Cellist Drake Driscoll has established herself as both a versatile performer and advocate for social change through music. Her commitment to the arts includes a significant component of administrative and community work in addition to her performance and teaching opportunities as a cellist. Drake is a member of the United Nations Chamber Music Society and was a Gluck Community Service Fellow at The Juilliard School. She has worked as the Management Associate at After Arts, Marketing and Production Assistant for the NYC branch of Music for Food, and interned for Reach Teach Play at the Ravinia Festival. A passionate teacher who loves working with kids, Drake is a mentor and substitute coach for the Juilliard Pre-College chamber music program and has a private studio of twenty five cello students in NYC. She has also served as the Teaching Assistant to Hans Jørgen Jensen and Julia Lichten at the Meadowmount School of Music. In February 2021, Drake began an adjunct faculty position at Walnut Hill School for the Arts, teaching an Arts and Community Engagement seminar and guiding high school seniors in designing and implementing their own social change projects.

Drake’s recent solo performances with orchestra include Elgar’s Concerto in E minor with the Triangle Youth Philharmonic and Lalo’s Concerto in D minor with the Lowell Philharmonic Orchestra. In 2020, Drake commissioned and premiered Aylan by Milad Yousufi on WQXR’s Young Artists Showcase. While participating in the Holland International Music Sessions, Drake was heard on National Public Radio in the Netherlands, performing Debussy’s Cello Sonata and Paganini’s Moses Variations. A recent highlight of Drake’s orchestral career was an appearance in the legendary BBC Proms Royal Albert Hall as part of the 2019 Juilliard/Royal Academy of Music orchestral collaboration.

Drake is a member of the 2020-2021 Global Leaders Program cohort, pursuing an Executive Graduate Certificate in Social Entrepreneurship, Cultural Agency, Teaching Artistry, and Civic Leadership. She recently graduated from The Juilliard School with a Master of Music degree where she was the recipient of the George J. Jakab Global Enrichment Grant, the 2020 Entrepreneurship Grant, the Norman Benzaquen Career Advancement Grant, and the Robert Sherman Award for Music Education and Community Outreach. She received a Bachelor of Music degree from Northwestern University’s Bienen School of Music, and previously attended the New England Conservatory Preparatory School and Walnut Hill School for the Arts where she graduated with the Music Department Award. Her previous teachers include Elizabeth Beilman, Natasha Brofsky, Hans Jørgen Jensen, and Nicole Johnson.

Australian-Korean violist, Sarah Sung, has travelled globally, performing at orphanages, prisons, rehabilitation centers, and nursing homes since the age of eight. Her purpose as a musician is strongly rooted in her passion to use music as a way of bringing healing and peace to broken communities. She has a vested interest for North Korean defectors and dreams of providing them with free music education.

Sarah is currently in the highly selective Accelerated Bachelor’s/Master’s Program at The Juilliard School, studying with Paul Neubauer and Cynthia Phelps. At Juilliard, she is a Gluck Community Service Fellow, and serves as a principal violist of the Juilliard Orchestra. Festival appearances include the Perlman Music Program Chamber Music Workshop, ChamberFest, Kneisel Hall Chamber Music Festival, Yellow Barn, and International Musicians Seminar Prussia Cove and Open Chamber Music directed by Steven Isserlis.

Hana Mundiya made her concerto debut with the New York Philharmonic at age 13 at David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center as a part of the orchestra’s Young People’s Concerts. Since then, she has performed as a soloist and chamber musician in major concert halls throughout the United States, including Carnegie Hall, Walt Disney Concert Hall, Alice Tully Hall, and Merkin Concert Hall, as well as internationally in Sweden, Japan, Germany, France, Austria, Spain, Czech Republic, Hungary, and Switzerland. She is a recent top prizewinner in the International Brahms Competition in Austria, Leopold Mozart Competition in Germany, Kosciuszko Foundation Wieniawski Competition, and Adelphi Orchestra Young Artist Competition.

A believer in the universal ideals outlined in the United Nations Charter, she is a member of the UN Chamber Music Society, and performs regularly at the UN Headquarters, Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center for UNHCR, UNESCO, the Red Cross, and Mount Sinai Hospital. She has also performed for RAINN, the largest anti-sexual assault organization in the United States, to offer solace to Asian survivors of gender-based violence and sexual assault. As President of Opus 21, Princeton University's chamber music collective, she led a collaboration with and now frequently performs at the Music on Park Avenue series at Scandinavia House in NYC. She is the Artist-in-Residence for the New York Piano Society.

As a baroque violinist, she has appeared with The Academy of Ancient Music and with the English Concert as a principal member of Early Music Princeton. She is particularly interested in the French baroque aesthetic, and as a student at the Royal College of Music and Princeton University, did extensive research on the links between ornamentation in the music of Couperin and literary and social trends in seventeenth and eighteenth century France.

Born to a Japanese mother and Indian father, Hana is a native of SoHo, New York City. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Comparative Literature from Princeton University specializing in French and Japanese Literature, and is currently pursuing a Master of Music degree at The Juilliard School under the tutelage of Catherine Cho and Naoko Tanaka. Her past teachers include Donald Weilerstein, Eric Wyrick, Nancy Wilson, Detlef Hahn, and Bojan Čičić. She is a graduate of Juilliard Pre-College and the United Nations International School in New York City.

Described as an “excellent soloist” of “great virtuosity” (NY Concert Review), delivering “thrilling” performances (Boston Globe), Venezuelan violinist Rubén Rengel is quickly gaining recognition as a remarkably gifted artist. Rubén has appeared as a soloist with the Philadelphia Orchestra, Detroit Symphony, Houston Symphony, New Jersey Symphony, Venezuela Symphony, among others. Rubén was the winner of the Robert F. Smith Prize at the 2018 Sphinx Competition and has appeared at Carnegie Hall, Severance Hall, the Kennedy Center, the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, and the Library of Congress. As a passionate chamber musician, he has performed with artists such as Joseph Silverstein, Pamela Frank, Peter Wiley, David Shifrin, Joel Krosnick, Timothy Eddy, and Gilbert Kalish. He has appeared at the Brevard Music Festival, the Evnin Rising Stars at the Caramoor Center, Music@Menlo, and the Perlman Music Program.

In addition to classical music, Rubén enjoys performing other genres such as Venezuelan folk music, Latin American music, and Jazz. He also has a strong interest in conducting and enjoys performing as a violist. Rubén’s teachers and mentors include Iván Pérez Núñez, Jaime Laredo, Paul Kantor, and Mark Steinberg. Currently, Rubén is a Fellow at Carnegie Hall’s Ensemble Connect.

Violinist Lucas Stratmann is currently pursuing his Master of Music Degree at The Juilliard School, where he studies with Sylvia Rosenberg and Masao Kawasaki. There, Lucas serves as a Concertmaster of the Juilliard Orchestra. He has also been a first prizewinner of several competitions, most notably winning the Aspen Music Festival’s Violin Competition in 2016 and being awarded the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation Young Artist Award from NPR’s From the Top.

Dedicated to bringing classical music to the younger generation, Lucas has performed as a soloist with The Little Orchestra Society on three separate concert series, performing works by Bach, Beethoven, and Bernstein, aimed at sparking the curiosity of young audiences. Along with performing, Lucas is an ardent teacher who believes that learning music is an essential part of education. Through helping to develop characteristics such as sensitivity, the ability to listen, and dedication to one’s dreams and goals, Lucas hopes more people can look for the commonalities they share with one another and work towards creating a brighter future together.

New York-based Venezuelan violist Ramón Carrero-Martínez is the winner of numerous competitions in the US, Italy, and Venezuela. His recent engagements include performances with the American String Quartet, US tour with the Mark Morris Dance Group Music Ensemble, South Korea tour with the New York Classical Players, and performance of the Stamitz Viola Concerto for his debut as a soloist in Italy. Mr. Carrero-Martinez was a member of the celebrated National System of Youth Orchestras “El Sistema” and previously studied economics in Venezuela. He holds a Bachelor of Music degree from Manhattan School of Music where he is currently pursuing his Master of Music degree, studying with Daniel Avshalomov.

Sterling’s recent accomplishments include being awarded 1st prize in the Senior Division of the 2019 22nd Annual Sphinx Competition on February 3, 2019. He was the youngest Finalist in the prestigious competition, and was also awarded the audience choice award. Days before the Sphinx Competition, Sterling performed several concerts in Switzerland at the World Economic Forum which included a performance on the CNBC Television Network. In October of 2018 Sterling had his solo debut at Carnegie Hall where Frank Daykin of New York Concert Review wrote: “The very fine young cellist Sterling Elliott played two movements from Cassadó’s Suite for Solo Cello with perfect intonation, style, and total involvement.”

In spite of such accolades, Sterling has enjoyed a simple, and humble musical journey. He began his cello studies at the age of three under the direction of Suzuki Cello teacher Susan Hines. Sterling made his solo debut at the age of 7 when he became the first place Junior Division winner of the PYO Concerto Competition. Sterling has enjoyed the honor of performing for French and American cellist Yo Yo Ma and also performing alongside recording artist Jennifer Hudson. Sterling is proud to have been awarded the 2016 Isaac Stern Award by the Sphinx Organization as well being featured in a 3-page interview in the October 2015 “Strings” Magazine. Sterling is also a two-time alum of NPR’s From the Top, a nationally syndicated radio broadcast featuring America’s most talented young musicians, where he was announced as a recipient of a $10,000 Jack Kent Cooke Award.

Professionally, cellist Sterling Elliott has soloed with the New York Philharmonic, The Cleveland Orchestra, Boston Symphony Orchestra, and many more orchestras across the United States. These concerto performances have taken place in venues such as Symphony Hall in Boston and Carnegie Hall, where Sterling recently performed Dvorak Concerto with New York Youth Symphony in 2020.

Sterling currently studies with Joel Krosnick at the Juilliard School working towards an undergraduate degree in Cello Performance where he is a proud recipient of a Kovner Fellowship.

Sophiko Simsive, piano (Kutaisi, Georgia), has won numerous awards and accolades including first prize at the Princess Christina Concours in the Netherlands, the Yamaha Piano Competition in Amsterdam, the Young Pianist Foundation Competition, first prize at the Geertruidenberg Klassiek, and GrachtenfestivalPrijs where she performed as Artist-in-Residence during the Grachtenfestival. She has toured extensively throughout North America, Asia, and Europe, and made her debut at Carnegie Hall with cellist Kian Soltani. She has participated in the Verbier International Music Festival, Yellow Barn Festival, and most recently she was selected as the winner of Music Academy of the West’s second Solo Piano Competition.

Sophiko has passion for sharing music with larger audiences, she has given recitals at retirement homes, hospitals, and has taught at local music schools. Sophiko is represented by Interartists Amsterdam Management and is currently pursuing her doctoral degree at the Manhattan School of Music with Dr. Solomon Mikowsky.