Composer John Harbison is among America’s most distinguished artistic figures. The recipient of numerous awards and honors, among them a MacArthur and a Pulitzer, Harbison has composed music for most of America’s premiere musical institutions, including the Metropolitan Opera, Chicago Symphony, Boston Symphony, New York Philharmonic, and the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. His catalog includes three operas, six symphonies, twelve concerti, a ballet, five string quartets, numerous song cycles and chamber works, and a large body of sacred music that includes cantatas, motets, and the orchestral-choral works Four Psalms, Requiem and Abraham. His music is widely recorded on leading labels.

Grammy-winning pianist Gloria Cheng is widely acclaimed for her poetic and rigorous performances of contemporary music. In recitals that have been described as “characteristically adventurous and filled with meaningful interrelations” (The New York Times), Cheng has been presented by the Ojai Festival, Chicago Humanities Festival, William Kapell Festival, and Tanglewood Festival of Contemporary Music. She has appeared on leading concert series including Carnegie Hall’s Making Music, Cal Performances, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra Engine408, Stanford Lively Arts, and at (le) Poisson Rouge.

Pianist Judith Gordon gave her debut recital at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1990. She has performed concertos by Mozart, Ravel and Saint-Saëns with the Boston Pops Orchestra, and by Bach, Schumann, Rachmaninoff, Hindemith, Berg, Boulez, and more, with ensembles that include the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, the Boston Modern Orchestra Project and the Pro Arte Chamber Orchestra. She has premiered music by Martin Brody, Peter Child, Alan Fletcher, John Harbison, Lee Hyla, Libby Larsen, Peter Lieberson, Salvatore Macchia, James Matheson, James Primosch, Eric Sawyer, and Donald Wheelock, among many others, and in 2015 she will record the solo piano works of Harbison for Bridge Records.

The profound influence of pianist Gilbert Kalish as an educator and pianist in myriad performances and recordings has established him as a major figure in American music-making. This season he appears with the St. Petersburg Chamber Philharmonic, performs at the Ojai Music Festival, and holds a residency at the San Francisco Conservatory. In 2006 he was awarded the Peabody Medal by the Peabody Conservatory for his outstanding contributions to music in America. He was the pianist of the Boston Symphony Chamber Players for 30 years, and was a founding member of the Contemporary Chamber Ensemble, a group that flourished during the 1960s and 70s in support of new music. He is particularly known for his partnership of many years with mezzo-soprano Jan DeGaetani, as well as for current collaborations with soprano Dawn Upshaw and cellists Timothy Eddy and Joel Krosnik. As an educator and performer he has appeared at the Banff Centre, the Steans Institute at Ravinia, the Marlboro Music Festival, and Music@Menlo; from 1985 to 1997 he served as chairman of the Tanglewood faculty. His discography of some 100 recordings embraces both the classical and contemporary repertories; of special note are those made with Ms. DeGaetani and that of Ives’ Concord Sonata. A distinguished professor at SUNY Stony Brook, Mr. Kalish has been an Artist of The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center since 2006.

Pianist and Conductor Robert Levin has been heard throughout the United States, Europe, Australia and Asia. His solo engagements include the orchestras of Atlanta, Berlin, Birmingham, Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, Los Angeles, Montreal, Utah and Vienna on the Steinway with such conductors as Semyon Bychkov, James Conlon, Bernard Haitink, Sir Neville Marriner, Seiji Ozawa, Sir Simon Rattle and Esa-Pekka Salonen. On period pianos he has appeared with the Academy of Ancient Music, English Baroque Soloists, Handel & Haydn Society, Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique, with Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Christopher Hogwood, Sir Charles Mackerras, Nicholas McGegan, and Sir Roger Norrington.

Born in Boston and raised near the coastal redwoods of northern California, pianist Ryan MacEvoy McCullough has developed a diverse career as recitalist, concerto soloist, vocal and instrumental chamber musician, with a particular love for new music and collaborations with living composers. Comfortable with a wide variety of repertoire, Mr. McCullough has received critical recognition for his artistic performances–in a performance of Chopin “his virtuosity was evident and understated, his playing projected a warmth… that conjured the humanity of Artur Rubinstein,” (Eli Newberger, The Boston Musical Intelligencer) and in a performance of contemporary music, his playing “found a perfect balance between the gently shimmering and the more brittle, extroverted strands… and left you eager to hear the rest.” (Allan Kozinn, NY Times)

Pianist Molly Morkoski has performed as soloist and collaborative artist throughout the U.S., Europe, the Caribbean, and Japan. Her playing has been recognized by The New York Times as “strong, profiled, nuanced . . . beautifully etched . . . . an energetic and focused player . . . . with flexibility and warmth . . .” and The Boston Globecalled her “outstanding.” In 2007, she made her solo debut in Carnegie Hall’s Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage playing Beethoven’s Bagatelles, Op. 126. As a soloist, she enjoys championing the classics, such as Bach’s Goldberg Variations and contemporary masterworks such as Ives’ Concord Sonata and Messiaen’s Vingt regards sur l’enfant-Jésus, as well as premiering new works of current composer colleagues, such as John Harbison, Steven Mackey, and Gabriela Lena Frank. Molly Morkoski has performed in many of the country’s prestigious venues, including Weill and Zankel Halls, Alice Tully Hall, Merkin Hall, (Le) Poisson Rouge, Boston’s Gardner Museum and Jordan Hall, St. Louis’ Powell Hall, Philadelphia’s Kimmel Center, and Washington D.C.’s Smithsonian. Internationally, she has performed at the Teatro Nacional in Santo Domingo, the Strasbourg Conservatoire, the U.S. Embassies in Paris and Nice, and in Japan’s Suntory Hall. She has performed concertos with the Raleigh, Asheville, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and Tuscaloosa Symphonies, and with the Moravian Philharmonic Orchestra.

Ursula Oppens is equally committed to programming traditional, and contemporary repertoire. She has performed with many of the world’s major orchestras, including the New York and Los Angeles philharmonics, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the American Composers Orchestra and the orchestras of Chicago, Cleveland and San Francisco. Abroad, she has appeared with such ensembles as the Berlin Symphony, Orchetra de la Suisse Romande, the Deutsche Symphonie and the London Philharmonic Orchestra. Oppens is an avid chamber musician and has performed with the Arditti, Juilliard and Pacifica quartets, among others. A four-time Grammy nominee, Oppens has over the years premiered works by such leading composers as Luciano Berio, William Bolcom, Elliott Carter, John Corigliano, Anthony Davis, John Harbison, Julius Hemphill, Tania Leon, Gyorgy Ligeti, Witold Lutoslawski, Conlon Nancarro, Tobias Picker, Frederic Rzewski, Joan Tower, Amy Williams, Christian Wolff and Charles Wuorinen.