, Connecticut. Jennifer and her late husband, pianist, Andrzej Anweiler, toured the US as a collaborative duo including a celebrated recital at the Steinway Gallery in Bonita Springs, Florida.
As a soloist, Jennifer has performed often and with re-invitations with the Connecticut Virtuosi Chamber Orchestra, the New Britain Symphony, the Connecticut Valley Chamber Orchestra, the Brighton Symphony, the Port Charlotte Symphony, the Eastern Symphony Orchestra, and the South Orange Symphony.
Jennifer deeply cherishes her teaching duties. She has taught music at the Eastern Music Festival, the Hartford Conservatory, the Greater Hartford Arts Academy and, since 2005, she has been a member of the chamber music faculty for the Pre-College at The Juilliard School working weekly with and supporting nine chamber music groups made up of many of the world's most gifted and advanced young artists.

Praised as a “stylish clarinetist” by *The New York Times*, Korean-American clarinetist Paul Wonjin Cho is a member of the Hartford Symphony Orchestra and Binghamton Philharmonic. He recently performed with The Cleveland Orchestra during their Miami residency and European tour, and continues to appear with them in Cleveland. Cho has also been a guest principal clarinetist with the American, New Haven, Vermont Symphony Orchestras, and Orchestra Lumos.

In New York City, Cho is a core member of Decoda, an ensemble affiliated with Carnegie Hall, and has performed with the Philadelphia Orchestra, Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, Orchestra of St. Luke’s, The Knights, Ensemble Échappé, and Ensemble NYC. A dedicated educator, Cho has taught at The Juilliard School’s MAP program, Manhattan School of Music, NYU, Skidmore College, and Vassar College. He currently serves on the faculty at the Horace Mann School.

Cho is passionate about expanding music education globally, having led outreach programs in Bangladesh, the Dominican Republic, and Haiti. He holds degrees from the Korean National University of Arts, Seoul National University, the University of Southern California, and the Yale School of Music, where he studied with Dong-Jin Kim, Yehuda Gilad, and David Shifrin. Cho is also an alum of Ensemble Connect, formerly Ensemble ACJW, at Carnegie Hall and is an endorsed artist of F. A. Uebel Clarinets.

Katalin Viszmeg is a native of Hungary, started playing the violin at an early age. Katalin earned her Bachelor’s and Master’s Degrees in Budapest at the prestigious Franz Liszt Music Academy. She also completed an Artist Diploma as part of the 20/20 Chamber Music Program at the Hartt School.

She received top prizes at the Hungarian National Violin Solo Competition, the Hungarian National Chamber Music Competition, garnered top prize at the International Chamber Music Ensemble Competition held in Boston, and won the Paranov Concerto Competition at the Hartt School of Music.

As a chamber player, she debuted at Carnegie Hall as a member of the Sylveen String Quartet. She collaborated with clarinetist and two-time Grammy Award winner, Larry Combs, as well as members of the Amelia Piano Trio and the Alturas Duo. As a soloist, she has performed with various ensembles in Hungary, Italy and the United States, including the Bela Bartok Youth Orchestra, Sandor Frigyes Chamber Orchestra, Connecticut Virtuosi Chamber Orchestra, and the Hartt Symphony.

Katalin is currently on the faculty of the Hartt Community School, violinist of the Clara Piano Trio and Artistic Director of the Simsbury Chamber Music Festival. She frequently plays with the Hartford Symphony, New Haven Symphony and the Waterbury Symphony.

An avid chamber musician, Melinda Daetsch has performed with the Lion’s Gate Trio, The Claremont Trio, The St Petersburg Quartet, the Philadelphia Piano quartet, and has collaborated with members of the Philadelphia Orchestra at the Mt Gretna and Luzerne Chamber Music festivals. She has also performed at the The Assisi Performing Arts Festival, (Italy), The Banff Arts Center (Canada), The Yehudi Menuhin Festival (Switzerland), and with Chamber Music Charleston (SC). She has performed with numerous orchestras in the US and abroad, and currently she serves as Principal viola for the Music at Penn’s Woods Festival at Penn State University. She also holds the Andre Jagendorf viola chair with the Cayuga Chamber Orchestra.

Ms Daetsch received a Master’s in viola performance from The Juilliard School. While there, her quartet received acclaim from the New York Times for their performance of Schoenberg’s seldom heard work “Ode to Napoleon” on the FOCUS! Festival of Contemporary Music. She holds a BA with honors in comparative religion from Harvard University where she worked closely with composer and chamber music coach Leon Kirchner. She joined the faculty of the Hartt School in 2002 after having served as the String Director of the State College Suzuki Program and conductor of the Central Pennsylvania Youth Chamber Orchestra for 9 years. She serves currently as the Chair of Chamber Music and Viola Coordinator at the Hartt Community Division and on the college viola, chamber music, and pedagogy faculty.

Daetsch is passionate about teaching as well as performing and has served as a guest artist and clinician at string workshops and festivals both abroad and in the United States. She has a special interest in musical ambassadorship and has led several successful European concert tours of young musicians. In the wake of 9/11 she and her colleagues at the State College Suzuki Program organized a special concert at Ground Zero for the children of a New York City public school. She is especially interested in using music as a tool to bring joy and to overcome difficulties in life and is very grateful to her mentors and to her parents for making it possible for her.
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