Echoes from the English Countryside
November 23, 2025
your symphony experience
JONES HALL
Since the opening of Jones Hall in 1966, millions of arts patrons have enjoyed countless musical and stage performances at the venue. Dominating an entire city block, Jones Hall features a stunning travertine marble facade, 66-foot ceilings, and a brilliantly lit grand entrance. Jones Hall is a monument to the memory of Jesse Holman Jones, a towering figure in Houston during the first half of the 20 th century.
CONCERT DISRUPTION
We strive to provide the best possible auditory experience of our world-class orchestra. Noise from phones, candy wrappers, and talking is distracting to the performers on stage and those around you. Please help us make everyone’s concert enjoyable by silencing electronic devices now and remaining quiet during the performance.
FOOD & DRINK POLICY
The Encore Café and in-hall bars are open for Symphony performances, and food and drink will be permitted in bar areas. Food is not permitted inside the auditorium. Patrons may bring drinks into the auditorium for Bank of America POPS Series concerts and Symphony Specials. Drinks are not permitted inside the auditorium for Classical concerts.
LOST & FOUND
For lost and found inquiries, please contact Patron Experience Coordinator Lien Le during the performance. She also can be reached at lien.le@houstonsymphony.org. You may contact Houston First after the performances at 832.487.7050
WHEN SHOULD I CLAP?
It’s a question we hear often! Traditionally, audiences wait to applaud until the very end of a piece, especially when it has several sections (called movements). This allows the music to flow without interruption and helps the performers stay focused. If you’re unsure, a simple cue is when the conductor lowers their arms and turns toward the audience—that’s your signal the piece has finished. That said, there’s no wrong way to show your appreciation. If the music inspires you in the moment, don’t hesitate to clap! Your enthusiasm and energy are always welcome at the Symphony.
CHILDREN
Children ages six and up are welcome to all Classical, Bank of America POPS, and Symphony Special concerts. Children of all ages are welcome at PNC Family Series performances. Children must have a ticket for all ticketed events.
LATE SEATING
Each performance typically allows for late seating, which is scheduled in intervals and determined by the conductor. Our ushers and Patron Experience Coordinator will instruct you on when late seating is allowed.
TICKETS
Subscribers of five or more concerts may exchange their tickets at no cost. Tickets to Symphony Specials or single ticket purchases are ineligible for exchange or refund. If you are unable to make a performance, your ticket may be donated prior to the concert for a tax-donation receipt. Donations and exchanges may be made in person, over the phone, or online.
ESCANEE AQUÍ PARA VER TRADUCCIÓN AL ESPAÑOL
ORCHESTRA ROSTER
Juraj Valčuha
Music Director
Roy and Lillie Cullen Chair
FIRST VIOLIN
Yoonshin Song, Concertmaster
Max Levine Chair
Vacant, Associate Concertmaster
Ellen E. Kelley Chair
Boson Mo, Assistant Concertmaster
Qi Ming, Assistant Concertmaster
Fondren Foundation Chair
Marina Brubaker
Tong Yan
MiHee Chung
Sophia Silivos
Rodica Gonzalez
Ferenc Illenyi
Si-Yang Lao
Kurt Johnson*
Christopher Neal
Sergei Galperin
Timothy Peters+
Samuel Park+
SECOND VIOLIN
Vacant, Principal
Vacant, Associate Principal
Amy Semes
Annie Kuan-Yu Chen
Mihaela Frusina
Jing Zheng
Tianjie Lu
Anastasia Iglesias
Tina Zhang
Yankı Karataş
Hannah Duncan
Alexandros Sakarellos
Tianxu Liu+
James Gikas+
VIOLA
Joan DerHovsepian, Principal
Wei Jiang, Acting Associate Principal
Samuel Pedersen, Assistant Principal
Paul Aguilar
Sheldon Person
Fay Shapiro
Keoni Bolding
Jimmy Cunningham
Meredith Harris+
Suzanne LeFevre+
CELLO
Brinton Averil Smith, Principal
Janice H. and Thomas D. Barrow Chair
Christopher French, Associate Principal
Jane and Robert Cizik Chair
Anthony Kitai
Louis-Marie Fardet
Jeffrey Butler
Maki Kubota
Xiao Wong
Charles Seo
Jeremy Kreutz
COMMUNITY-EMBEDDED MUSICIAN
Lindsey Baggett, Violin
LIBRARIANS
Ali Verderber, Associate Librarian
Megan Fisher, Assistant Librarian
DOUBLE BASS
Robin Kesselman, Principal
Timothy Dilenschneider, Associate Principal
Steven Reineke, Principal POPS Conductor
Andrés Orozco-Estrada, Conductor Laureate
Anthony J. Maglione, Director, Houston Symphony Chorus
Gonzalo Farias, Associate Conductor
Andrew Pedersen, Assistant Principal
Eric Larson
Logan May
Burke Shaw
Donald Howey
Avery Weeks
FLUTE
Aralee Dorough, Principal
General Maurice Hirsch Chair
Matthew Roitstein, Associate Principal
Judy Dines
Kathryn Ladner
PICCOLO
Kathryn Ladner
OBOE
Jonathan Fischer, Principal
Lucy Binyon Stude Chair
Anne Leek, Associate Principal
Colin Gatwood
Adam Dinitz
ENGLISH HORN
Adam Dinitz
Barbara and Pat McCelvey Chair
CLARINET
Mark Nuccio, Principal
Bobbie Nau Chair
Vacant, Associate Principal
Christian Schubert
Alexander Potiomkin
Ben Freimuth+
E-FLAT CLARINET
Vacant
Ben Freimuth+
BASS CLARINET
Alexander Potiomkin
BASSOON
Rian Craypo, Principal
Isaac Schultz, Associate Principal
Elise Wagner
Adam Trussell
CONTRABASSOON
Adam Trussell
STAGE PERSONNEL
Stefan Stout, Stage Manager
José Rios, Assistant Stage Manager
Nicholas DiFonzo, Head Video Engineer
Justin Herriford, Head Audio Engineer
Connor Morrow, Head Stage Technician
Giancarlo Minotti, Audio Production Manager
HORN
William VerMeulen, Principal
Mr. and Mrs. Alexander K. McLanahan
Endowed Chair
Robert Johnson, Associate Principal
Nathan Cloeter, Assistant Principal/Utility
Ian Mayton
Barbara J. Burger Chair
Brian Mangrum
Spencer Bay+
TRUMPET
Mark Hughes, Principal
George P. and Cynthia Woods
Mitchell Chair
John Parker, Associate Principal
Robert Walp, Assistant Principal
Richard Harris
TROMBONE
Nick Platoff, Principal
Bradley White, Associate Principal
Phillip Freeman
BASS TROMBONE
Phillip Freeman
TUBA
Dave Kirk, Principal
TIMPANI
Leonardo Soto, Principal
Matthew Strauss, Associate Principal
PERCUSSION
Brian Del Signore, Principal
Mark Griffith
Matthew Strauss
HARP
Allegra Lilly, Principal
KEYBOARD
Vacant, Principal
LIBRARIAN
Luke Bryson, Principal
*on leave + contracted substitute
Echoes from the English Countryside
ARALEE DOROUGH, flute (Musgrave, Dring)
ANNE LEEK, oboe (Britten)
COLIN GATWOOD, oboe (Musgrave, Dring)
JANICE FEHLAUER, piano (Vaughan Williams)
NEAL KURZ, piano (Dring)
YOONSHIN SONG, violin (Vaughan Williams)
SOPHIA SILIVOS, violin (Britten)
JOAN DERHOVSEPIAN, viola (Vaughan Williams)
PAUL AGUILAR, viola (Britten)
CHRISTOPHER FRENCH, cello (Britten)
CHARLES SEO, cello (Vaughan Williams)
ROBIN KESSELMAN, bass (Vaughan Williams)
0:14 BRITTEN – Phantasy for Oboe, Violin, Viola, and Cello, Opus 2
0:04 MUSGRAVE – Impromptu No. 1 for Flute and Oboe
0:10 DRING – Trio for Flute, Oboe, and Piano
0:31 VAUGHAN WILLIAMS – Piano Quintet in C minor Allegro con fuoco Andante Fantasai (quasi variazioni). Moderato
Sunday, November 23 Jones Hall 6:30 p.m.
Program Notes
BRITTEN
Phantasy for Oboe, Violin, Viola, and Cello, Opus 2
Mention the name Benjamin Britten to most music lovers, and what comes to mind first and foremost is this 20th-century titan’s large-scale vocal works: the pacifist masterpiece War Requiem, completed in 1962, and enduring operas like Peter Grimes, Billy Budd, The Turn of the Screw, and Death in Venice. But Britten, born in 1913 in the British seaside town of Lowestoft, was productive and inspired across the full span of compositional genres, from his ingenious unaccompanied Cello Suites to powerful, potent orchestral works like Sinfonia da Requiem
Prodigious from an early age, Britten wrote his Phantasy for Oboe, Violin, Viola, and Cello at age 19, while enrolled at the Royal College of Music. His talent already eclipsed the capacity of his teachers to keep up. “When you're immensely full of energy and ideas, you don't want to waste your time being taken through elementary exercises in dictation,” he wrote years later. “My musical education was perhaps more outside the college than in it.”
Britten wrote his concise piece for a competition established in 1905 by Walter Willson Cobbett, an English businessman and amateur violinist, to revive a musical form common during the Tudor and Stuart eras: the phantasy, the term an Old English spelling of fantasia. Britten had won the same competition the previous year with a Phantasy string quintet. He did not repeat his victory in his second try, but nevertheless won the satisfaction of having his piece played by Leon Goosens, arguably the eminent oboist of his day, in an August 1933 BBC Radio broadcast.
Britten’s Phantasy has been described as a sonata with a slow movement stuck in between the development and recapitulation. The piece begins with a march for strings, joined by a lyrical oboe melody that floats above the rhythmic pulse. Those two components join in brisk, lively dialogue that builds to a climax and sudden release, followed by a slow interlude in a songlike British pastoral mode, initially for strings alone. The oboe returns, high and plaintive, for a reversal of the previous course: a return to animated chatter, and then a final march to the end.
–Steve Smith
Program Notes
MUSGRAVE
Impromptu No. 1 for Flute and Oboe
Writing about her own Impromptu No. 1 for Flute and Oboe, the Scottish composer Thea Musgrave offered commentary as clear and concise as her blithe piece itself: “Impromptu for flute and oboe was written in 1967. As the title implies it is a short light-hearted work. It is based on a short distinctive phrase heard at the outset. This returns many times at different pitches and always with a different continuation.”
Born in 1928 in Midlothian, Musgrave by 1967 had become firmly established as one of the United Kingdom’s most skillful, inquisitive composers, an artist fully aware of the revolutionary changes underway in 20th-century music, but also determined to go her own way, embracing harmony, experimentalism, electronics, and collage in service to a personal, communicative style.
Initially trained by Austrian composer Hans Gál, she pursued studies with Nadia Boulanger, the most influential pedagogue of the 20th century, and absorbed influences from American composers like Charles Ives, Aaron Copland, and Milton Babbitt. After meeting and falling in love with Peter Mark, an American violist and conductor, in 1970, Musgrave came to the United States for a guest professorship in Santa Barbara. The couple were long based in Norfolk, where Mark served as founding artistic director of the Virginia Opera from 1978 to 2010, and now live in Los Angeles.
Long one of the most visible, successful women artists active in composition, Musgrave could be droll about her status. “Yes, I am a woman; and I am a composer,” she told a BBC Radio 3 interviewer in 2015. “But rarely at the same time.”
Declared “Britain's most prolific and arguably most communicative opera composer” by The Guardian in 2014, Musgrave has also demonstrated her abundant gifts for dramatic pacing and evocative storytelling in her instrumental works. Even in a piece as brief and lean as the Impromptu No. 1, you might sense two kindred yet disparate characters in an animated conversation, filled with bold statements, occasional disputes, and harmonious concords.
–Steve Smith
Program Notes
DRING
Trio for Flute, Oboe, and Piano
Although her name is little remembered now, Madeleine Dring was one of the most promising artists active in her native England, renowned as a composer, singer, actress, and mime. Born in 1923, Dring demonstrated talent at an early age. She was accepted at age 10 into the junior department of the Royal College of Music on a violin scholarship, and participated in children’s theater productions, starting a lifelong association with the stage.
Dring’s composition teachers were some of the most eminent British composers of her day, including Herbert Howells, Ralph Vaughan Williams, and Gordon Jacob. Her own style, though, developed along different lines, eschewing weighty symphonies and sweeping oratorios in favor of brief, well-crafted, and melodically engaging solo and chamber works closer in style to those of the Anglo-Australian Arthur Benjamin, French composer Francis Poulenc, and even the popular American George Gershwin, as well as incidental music for the stage, radio, and TV.
In 1947, Dring married Roger Lord, for more than 30 years the principal oboist of the London Symphony Orchestra, which surely accounts for the quantity and brilliance of her works for that instrument. Dring’s Trio for Flute, Oboe, and Piano, composed in 1968, is among her best loved and most played works, a roughly 12-minute piece in three movements that rivals the breezy sophistication and rhythmic playfulness associated with the better-known Poulenc. The delightful piece takes advantage of the similar temperaments and contrasted sounds of its woodwind protagonists; plaintive melodies in the central Andante semplice are instantly memorable.
That Dring should have achieved so much success during her lifetime, when the concert-music world had not yet opened its arms to embrace women composers as fully as it does today, attests to her determination, skill, and generous talent. She died prematurely of a cerebral hemorrhage in 1977, at only 53 years old. But thanks to diligent researchers, her profile has risen in recent decades—buoyed by the enduring charm of her music.
–Steve Smith
Program Notes
VAUGHAN WILLIAMS
Piano Quintet in C minor
Ralph Vaughan Williams was, alongside Benjamin Britten, the eminent English composer of the 20th century, a creator of ambitious symphonies, concertos, and operas of distinction and rigor, as well as the craftsman of some of the most timeless and popular works in the canon, like his lyrical violin showpiece The Lark Ascending. He broke new compositional ground continuously throughout his long lifetime, but also maintained strong ties to the English folk music he collected, preserved, and incorporated into many of his concert works.
But in the Piano Quintet in C minor, an early work from 1903, the spirits of two distinguished forebears hold sway. The instrumentation is not the conventional piano quintet configuration of piano plus string quartet, but rather piano, violin, viola, cello, and double bass: the assemblage for which Franz Schubert composed his eloquent, songful Piano Quintet in A, the so-called “Trout” Quintet of 1819.
The other shade suffusing this early Vaughan Williams chamber work is that of Johannes Brahms, whose weighty, dramatic character is evident from the first stormy bars of the opening Allegro con fuoco movement. But already, the kind of yearning modal melody that would characterize the young composer’s personal style, only a few years away from full bloom, provides contrast in slower passages.
That same knack for luxurious melody resurfaces in the second movement, Andante, whose main theme resembles “Silent Noon,” a song Vaughan Williams composed the same year. For the final movement, Fantasia, quasi variazioni, the composer opens with a simple, effective theme, then follows it with five characterful variations.
Following the advice of his close friend, Gustav Holst, Vaughan Williams revised his quintet in 1904 and again in 1905, when it was finally performed. He then withdrew the work, along with numerous other juvenile creations; the quintet only saw publication in 2002, decades after Vaughan Williams died. Still, he couldn’t have found the piece entirely without merit—in 1952, he recycled the theme from his finale to serve exactly the same purpose in his last major instrumental work, his Violin Sonata, which was premiered on his 82nd birthday in 1954.
–Steve Smith
Program Bios
Aralee Dorough, flute
Aralee Dorough began her tenure with the Houston Symphony as second flute in 1985, becoming the orchestra’s principal flute in 1991. Dorough teaches orchestral repertoire at the Texas Music Festival and the Festival-Institute at Round Top and is an affiliate artist on the faculty of the Moores School of Music at the University of Houston.
She first appeared as a soloist with the Houston Symphony performing Mozart’s Concerto in C Major for Flute, Harp, and Orchestra with internationally-renowned harpist, Marisa Robles, and led by then-Music Director Christoph Eschenbach, for the 1992–93 season Opening Night gala concert. Dorough also performed Mozart’s Concerto in G Major with Eschenbach and the Houston Symphony in 1993 for a triple CD set released by IMP Records in 1994, and again in concert in 2004 under former Music Director Hans Graf. Her latest performance of the popular D major flute concerto completed her personal “Mozart cycle.”
Dorough gave the world premiere of Bright Sheng’s concerto,
Flute Moon, in 1999, which was commissioned by the Houston Symphony and broadcast live on PBS. In 2003, she gave the U.S. premiere of Salvador Brotons’s concerto, which Brotons himself conducted for the National Flute Association Convention. In 2006, Dorough and Houston Symphony colleagues presented the premiere of a chamber work by composer Gabriela Frank on a collaborative program between the Houston Symphony and the Da Camara Society. Other solo appearances with the Symphony have included Quantz’s Concerto in G major with conductor Nicholas McGegan and Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 with conductor Joshua Rifkin and violinist Eric Halen.
An avid chamber player and contemporary music performer, Dorough has played with the Houston Symphony Chamber Players, whose recording of Schoenberg’s Quintet for Winds on the Koch label has been met with critical acclaim. She has also performed with the Da Camera Society of Houston, The Foundation for Modern Music, Musiqa, the Festival-Institute at Round Top, and Chicago’s Ravinia Festival in collaboration with Christoph Eschenbach at the piano. Dorough can be heard on more than 20 Houston Symphony recordings and performances aired on PBS and American Public Media’s Performance Today, and she has worked with a distinguished roster of conductors and guest artists including Eric Leinsdorf, Michael Tilson Thomas, Leonard Slatkin, and Yo-Yo Ma. She also collaborated with her father, jazz artist and Schoolhouse
Rock composer Bob Dorough, on The Houston Branch CD project in 2005, available at cdbaby.com. The album features Dorough along with her husband, father, and three of Houston’s top jazz musicians performing standard tunes and her father’s originals, including one of her own compositions. Because of her father, Dorough has been peripherally involved with jazz and studio work throughout her career, including a speaking part on “My Hero Zero” for ABC TV’s Schoolhouse Rock at age nine.
Dorough received her undergraduate degree from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music in 1983, where she studied with master teacher Robert Willoughby and met her future husband, Houston Symphony oboist Colin Gatwood. She continued her studies as a graduate student at the Yale School of Music where she worked with renowned teacher, the late Thomas Nyfenger.
Along with their son, Corin, Dorough and her husband enjoy traveling, most recently on the Houston Symphony’s The Planets–An HD Odyssey tour to the UK. They also participated in the Walled City Music Festival in Derry, Ireland.
Program Bios
Anne Leek, oboe
Anne Leek was educated at Juilliard where she received her bachelor of music, master of music, and doctor of musical arts degrees. During her time in New York, she performed on a recital in Carnegie Hall sponsored by the Artists International Contest, which she won. During the 1980s, Leek was Solo Principal Oboe of the Mannheim Orchestra in Germany.
Before joining the Houston Symphony, she played a two-year position as principal oboe in the Pittsburgh Symphony, under the baton of Lorin Maazel. Along with her career as an orchestral musician, Leek has taught at Indiana University, Arizona State University, and the University of Houston. As a recital soloist and chamber musician, she has appeared in numerous major cities across the world.
Colin Gatwood, oboe
Colin Gatwood was born in Cleveland, Ohio but grew up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania where his father was principal oboe with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and his mother, a violinist, was a freelance musician and teacher. He began his musical studies on the piano at age 5, but by the time he was 9, he had begun taking oboe lessons from his father.
Gatwood is a graduate of the Oberlin Conservatory of Music in Ohio. His first orchestra job was with the Pittsburgh Symphony, playing second oboe for four years. From there, he went on to join the Guadalajara Symphony Orchestra in Mexico, and in 1991, he won the position of second oboe with the Houston Symphony.
Janice Fehlauer, piano
Janice Fehlauer was the gold medalist at the Wideman International Piano Competition. Recent appearances as concerto soloist in the U.S. include performances with the Mississippi Symphony, North Florida Symphony, Meridian Symphony, Shreveport Symphony, Lewisville Lake Symphony, Clear Lake Symphony, Baytown Symphony, Akron Pops Symphony, Symphony North, Golden Valley Symphony, and the UNT Symphony, as well as with orchestras across Canada.
She recently completed a solo recital tour of England and Scotland, including a performance at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and presented recitals at the Museo Nacional in Bogotá and the Festival Internacional de Bellas Artes in Medellín, Colombia.
Janice is also a sought-after opera coach and collaborative pianist who has worked at The Dallas Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Fort Worth Opera, the Franco-American Vocal Academy in France, the American Institute of Music Studies in Austria, UNT Opera Theater, University of Houston Moores Opera Center, Taos
Program Bios
Opera Institute, and the Houston Symphony Chorus.
She began her musical training in her hometown in British Columbia where she received Associate Diplomas from the Royal Conservatory of Music in both piano and violin. She holds degrees in music from the University of British Columbia and the University of North Texas, and a doctorate from the University of Houston.
Neal Kurz, piano
Neal Kurz has appeared nationally as a collaborative pianist. He has appeared in performance with Camilla Wicks, Arthur Weisberg, Kathleen Winkler, Brian Lewis, Sadao Harada, Toby Appel, Kate Ransom, Lawrence Stomberg, and Norman Fischer, among others. He studied with Frank Glazer and Rebecca Penneys at the Eastman School of Music, and with Martin Katz at the University of Michigan. Kurz has been on the staff at the Meadowmount School of Music, appearing in performance there and at the Lake Placid Center for the Arts with Alan Bodman and Corey Cerovsik. He has also appeared at the Roundtop
Festival Institute, in Texas, and in performances with Jorja Fleezanis, Peter Rejto, James Dunham, Håkan Rosengren, and the Dorian Wind Quintet. He is currently on the faculty at the Philadelphia International Music Festival (PIMF) and has appeared in performances with Jennifer Montone and Mark Livshits.
He is a member of the collaborative piano staff at the Shepherd School of Music, and has worked with the students of Kathleen Winkler, Cho-Liang Lin, Ivo van der Werff, and Lynn Harrell. He is a regular keyboardist with the Houston Symphony and has accompanied the orchestra on tour performances in Carnegie Hall and in the UK. He appears in their Grammy Award-winning recording of Berg’s Wozzeck, and an upcoming release of works by Jennifer Higdon, for Naxos Records.
He has accompanied participants in several international competitions, including the Corpus Christi Young Artists’ Competition, Houston Symphony’s Ima Hogg Competition, the William Byrd Young Artists’ Competition, and the Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow. He has worked with Houston Grand Opera as a coach. Kurz has also arranged and performed numerous scores for silent films; DVD releases include Captain Fracasse, The Parson’s Widow and Michael, Unseen Cinema, and George Méliès: Cinema Magician. Several of these releases have aired on Turner Classic Movies, Kanopy, and HBOMax.
Yoonshin Song, violin
Yoonshin Song was appointed as Concertmaster of the Houston Symphony in August 2019. Prior to that, she held the same position with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra for seven seasons. In Europe, Yoonshin has served as guest concertmaster of the Budapest Festival Orchestra under Iván Fischer for several years, and she has led the Verbier Festival Chamber Orchestra under numerous top-tiered conductors, such as Sir Simon Rattle, Klaus Mäkelä, Daniel Harding, Mikhail Pletnev, and Antonio Pappano. She also served as guest concertmaster of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, and the KBS Symphony Orchestra. Beyond her first chair duties, Yoonshin has performed as a soloist with many orchestras around the world, including the Houston Symphony, Budapest Festival Orchestra, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Utah Symphony, New Mexico Philharmonic Orchestra, Bayreuth Festival Orchestra, Paul Constantinescu Philharmonic Orchestra, Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra, and the KBS Symphony
Program Bios
Orchestra, among many others. She has also participated as a soloist and a chamber musician in various roles in leading music festivals, including the ones in Verbier, Lucerne, Samos, and Bayreuth in Europe; and the Marlboro, Great Lakes, and Deer Valley in the United States.
Yoonshin has earned many prestigious prizes throughout her career, including top prize awards in the Lipizer International Violin Competition, the Lipinski and Wieniawski International Violin Competition, the Henry Marteau International Violin Competition, and first prize at the Stradivarius International Competition in the United States.
She studied under the tutelage of Donald Weilerstein at the New England Conservatory and with Robert Mann, Glenn Dicterow, and Lisa Kim at the Manhattan School of Music.
Sophia Silivos, violin
Sophia Silivos, violin, has been a member of the Houston Symphony since 1992. Silivos began her career as first violin of the Dakota quartet and then was named principal second violin of the
New Mexico Symphony. She has performed as soloist with the Houston Symphony and served as Associate Concertmaster for the 2005–06 season.
An ardent proponent of chamber music, Silivos has appeared with ensembles throughout the United States and has performed live for public radio stations in Chicago, Houston, and Minneapolis. Here in Texas, she is a featured violinist for the St. Cecilia Chamber Music concert series.
She has served on the faculties of the University of Houston and Augustana college, teaches privately, and gives master classes.
In the summer of 2007, Silivos was an invited participant in a three-week tour of China, giving masterclasses and performing recitals and solos with orchestra.
Joan DerHovsepian, viola
Joan DerHovsepian was appointed Principal Viola of the Houston Symphony after winning the international audition held in May 2023. She first joined the viola section of the Houston Symphony in 1999, hired by Christoph Eschenbach, won the audition for
Associate Principal Viola in the fall of 2010 during the tenure of Hans Graf, and serves as Principal with Music Director Juraj Valčuha. Solo performances with the Houston Symphony include Mozart Sinfonia Concertante with Concertmaster Yoonshin Song in October 2022 and Bruch Double Concerto with Principal Second Violin MuChen Hsieh in March 2022. Joan was formerly Principal Viola of the Charleston Symphony Orchestra and has appeared as guest principal viola with the Chicago and Cincinnati symphonies.
Joan is Artist Teacher of Viola at Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music, instructing students in viola orchestral repertoire and independent study. Students who have come through her course have gone on to win positions in the Cincinnati Symphony, Colorado Symphony, Dallas Symphony, Fort Worth Symphony, Houston Symphony, Metropolitan Opera, Minnesota Orchestra, National Arts Center Orchestra, National Symphony, North Carolina Symphony, Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, Pittsburgh Symphony, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, San Diego Symphony, and Washington National Opera, among others. She is regular guest faculty for the New World Symphony and has given masterclasses in the study of orchestral excerpts for viola students of The Juilliard School, the New England Conservatory, and the University of Melbourne Conservatorium.
Recent festival and chamber music appearances include the Seattle Chamber Music Society, Mainly Mozart Festival, Grand Teton
Program Bios
Music Festival, Mimir Chamber Music Festival (Fort Worth, Texas and Melbourne Australia), Music in Context, Peninsula Music Festival, National Orchestral Institute, and Lake Lure Chamber Music Festival.
She was the violist of the awardwinning Everest Quartet, top prize winners at the Banff International String Quartet Competition and the Fischoff Chamber Music Competition. Joan was the second prize recipient of the Primrose International Viola Competition. She attended the Eastman School of Music studying with violist James Dunham, and the Hochschule für Musik in Freiburg Germany, with violist Kim Kashkashian.
Paul Aguilar, viola
Hailed by audiences across North America and Europe for his commanding and expressive performances, Venezuelan/ American violinist and violist Paul Aguilar currently resides in Houston, Texas. As an orchestral musician, he was recently appointed as a member of the Houston Symphony viola section, and he also maintains an active solo and chamber music
performance schedule of more than 40 recitals every year.
As a chamber musician, Paul has appeared on concert series and in concert halls across North America and internationally, including Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall, Ravinia Festival, ChamberFest Cleveland, Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts, La Jolla Summerfest, the Great Lakes Chamber Music Festival, the Schneider Concert Series, the Heidelberg String Quartet Festival, and the Emilia-Romagna Festival. Equally comfortable on both violin and viola, Paul has won top prizes in nearly every major chamber music competition, including the Banff International String Quartet Competition, the Bordeaux International String Quartet Competition, the Melbourne International String Quartet Competition, and the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition. He was selected as the only Orpheus Chamber Orchestra Performance Fellow for the 2020–21 season, and he also performs regularly as a member of the Astralis Chamber Ensemble. His chamber music collaborators have included artists such as James Ehnes, Augustin Hadelich, Phil Setzer, Lawrence Power, Paul Watkins, Desmond Hoebig, Jon Kimura Parker, Frank Cohen, and Shirley Brill.
Bringing total dedication and commitment to everything he does, Paul strives to educate the next generation on the importance of true excellence in every area of life, and of classical music’s role as simply a tool along that path. As an educator, Paul has appeared as guest artist faculty at festivals
and institutions across the United States including Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music, the Cleveland Institute of Music Young Artist Program, the Intermountain Suzuki String Institute, and the Fine Arts Center in Greenville, SC. He is actively involved with the Sphinx Organization in both performance and outreach and was a 2019 MPower Grant recipient.
A graduate of the Cleveland Institute of Music, Paul counts Jaime Laredo, Jan Mark Sloman, and Si-Yan Darren Li as some of his most formative musical influences; he also holds a degree from Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music where he participated in their String Quartet Residency. Paul pursued further chamber music studies in Europe at the Escuela Superior de Música Reina Sofía in Madrid and at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna where he was fortunate to study under Günter Pichler, Gerhard Schulz, Johannes Meissl, and Avri Levitan.
In addition to his busy travel and performance schedule, Paul is committed to regularly sharing music in schools and organizations throughout his community. When not involved with music, Paul enjoys running, reading, and spending time with his family. Paul plays on a very fine violin and viola that were commissioned from master luthier Kevin Lee.
Program Bios
Christopher French, cello
Christopher French is the associate principal cello of the Houston Symphony. Before joining the orchestra in 1986, he held titled positions in both the Shreveport Symphony Orchestra and the Honolulu Symphony. French is the seventh of a full octave of musical siblings. He enjoys performing with the Bad Boys of Cello, the alter ego of the Houston Symphony cello section. The Bad Boys have played in homeless shelters and elementary schools in an effort to eliminate the classist misconceptions about classical music.
French is a graduate of North Park University in Chicago, where he won the Performance Award. In addition to three concerto performances with the Houston Symphony, he has appeared on the Chamber Players series, and with Da Camera of Houston and the Greenbriar Consortium. He participates in the Mainly Mozart Festival in San Diego, Music in the Mountains in Durango, Colorado, and the Grand Teton Music Festival in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. French teaches orchestral repertoire at Rice University.
Charles Seo, cello
Cellist Charles Seo was appointed cellist of the Houston Symphony in the summer of 2018 at age 22. Previously, he served as principal cello in the Colburn Orchestra. Charles, who made his solo orchestral debut at age 10, has performed as guest soloist with the Houston Symphony, Dallas Symphony Orchestra, and San José Chamber Orchestra. He is silver medalist of the 2014 Irving M. Klein International String Competition and bronze medalist of the 2014 Stulberg International String Competition. In 2013, he was the gold medalist of the Houston Symphony League Concerto Competition, the Lynn Harrell Concerto Competition, the Schmidbauer International Competition, and the 30 th Pasadena Showcase House Instrumental Competition. Charles performed Sarasate’s Zigeunerweisen with Christopher O’Riley on NPR’s From the Top Charles has collaborated with cellists Lynn Harrell, Robert deMaine, Clive Greensmith, Wolfgang Emanuel Schmidt, David Geringas, Steven Isserlis, Jian Wang, Myung-wha Chung, Lluís
Claret, Li-Wei Qin, Bion Tsang, and Laurence Lesser. He holds a Bachelor of Music degree from the Colburn School, where he studied with Ronald Leonard and Clive Greensmith.
Robin Kesselman was appointed Principal Bass of the Houston Symphony Orchestra in 2014. He has performed as Guest Principal Bass with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Singapore Symphony Orchestra, and the Israel Philharmonic; travelled internationally with the Philadelphia Orchestra and Los Angeles Philharmonic; and appeared with the National, Atlanta, and Baltimore symphonies.
Kesselman has appeared multiple times as soloist with the Houston Symphony, in subscription performances of the Koussevitzky Concerto for Double Bass, Missy Mazzoli’s concerto Dark with Excessive Bright, and Bottesini’s Gran Duo Concertante with Gil Shaham. Previous season highlights include Krzysztof Penderecki’s Duo Concertante during the composer’s Carnegie
Robin Kesselman, double bass
Program Bios
Hall residency in collaboration with the Curtis Institute and Bottesini’s Concerto No. 2 with the Houston Civic Symphony. Recent festival engagements include leading the bass sections of the Grand Teton, Mainly Mozart, Arizona Musicfest, and Aspen Festival orchestras.
Kesselman frequently performs as a soloist and chamber musician and presents recital programs and masterclasses at the nation’s top universities. He has also served as faculty for the National Youth Orchestra – USA, Curtis Institute’s Summerfest, the Richard Davis Bass Conference, and the summer residency of the Youth Philharmonic of Colombia. He recently released Bow Speed Geography, a method book
and video series dedicated to the improvement of legato and sustain from the standpoint of bow speed.
Kesselman holds a Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Southern California and an Artist Diploma from the Curtis Institute of Music. His primary teachers have included David Allen Moore, Harold Robinson, Edgar Meyer, Paul Ellison, Chris Hanulik, and Virginia Dixon.
