Amici faculty members – Fiona Carnie, RACHEL BALJEU, Andrea Case, Diane Lane, Leila Linton, and Andrea Poon – welcome local and guest performers for Amici String Camp and Calgary Stringfest.
CATHERINE ORDRONNEU piano & KAI GLEUSTEEN violin
Catherine Ordronneau performed her first recital at the age of twelve and it wasn’t until the age of twenty, after two years of law school, that she decided to devote herself entirely to music. She received the highest distinction at the Conservatory in Rouen and later the prestigious Concert Award at the Ecole Normale Alfred Cortot in Paris. She devotes a large part of her time to the duo with Kai Gleusteen and the Trio Liceu.
Violinist Kai Gleusteen studied violin from the age of five in his native city, Calgary. By the age of seventeen, Kai was awarded the top prize in the Commonwealth Concerto Competition in Australia and the prestigious Skene Award in Scotland. Kai is the concertmaster of the Orchestra ‘del Gran Teatre del Liceu’ in Barcelona, where he is also
Professor at the Escuela Superior de Musica de Catalunya. He continues to perform extensively as a soloist in Europe and North America and has released numerous critically acclaimed recordings.
BETH ROOT SANDVOSS cello
Cellist Beth Root Sandvoss has a notably varied career as a recitalist, chamber musician and pedagogue. Beth’s early professional activities took her to Hong Kong, where she became a member of the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra as well as the Victoria String Quartet, performing throughout Asia. After completing undergraduate studies at the University of Wisconsin, Madison with cellist Parry Karp, Beth finished graduate work at the Cleveland Institute of Music as well as further studies in San Francisco. Beth settled in Calgary, Alberta where she enjoys an active performance career in Canada and abroad. Beth has recorded six commercial CDs and has premiered more than 50 new works for solo cello, cello/piano and chamber ensemble.
Beth has an intense interest in new music and is a founding member of the acclaimed Land’s End Ensemble, whose most recent Centrediscs release, Gravity and Grace, won a Juno Award and a Western Canadian Music Award in the category of Classical Composition of the year (2014) for the work Field Notes by Allan Gordon Bell. In addition to her Land’s End Ensemble activities, Beth is a member of the UCalgary String Quartet in residence at the University of Calgary. Nominated as Instrumental Group of the Year, the UCalgary String Quartet has completed live recordings of all the Beethoven String Quartets as well as the CD Far Behind I left My Country which features Klezmer and East European Folk Music.
Along with her performance career, Beth is a very dedicated pedagogue. As a sought after clinician she has worked with both teachers and students on her methods. Her pupils have won numerous competitions in Canada and are regularly invited to summer festivals around the world. Beth’s students have continued on as scholarship students to major universities and conservatories such as New England Conservatory, Mannes College of Music and the Juilliard School. She is a faculty member at Mount Royal University as well as the University of Calgary and spends her summers teaching and performing at music festivals throughout Canada and the United States. Beth has the great pleasure and privilege to perform on an award – winning cello made by her husband, Luthier, Christopher Sandvoss.
“The performance brought out its depth of passion….Beth Root Sandvoss has a beautiful sound, coupled with an excellent sense of harmony—“ Gordon Rumson, Music and Vision
DANIEL SCHOLZ viola
Originally from Regina, Daniel studied at the University of Regina, McGill University and at the University of British Columbia. He was a prize winner at the Lionel Tertis Viola Competition, the most prestigious event of its kind, held on the Isle of Mann. Daniel served as the Principal Viola of the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra and the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra, the Winnipeg Chamber Music Society, and the Rembrandt String Quartet for twenty seven years before retiring in the fall of 2021. As a solo artist, Daniel has performed with the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra, Musickbarock, the Okanagan Symphony and the Vancouver Chamber Players. Daniel has also toured Europe with the Nordic Symphony of Tallinn, Estonia as Guest Principal Viola.
Daniel has been an instructor at the Marcel A. Desautels Faculty of Music at the University of Manitoba as well as the conductor of the Winnipeg Youth Symphony Orchestra. Daniel has been Artist in Residence at the Université de Montréal, Western University, Amici String Program, The Regina Conservatory, and Mount Royal University. Daniel continues to adjudicate for many of Canada’s major music festivals. Daniel is a sought after chamber musician and teacher at many of Canada’s major festivals and is a faculty member of the National Youth Orchestra of Canada. Daniel was also invited to perform and teach in Perth, Australia by the Australian String Teachers Association and the West Australian and New Zealand Viola Society. Daniel plays on a contemporary viola made by Garth Lee of Winnipeg.
LIZA SCRIGGINS viola
Violist Liza Scriggins is a graduate of Williams College and the New England Conservatory. An active freelance musician, she is a member of Kensington Sinfonia and has performed with Calgary Philharmonic, Red Deer Symphony, the National Ballet, and Theatre Calgary. Liza also teaches both violin and viola at the Mount Royal University Conservatory. In recent years, she has ventured into writing as the founder of StoryMusic, which presents storytelling chamber music concerts, and has performed for numerous children at immigrant service centres, libraries and schools, thanks to grants from the Alberta Foundation for the Arts and the National Arts Centre. Calgary Philharmonic selected Liza’s version of Little Red Riding Hood, set to Beethoven’s Quartet Op. 95, for their 2021 Education Concerts. StoryMusic’s second recording is in the works and will be released in early 2025.