It’s summertime in Portland. And that means Chamber Music Northwest’s 2025 Summer Festival is under way. J. S. Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos and the mind-blowing Goldberg Variations – all the buzz – have kicked off this year’s CMNW theme, “Echoes of Bach.” And you are probably thinking that CMNW’s July 6 presentation of the Oregon Bach Festival’s B Minor Mass is next up. Oh, yeah, there’s more Bach on the calendar (see the full one here). But now please take a look at just the next few days.

Do you see those two Young Artist Institute concerts, on Thursday, July 3, and Saturday, July 5? These two free events are your opportunity to celebrate the conclusion of this year’s Young Artist Institute – CMNW’s gift to the future of the musical arts. Not familiar with the Young Artist Institute? Hmm. Let’s put it this way. “Echoes of Bach” celebrates how music has been inspired by a composer of the past; the Young Artist Institute is inspiring the brilliant music and musicians of the future.

This is only the fourth year of the Young Artist Institute, so it is understandable if you are only now appreciating its impact; only now realizing that it has nurtured almost 60 talented string players from around the world.

Here’s how it started. CMNW Artistic Co-Directors Gloria Chien and Soovin Kim launched the Young Artist Institute in the 2022 summer festival. But Kim, in a June 26 appearance with several YAI musicians on Portland’s KQAC’s Thursdays @ Three (catch it here until July 10), gave a shout-out to former Artistic Director David Shifrin, who launched CMNW’s first emerging-artist initiative, the Protégé Project, in 2010. The Protégé Project has helped elevate the careers of hundreds of upcoming musician artists. One of those Protégé artists was CMNW’s own Gloria Chien.

Today’s Young Artist Institute nurtures a younger group. For the past four years, Chien and Kim have reached out to their teaching colleagues around the world to identify some of the high-school-age leaders of the next generation of string musicians. These are young artists who have already distinguished themselves in competitions, have been awarded solo performances with orchestras, and who are performing with chamber ensembles and orchestras across the country. These are the performers you can see on July 3 and 5. These are music leaders of the next generation. 

On June 14, CMNW welcomed the sixteen high-schoolers to their room-and-board accommodations on the campus of the University of Portland. Within days the talented young students were making their ways to UoP practice rooms, checking out the offerings at the campus food hall, meeting the two YAI Collaborative Pianists, and having their first lessons with the Institute Faculty: world-class string educators Soovin Kim and Jessica Lee, violin; Wenting Kang, viola; Edward Aaron, cello; and Peter Strumpf, cello. 

Also within days of their arrival, the young artists attended the Oregon Symphony performance of Mahler’s 3^rd Symphony, in which violinist/educator Jessica Lee, now in her fourth year with the YAI, appeared in her new position as Oregon Symphony Associate Concertmaster. Last year, Lee and other YAI faculty members and students shared their season 2024 experiences with journalist James Bash in this Oregon Arts Watch feature story.

A showcase of talent

The first official YAI concert of the Summer Festival was held at The Old Church Concert Hall in Portland. But these artists had already been popping up in Portland locations: at Powell’s Books, the Central Library and the Oregon Historical Society, to name a few. One artist appeared on KOIN’s AM Extra with Artistic Director Kim.

But as the rainclouds gathered on Friday, June 20, eight string performers took the stage and for almost two hours captured the attention of approximately 100 folks in YAI Showcase 1. There would be two more Showcase Concerts: No. 2 at First Congregational Church on June 27 and No. 3 in Kaul Auditorium on June 29. All sixteen artists took the stage, told a bit about themselves and their pieces, and then they played. No, let me rephrase that. They brought us beautiful music.

After almost every solo performance I found myself glancing down in wonderment at the age of the talented young artist. Each artist said their age in their introduction, but I had to check again. And so, here are the CMNW 2025 Young Artists by age:

• Age 18; Luke D’Silva (viola, PDX); Minji Kim (violin, Ann Arbor, MI); Sarah Lee (cello, PDX); and Tokuji Miyasaka (violin, Pullman, WA);
• Age 17: Peyton Crony (viola, Rochester, NY); Caitlin Enright (cello, Chatham, NJ); Griffin Frost (viola, NYC); Katie Liu (violin, PDX); Leo Trajano (violin, Hillsboro); and Andie Zhu (viola, Lexington, MA);
• Age 16: Kai Isoke Ali-Landing (violin, Chicago); Daphna Raveh Glassman (Sunnydale, CA); Aiden Kim (cello, San Jose, CA); Aaron Ma (violin, Palo Alto, CA); Isabel Jing Metz (violin, Alfred Station, NY);
• and Christie Cheung, violinist from Toronto, Canada is 15.

You may have noticed that Katie, Luke and Sarah are from Portland and Leo is from Hillsboro. In Showcase 1, Katie – who participated in the Institute last year, as did Caitlin and Tokuji – commented that her hometown connection meant a good supply of cookies from Mom. Then she raised her bow and ascended into the exquisite despair and final frenzied dance of Pablo de Sarasate’s Zigeunerweisen.

Local and out-of-town cohort members reside together in the dorms and participate in all activities through the entire three weeks of the Institute. All sixteen immersed in the community. But there are two other performing artists who are essential in this YAI community and deserve special mention: Collaborative Pianists Cynthia Tseng and Elgin Lee. The Collaborative Piano Fellowship is an opportunity offered to another group of young musicians who need support as they advance their careers. They work with the students individually and in studio lessons. Tseng and Lee deserve a special cheer for their role. 

In the Showcase concerts we heard the solo works on which each young artist has chosen to focus their attention. This year’s literature is a good dose of the 1800s – European and British – and some early 1900s American; all male composers. But repertoire is carefully selected for skill and technique development. Note that several CMNW concerts this season feature female composers, in particular the Protégé Spotlight on July 22. You can read more about that concert in Angela Allen’s recent preview here, and you can read the entire Festival Summer brochure right here.

As the audience gathered for Showcase 2 another kind of “development” was observable and heartwarming. The eight cohort artists not performing that afternoon sat in happy little clusters; three of them with arms entwined, laughed over something on a phone. Griffin, Isabel and Andie were huddled over a hymnal sight-reading in three-part harmony. When the concert began, the entire group sat together and cheered on their mates. They were growing into a family.

CMNW Marketing and Communications Director Nicole Lane wrote in email to OAW about this aspect of Young Artist Institute recruitment, one which begins early in the process:

“Soovin works to balance the group on a variety of other considerations, and is in touch with their teachers and others to get a sense of ‘do they play well in the sandbox’ with others—that is extremely important, it is chamber music after all, which is all about musicians working together well and cooperating.”

Even disciplined practice time, which continues late into the evening hours, is not immune from some good family fun. Pics of friends sleeping in practice rooms (aka YAI Never Sleeps) are apparently a thing in this cohort. Eating together can be a community-building activity. At a recent event, Peyton and Kai, both vegans, shared with OAW the pros and cons of cafeteria food but gushed with delight about after-concert Thai take-out. Noodles at night. Oh, yeah.

But it is the joy in the development of musical skills that drives these gifted musicians. Kai has been studying the “Finale” to Peter Tchaikovsky’s Concerto in D Major, Op. 35. In her Showcase 2 introductory remarks Kai said her teacher wanted her to work on making her performance more joyous and boisterous. Here’s how it turned out:

Aaron Ma took on the challenge of the “Finale” of Felix Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto in E Minor, Op. 64. He and Elgin Lee were superbly synced on those marvelous delicate passages and finished with a flourish. In his opening remarks Aaron rated his weeks at the YAI as right up there with seeing Joshua Bell perform about 10 years ago. We get it, Aaron. Those of us who saw Bell thirty-five or so years ago knew then that we were seeing one of the brilliant artists of his generation. We got it then. We get it now.

You can see many of the artist’s Showcase performances on YouTube. Showcase 2 is here; Showcase 3 is here.

Playing well together

The YAI musicians also kicked off the Prelude Performance series this past week. Christie, Aiden, Andie and Tokuji performed solo works in the first half. Tokuji and Elgin Lee thrilled the Prelude audience with the opening movement of Beethoven’s Sonata No. 5 in F Major, Op. 24. 

But the second half was all about string quartets. Leo Trajano, Aaron Ma, Daphna Raveh Glassman and Sarah Lee  performed Movements 1 and 2 of Dmitri Shostakovich’s Quartet No. 8.

Christie Cheung, Isabel Jing Metz, Luke D’Silva and Aiden Kim took on Schubert’s “Death and the Maiden” String Quartet No. 14 in D minor. 

It was exciting to witness this dynamic – to observe the nervousness that blossomed into assertiveness, note the sharing of sound space and the quest for ensemble. Both quartets gave stirring performances. The second YAI Prelude Performance, featuring two more quartets, was on Tuesday July 1.  

These Prelude Performances – free community offerings by young local musicians – continue on Thursday’s and Saturday’s performances. They begin one hour prior to the main performance (6:30 at the Reser; 7 at Kaul). There’s plenty of room and all are welcome.

For the love of one moment

To me, one YA performance was a standout. It will long reside in memory not because of perfection or innovation but because violist Andie Zhu and pianist Cynthia Tseng discovered the music – on stage, in that moment – and rode it to the end. As the two musicians performed movements three and four of Johannes Brahms’s Sonata in F Minor they got into a groove; it was as if they were immersed in an intimate conversation. They knew it – Tseng started smiling halfway through the “Vivace” – the audience knew it and their YA family knew it. They burst into wild cheering and applause at the end. Hmm. Perhaps some of Kai’s joyous and boisterous vibe was in the air? Perhaps just the “vibe” of the Young Artist Institute coming to close in six days. Well done, Andie and Cynthia.

This is the reason to attend, to see these talented young performers on the live stage. On July 3, pack a picnic and enjoy an open-air YAI happening at Shipstad Field on the University of Portland campus on the delightful “SoundsTruck NW” mobile concert stage. 

And on July 5 at 7 pm Kaul Auditorium the final YAI concert doubles down on the talents of our young generation of musicians. In addition to presenting string quartets, the Institute artists will perform the world premieres of mini quartets composed by participants in the Fear No Music Young Composer’s Project. Be there as these Bach-inspired works are launched into the world. There are plenty of free seats for all. And for those unable to venture out that the YAI Final Concert will be livestreamed right here. 

Chamber Music Northwest’s Young Artist Institute exists to elevate – the students, the art and our community. CMNW Young Artist Institute Manager Alyssa Tong implied what can make it even better. “The final puzzle piece is the audience; I can’t wait to see the audience get to experience and enjoy such a high level of playing from such young artists” (festival website).

Help complete the puzzle. Attend the final two free concerts with friends and family. Bring a crowd. Especially bring lots of children. Let’s all be boisterous in support of CMNW’s Young Artists and joyously confident that the future of chamber music is in good hands.