Violinist Ching-Yi Lin’s recent performances and masterclasses have taken her to the Barratt Due Institute of Music in Norway, the Shenyang and Xi’an Conservatories in China, Northwestern University, Vanderbilt University, and the University of British Columbia. She’s also performed in New York on the Museum of Modern Art’s Summer Garden Series, at Sejong Center in South Korea, and in Taiwan at the National Concert Hall in Taipei.

Her recent album on MSR Classics features sonatas for violin and piano by Charles Ives, William Bolcom, and John Corigliano. In reviewing the album, Gramophone noted the “panache and warmth” of Ms. Lin’s playing and described her interpretations as “a series of tender, lively, and challenging conversations.”

A dedicated and creative teacher, Ching-Yi Lin is Associate Professor at Western Kentucky University and also serves on the faculty at the Indiana University Summer String Academy and the WKU Summer String Institute. Previously, she served on the faculty of the Sommersymfoni i Kristiansand in Norway and Chicago Chamber Music Festival.

In 2013, Ching-Yi was presented with the prestigious Jefferson Award for Public Service in Washington, DC, recognizing her work in bringing music into the lives of young people throughout her community. And in 2017, Ching-Yi received a Sisterhood grant from Western Kentucky University to direct student teachers and volunteers in teaching the violin to refugee children in Bowling Green, KY. In 2020, this program developed into a non-profit organization called Bridging Cultures with Music. The program offers college music majors an opportunity to teach, inspire, and make an impact in a global classroom setting.

Ching-Yi regularly presents at the American String Teachers Association National Conference and is an active clinician and adjudicator. As a board member for the Daraja Music Initiative, a non-profit organization in Moshi, Tanzania, Dr. Lin founded a beginning strings program for students of the Majengo Primary School in 2016. Over 60 string instruments were donated from across the United States for this endeavor. She also currently serves as the Secretary and on the Board of Directors of the Suzuki Association of the Americas.

Dr. Lin holds bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, and she undertook additional studies at the Vienna Conservatory. She plays on a violin made in 1863 by Jean-Baptiste Vuillaume.

www.chingyilin.com

Andrew Braddock

Violist Andrew Braddock’s teaching and performing career has recently taken him to the Sejong Center in Seoul, South Korea, the National Concert Hall in Taipei, Taiwan, and the International Viola Congress in Rotterdam.

A passionate educator, he has given masterclasses at Vanderbilt University, the Chinese Culture University in Taipei, Taiwan, Bowling Green State University, and many others. He teaches at Western Kentucky University (WKU) and is the co-director of the WKU String Academy. In the summers, he teaches at the Indiana University Summer String Academy and directs the WKU Summer String Institute, an intensive summer camp for students ages 4 to 18 based around chamber music and orchestral performance. His creative teaching led him to co-found Bridging Cultures with Music, a 501(c)(3) organization that supports various pedagogical and outreach programs in his community and abroad.

Research, writing, and intellectual discovery are central to his artistic mission. His writings have appeared in publications such as The Strad and the Journal of the British Music Society. He is currently the editor of the American Suzuki Journal, a quarterly publication of the Suzuki Association of the Americas. From 2017 to 2021, Dr. Braddock was the editor of the Journal of the American Viola Society, the most prominent peer-reviewed publication for viola scholarship. He previously served as the journal’s New Music Editor and on the board of the American Viola Society.

He is the principal violist of the Paducah Symphony Orchestra, and he regularly plays with the Nashville Symphony and the Nashville Opera. He holds degrees from Indiana University, Vanderbilt University, and the University of Kentucky. His principal teachers are Atar Arad, Kathryn Plummer, and John Graham. He plays a viola made by Giovanni Pistucci, ca. 1920.

Visit his personal website for his recordings, research, and arrangements for viola: andybraddock.com

Patrick Hopkins

Cellist and conductor Patrick Hopkins is an active soloist, chamber musician, and orchestral player having performed nationally and internationally in venues such as Alice Tully Hall, David Geffen Hall, Carnegie Hall, The Kennedy Center, Merkin Hall, The New World Center, and Suntory Hall. He made his Lincoln Center debut in 2008 as soloist with the Juilliard Pre-College Orchestra and has appeared three times as soloist with the Fairbanks Symphony. In July 2015, he was soloist/principal cellist with the National Repertory Orchestra and recently appeared as soloist with the New Amsterdam Orchestra of New York. In 2011, Dr. Hopkins was the Grand Prize winner of the Music Teachers National Association Young Artist Competition. He was the recipient of the 2010 Young Alaskan Artist Award that led to his Anchorage recital debut. Dr. Hopkins is also a Yamaha Young Performing Artist. He was a member of the Wichita (Kansas) Symphony Orchestra, served as a lecturer at Rutgers University, and was a faculty member at South Texas College where he taught cello, bass, chamber music, and conducted string ensembles.

Dr. Hopkins has appeared as a member of The Juilliard Orchestra and the New World Symphony, and has served as principal cellist of the Aspen Opera Theater Company Orchestra, The Juilliard Orchestra, the Manhattan School of Music Symphony Orchestra, and the Rutgers Symphony Orchestra. He has worked with conductors such as Alan Gilbert, Bernard Haitink, Robert Spano, and Yannick Nezet-Seguin.

A versatile chamber musician as well as an experienced soloist and orchestral leader, Dr. Hopkins is performing across the United States with the New York based chamber ensemble Frisson. He has studied chamber music with members of the American, Cleveland, Emerson, Juilliard, and Orion Quartets as well as Toby Appel, Joseph Kalichstein, Seymour Lipkin, and Sylvia Rosenberg. Dr. Hopkins has performed in master classes with Zuill Bailey, Colin Carr, Timothy Eddy, Pamela Frank, and Franz Helmerson, and has performed with members of the Harlem and Orion Quartets.  

Dr. Hopkins began cello studies at age four in Fairbanks, Alaska and is a graduate of Juilliard’s Pre-College Division. He received his Bachelor of Music degree from The Juilliard School as a scholarship student of Bonnie Hampton and Richard Aaron, his Master of Music degree from the Manhattan School of Music in the Orchestral Performance program as a full scholarship student of Alan Stepansky, and his Doctor of Musical Arts degree from Rutgers University as a full scholarship student of Jonathan Spitz. Other teachers with whom he has worked extensively include Amy Barston, Hans Jørgen-Jensen, Melissa Kraut, and Minna Rose Chung. He attended the Meadowmount School of Music and received summer fellowships from the National Repertory Orchestra, Spoleto Music Festival, Aspen Music Festival, and the Music Academy of the West. Dr. Hopkins currently serves as Assistant Professor of Cello and Bass at Southeast Missouri State University and Artistic Director and Conductor of the Southeast Missouri Symphony Orchestra.