Meet the Artists
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Yun-Ting Lee
VIOLIN
Taiwanese-American violinist Yun-Ting Lee joined the second violin section of The Cleveland Orchestra in 2013. He completed his Bachelor and Master degrees from the Cleveland Institute of Music, where his principal teachers were David Cerone, William Preucil, and David Updegraff. He has also studied with Dr. Phyllis Skoldberg and Ming-De Zhang.
Yun-Ting has appeared as soloist with Spoleto Festival USA, Music Academy of the West, Cleveland Institute of Music, National Repertory, and Phoenix Symphony orchestras.
A dedicated chamber musician, Mr. Lee received the Dr. Bennett Levine Memorial Award in Chamber Music from CIM. Yun-Ting has collaborated with Orion Weiss, Lyrica Baroque Ensemble, members of the Juilliard, Cavani, Verona, and Tokyo String Quartets.
Yun-Ting has performed with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, the San Diego symphony, Columbus Symphony Orchestra, the Minnesota Orchestra, and the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. He is an alumnus of the New York String Orchestra Seminar, the Holland International Music Sessions, Encore School for Strings, and the Pacific Music Festival.
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Dane Johansen
CELLO
Dane Johansen joined The Cleveland Orchestra at the beginning of March 2016. He was cellist with the Escher String Quartet for five years, during which he and his colleagues were BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artists, and also recipients of an Avery Fisher Career Grant and the Martin Segal Award from Lincoln Center. He has performed as a soloist and chamber musician around the world. Mr. Johansen made his Lincoln Center debut in a performance of Elliott Carter’s Cello Concerto under the direction of James Levine in celebration of the composer’s centennial. He made his Carnegie Hall debut as first winner of the Juilliard Leo Ruiz Memorial Award and, in November 2016 performing William Walton’s Cello Concerto, made his debut with the London Philharmonic Orchestra.
For many years, Dane Johansen has dedicated time and energy exploring Johann Sebastian Bach’s Six Suites for Solo Cello. He performed them at New York’s Alice Tully Hall in 2010 and also throughout his 580-mile pilgrimage along the Camino de Santiago in Northern Spain in 2014; the story of his adventure on the Camino with Bach was made into a documentary film called Strangers on the Earth.
A native of Fairbanks, Alaska, Dane Johansen studied at the Cleveland Institute of Music, Conservatoire National Supérieur de Paris, and at the Juilliard School, where he earned his artist diploma. He studied privately with Bernard Greenhouse.
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Jonathan Vinocour
VIOLA
Violist Jonathan Vinocour enjoys a varied career as an orchestral player, chamber musician, and soloist. He was appointed Principal Viola of the San Francisco Symphony in 2009 having previously served as Principal Viola of the Saint Louis Symphony and Guest Principal of the Gewandhaus Orchestra of Leipzig. Since that time, he has appeared frequently as a soloist with the San Francisco Symphony. Concerto performances have also brought him to the Saint Louis Symphony, Mainly Mozart Festival Orchestra and the New World Symphony where he was a featured artist of their Viola Visions Festival alongside Tabea Zimmerman, Kim Kashkashian, Roberto Diaz, and Cynthia Phelps.
A sought-after chamber musician, he is a regular guest of festivals such as the Seattle Chamber Music Society, La Jolla SummerFest, Marlboro, Bridgehampton, Salt Bay Festivals and Chamberfest Cleveland. Chamber music partners have included Yefim Bronfman, Yo-Yo Ma, Jean-Yves Thibaudet and James Ehnes among others. He also performs frequently on the chamber music series of the San Francisco Symphony and as a recitalist and chamber musician on concert series around the country.
Vinocour graduated from Princeton University with a degree in chemistry and from the New England Conservatory where he studied with Kim Kashkashian. An active and dedicated teacher, he serves on the faculty of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music as well as the Aspen Music Festival and School and is a frequent coach at the New World Symphony. Vinocour plays on a 1784 Lorenzo Storioni viola on loan from the San Francisco Symphony.
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Sayaka Tanikawa
PIANO, CO-ARTISTIC DIRECTOR
Noted for her sensitive and thoughtful approach, pianist Sayaka Tanikawa enjoys an active career as a recitalist and chamber musician in the United States and abroad, performing in such venues as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Carnegie Weill Recital Hall, David Geffen Hall at the Lincoln Center, Davies Hall, and Suntory Hall. An accomplished chamber musician, Ms. Tanikawa has performed with Peter Frankl, Osmo Vanska, members of the San Francisco Symphony, New York Philharmonic, Minnesota Orchestra, San Francisco Ballet, NHK Philharmonic, and Sô Percussion. She has appeared in San Francisco Symphony Chamber Music Series, Minnesota Orchestra’s Sommerfest, Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, Caramoor Performer’s Showcase, and Banff Chamber Music Festival.
An avid educator, she has served as an Artist-in-residence at South Carolina Governor’s School for the Arts and Humanities in Greenville, South Carolina. She is currently on the faculties of Hunter College and Juilliard School’s Preparatory Division in New York City. She is also an artistic director of Duluth Chamber Music Festival, which brings together world-class musicians to perform and to build meaningful collaborations with the local community in Duluth, MN.
Ms. Tanikawa holds a bachelor’s degree in Art History from Columbia University, a master’s degree from Yale School of Music, and a doctorate from Manhattan School of Music. She has worked closely with Peter Frankl, Boris Berman, Claude Frank, Arkady Aronov, and André-Michel Schub.
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Matt Young
CO-ARTISTIC DIRECTOR
Matt Young is a member of the San Francisco Symphony viola section and is a faculty member at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. His students have recently won jobs in the Atlanta, California, Dallas, Fort Worth, Jacksonville, Geneva, Pittsburgh, and Santa Rosa symphonies.
Formerly a member of the Minnesota Orchestra and a recipient of a McKnight Artist Fellowship for Performing Musicians, he continues to have close ties with Minnesota. Matt is co-artistic director and a founder of the newly incorporated Duluth Chamber Music Festival, launching in August, 2022
A founding member of the Verklärte Quartet, which won the grand prize of the Fischoff Chamber Music Competition, he has performed with the Boston Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, London Philharmonic, Minnesota Orchestra, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, and the Vancouver Symphony.
He has taught at The National Orchestral Institute, SFCM, The SF Academy Orchestra, as a mentor for the SFS’s Community of Music Makers program, and in guest masterclasses around the world. A founding member of Ensemble SF, he works towards building bridges with music across the SF Bay area, in partnership with many local non profit organizations.
Matt attended the University of Kentucky and the Yale School of Music, as well as the Cleveland Institute of Music. At CIM his teacher was Robert Vernon and Matt was a featured soloist in Severance Hall with the CIM Orchestra and received the Robert Vernon Prize for Viola Performance.