Artists

Dr. Andre’ E. Godsey, Sr., Ph.D. has found his voice in the contemporary classical music venue. Over the last 15 years, he reveals an ability to inspire and entertain audiences nationally and internationally. At Lake Clifton Senior High school in Baltimore MD, he was awarded the Musician of the Year for 1979. In more recent times, several musical events include the world premiere of Symphony Number One in C# Minor: Themes for Soren Kierkegaard, “Movement One,” at the Sao Paulo Contemporary Classical Music Festival, in Sao Paulo, Brazil, 2019. The same work was recorded by Navona Records and featured on DIMENSIONS VOL 3, which received a Silver Medal in the December 2020 Global Music Awards. 

Philip Spray performs, records, and consults with period instrument ensembles and publishers across the country. He co-founded the Indianapolis Baroque Orchestra under Barthold Kuijken and later Musik Ekklesia whose first recording The Vanishing Nordic Chorale was part of a 2011 GRAMMY® nomination for Best Classical Producer. He has long maintained interest in writing, composing, teaching, and arranging. His current ensemble Alchymy Viols offers performances from some of America’s finest players on the viola da gamba: Wendy Gillespie, Joanna Blendulf, and Erica Rubis.

Lewis Spratlan was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in Music in 2000. He has received fellowships from the Guggenheim and Massachusetts Artists Foundations, the NEA, the Tanglewood Festival, and the MacDowell Colony. Recent commissions include Earthrise, for the San Francisco Opera; Streaming for the Centennial Celebration of the Ravinia Festival; Wonderer for pianist Jonathan Biss; Shadow for cellist Matt Haimovitz; a concerto for a consortium of 30 saxophonists; A Summer's Day for BMOP (Boston Modern Orchestra Project), and Process/Bulge for Wet Ink. His opera Life is a Dream received its world premiere at Sante Fe Opera in July 2010. Apollo and Daphne Variations, Concerto for Saxophone and Orchestra, and A Summer's Day are currently in preparation for a BMOP CD, as is his Trio for Clarinet, Violin, and Piano for Albany Records.

Ensemble Spinoza is a Montreal based early music ensemble. It was co-founded by Noémy Gagnon-Lafrenais and Christophe Gauthier in 2020. Acclaimed gambist Margaret Little joined the ensemble in 2021. The group specializes in the performance of 17th century baroque on period instruments. The ensemble’s mission is to uncover hidden gems of the repertoire and make them available to North Americans. Ensemble Spinoza stands apart through its profound artistic contemplation, embodying a pursuit of knowledge that echoes the philosophers from whom it draws its name.

Composer Mira J. Spektor was born in Europe, graduated from Sarah Lawrence College, and then studied at Mannes and Juilliard. In 1975, she founded the acclaimed Aviva Players, dedicated to presenting the rich repertoire of chamber music and songs by women composers from the 12th to 21st Centuries. The New York Times called her “An interesting composer” and “attractive and tonal,” with music described as “A passionate duet” and “A sprightly songfest.”

Joseph T. Spaniola is a composer on a passionate quest to engage the hearts and minds of audiences and performers through the communicative powers of music. Spaniola is active as a composer, arranger, educator, conductor, lecturer, producer, clinician, and adjudicator. He has composed works for band, orchestra, chamber ensembles, solo instruments, voice, choir, and electronic tape. His works have received honors from National Band Association, The American Prize, Global Music Awards, Florida State Music Teachers Association, Dallas Wind Symphony, and others.

Composer Dawn Sonntag translates the experience of being human into music that has been called “hauntingly lyrical” (Schaumburg-Lippe Landeszeitung), “visceral,” and “freshly relevant.” Her operas have been featured at the Cleveland Opera Theater’s New Opera Works festival, the Hartford Women’s Composers Festival, the Hartford Opera Theater’s New in November festival, and the Opera from Scratch festival in Halifax. Based on the true story of World War II refugees, her first opera, Verlorene Heimat, for which she wrote the libretto and music, won Honorable Mention in the 2021 American Prize for composition. Her settings of Sara Teasdale’s poetry are included in the new Modern Music for New Singers: 21st Century American Art Song.

Chi Young Song (he/him/his), violinist and educator, has engaged with audiences throughout Asia, North America, and Europe. A passionate collaborator in both orchestral and chamber music, Chi Young is frequently invited to lead and perform with various ensembles and orchestras throughout the United States. As a recitalist, he is committed to putting into dialogue the works of marginalized and underrepresented composers within traditional repertoire.

Dr. Cornelia Sommer is a bassoonist, arranger, and educator dedicated to sharing music with diverse audiences and expanding the bassoon’s repertoire. Originally from Seattle, she joined the Detroit Symphony Orchestra as Second Bassoon in Fall 2023. Sommer’s recent performance and research projects have focused on music inspired by fairy tales. NEW ENCHANTMENTS: FAIRY TALE MUSIC FOR BASSOON is her debut album and is supported by grants from the Presser Foundation and the International Double Reed Society.

Raised amidst the diverse musical traditions of southern Appalachia, cellist Juliana Soltis inspires audiences the world over with “exquisite, heart-rending” (Early Music America) performances that are redefining classical music. A “true virtuoso” (Classical Music), Soltis delights in connecting listeners with the forgotten stories of classical music. 

David Warin Solomons (b. 1953) began his musical career relatively late, taking up the violin at the age of 14 and the classical guitar a few years after that. Most of his musical expression in composition has been based on the principle of "learning by doing," liberally seasoned with musical collaborations. The first of these collaborations, as far back as 1969, was with two pen-friends in France and Germany, which gave rise to several trios for the unusual combination of violin, trumpet, and piano. Solomons moved on to Christ Church at Oxford University in 1972 to study French and German and also began to sing there on a regular basis, eventually settling on alto as his preferred range. At Oxford he met lots of great musicians, many of whom had important influences on his compositional style.

Scott Solak (b. 1961) has written works in a wide variety of genres, including solo piano, orchestral, and chamber music. The bulk of his output has been in the realm of vocal and choral music, both sacred and secular. Choral commissions include two full-length oratorios for church performance (Healing of the Blind Man and Welcome to Thy World, O King [Chevy Chase Concerts and Bradley Hills Presbyterian Church]; Velvet Shoes and This Music [Reston Chorale]; and The Day of Pentecost [private commission]. Instrumental commissions include Canzona for Oboe and Orchestra [Reston Community Orchestra]; Sonata di Gloria for two violins and piano [commissioned for the Chamasyan Sisters]; Slant of Light [Washington Saxophone Quartet]; and Sicilienne for viola and piano [private commission].

Pavel Šnajdr is a Czech conductor and composer. He is a graduate of the Janáček Academy of Music and Performing Arts (JAMU), Brno in composition (which he studied with Alois Piňos) and conducting (with Emil Skoták). Beyond working with symphony orchestras, he has been engaged by music theatres including the J.K. Tyl Theatre in Pilsen, the Prague State Opera and the Moravian Theatre in Olomouc, and currently conducts opera at the National Theatre in Brno.

Kile's frequently performed music is praised by audiences and critics for its emotional power, direct appeal, and strong voice. He is Curator of the Fleisher Collection of Orchestral Music in the Free Library of Philadelphia, co-host of Discoveries from the Fleisher Collection, and host of the contemporary American music show Now is the Time on WRTI 90.1 FM in Philadelphia.

Pianist and composer Vytautas Smetona was born in Cleveland OH. His parents, Birute and Julius, and paternal grandparents narrowly escaped the 1940 Soviet invasion and subsequent occupation of Lithuania. Smetona’s grandfather, Antanas Smetona, was the last President of independent Lithuania. The family arrived and settled in the United States in 1941 via a route through Germany, Portugal, and Brazil. Vytautas’ father, Julius, was an attorney, and his mother was a musician.

When NINA SMEETS makes music, she fully expresses the feelings coming from her heart and soul. She combines a fresh, delicate, and clear sound with a full range of musical colors. Her ability to mesmerize the audience with pure, sincere, and touching performances makes her an artist of unconditional value. Smeets devotes herself fully to music. She’s not only a performer, but also a passionate composer. After the release of her solo piano book and album, Project Reborn, Smeets’s music was nominated for an award in 2016.

Gary Smart’s career has encompassed a wide range of activities as composer, classical and jazz pianist, and teacher. Always a musician with varied interests, he may be the only pianist to have studied with Yale scholar/keyboardist Ralph Kirkpatrick, the great Cuban virtuoso Jorge Bolet, and the master jazz pianist Oscar Peterson. A true American pluralist, Smart composes and improvises music that reflects an abiding interest in Americana, jazz, and world music, as well as the Western classical tradition.

Michael K. Slayton is an American composer who has written works in a cross-section of musical genres, with specific emphasis on chamber music. His continuing dedication to the value of artistic exchange has afforded him opportunity to partner with distinguished performers all over the world. His music, published by ACA, Inc. (BMI), is regularly programmed in the U.S. and abroad, including Chemnitz, Seitz, Leipzig, Droyssig, and Weimar, Germany; Graz, Austria; Paris,Tours, and Marquette-lez-Lille, France; Kristiansund, Norway; Aviero, Portugal; Brussles, Belgium; Johannesburg and Potchefstroom, South Africa; London, UK; and New York, NY.

Jiří Skopal, choral conductor and music educator, was born on August 15, 1947 in Velké Losiny, Czech Republic. Skopal received his first music education from his father, Jan Skopal, a choral conductor of North Moravia’s Teachers’ Association. For his Master’s in Education, he studied in Olomouc from 1965 to 1969, and received his doctorate in 1973. In 1982, he was named Associate Professor at the Charles University in Prague, and in 1994 he became a full Professor.

Hailed by The Australian as possessing a “rare gift as a melodist” and by Limelight as expressing “both exquisite delicacy and tremendous power,” Australian composer Lachlan Skipworth writes across the mediums of orchestral, chamber, vocal, and experimental music. His vivid musical language is colored by three years spent in Japan where his immersion in the study of the shakuhachi bamboo flute inevitably became a part of his muse.