South African–born violinist Amanda Goodburn is a founding member of the Tokai String Quartet and a member of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra.
She has collaborated as a chamber musician with the Art of Time Ensemble, ArrayMusic, and the ARC Ensemble; and has performed at the Ottawa Chamber Music Festival, Toronto Summer Music Festival, and the Ahuntsic en Fugue and Concerts aux Îles du Bic festivals in Québec. She has also performed as soloist with the Toronto Symphony, Cape Town Philharmonic, and KwaZulu-Natal Philharmonic orchestras.
Amanda completed her undergraduate studies at the University of Stellenbosch, and holds a master’s degree from the University of Toronto and diplomas from the Royal Northern College of Music in England, where she was an Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music (ABRSM) scholar.
A Hamilton based violin and viola performer and pedagogue, Caitlin Boyle is a member of the Isabel String Quartet, Sinfonia Toronto, the Niagara Symphony Orchestra, and teaches at the Hamilton Suzuki School of Music.
Her passion for music education has led her to teach at the Faculty of Music at the University of Toronto, Cardinal Carter Academy for the Arts, Taylor Academy at the Royal Conservatory of Music, Festival of the Sound Music Scores Program, Toronto District School Board, Central Okanagan School District, in addition to having taught students across the US, Spain, UK, Italy, and the UAE.
She currently coordinates and coaches the chamber music program at Mooredale Youth Orchestras. A JUNO-nominated performing artist, Ms. Boyle concertized extensively for thirteen years with the Cecilia String Quartet. She has won several international awards including Banff, Bordeaux, and Osaka String Quartet Competitions.
Violinist Csaba Koczo is currently Assistant Principal Second Violin of the Canadian Opera Company Orchestra, and holds a position with the National Ballet of Canada Orchestra.
Mr. Koczó also enjoys a prolific career as a chamber musician and soloist both in Canada and abroad. As a founding member of the Banff Competition prizewinning and Dora award nominated Tokai String Quartet, Mr. Koczó has toured across Canada and the US and some of his performances have been broadcast on the CBC and the Hungarian National Radio. He has performed at Ottawa Chamberfest, and the Toronto Summer Music Festival where he has worked with Ian Swensen and the Leipzig String Quartet. Mr. Koczó has taught at the Universities of Stanford, Toronto, Kingston, Halifax and Acadia in Wolfville NS, and spent many summers as a faculty member of Music at Port Milford in Picton, ON. He also often appears on the Chatter Chamber Music series in New Mexico and plays with the Santa Fe Opera Orchestra. He is a member of the TakeFive Ensemble, and was one of the founding members of the Via Salzburg Chamber Orchestra.
Mr. Koczo has shared the stage with such illustrious musicians as Mayumi Seiler, Steven Isserlis, Scott St.John, Douglas McNabney, Yehonatan Berick and the St. Lawrence String Quartet. As a soloist, he has been featured with the Sandor Frigyes Chamber Orchestra and has also had the opportunity to perform the Beethoven Violin concerto and Vivaldi’s Four Seasons.
Born in Hungary, Mr. Koczó began his studies in Yugoslavia and then continued in Hungary at the Richter Conservatory in Gyor and the Béla Bartók Conservatory in Budapest. After attaining his bachelor’s degree with distinction from the College of the Franz Liszt Academy of Music, he continued his studies in Toronto with Lorand Fenyves and Erika Raum at the Glenn Gould School and the University of Toronto, where he was the recipient of the H. Carter scholarship.
Rachel Desoer is a cellist from Hamilton, Ontario. She studied at the Juilliard School, Oberlin College, McGill University and the Banff Centre.
She graduated from Oberlin in 2008 with a Bachelor of Music degree. Rachel was the cellist of the Cecilia String Quartet from 2010 to 2018. In this ensemble Rachel toured extensively around the world, recorded 4 albums on the Analekta label and taught chamber music at the University of Toronto. Touring has brought Rachel to inspiring venues such as Wigmore Hall, The Concertgebouw (Amsterdam), Konzert Haus Berlin and many more. The Cecilia Quartet also made educational programming a priority and performed hundreds of presentations for schools.
In 2014 the quartet created a concert series called Xenia concerts specifically designed for children on the autism spectrum and their families. Exemplifying their commitment to the equal representation of women in music, Rachel spearheaded the commissioning of 4 string quartets by Canadian women composers in 2016. Throughout her schooling and career Rachel has also played recitals and concertos with orchestra. She has also worked in other orchestras, most notably, the National Arts Centre Orchestra and the Canadian Opera Company. She is currently the acting principal cellist of Symphony Nova Scotia.
Principal Cello of the NAC Orchestra in Ottawa and Co-Artistic Director of the "5 at the First" Chamber Music Series in Hamilton, Canadian cellist Rachel Mercer has appeared as a soloist and chamber musician across five continents.
Described as a "pure chamber musician" (Globe and Mail) creating "moments of pure magic" (Toronto Star), Rachel plays with the Mercer-Park Duo, and was a member of JUNO-winning Ensemble Made In Canada (2008-20), and the Aviv Quartet (2002-10).
An advocate for new Canadian music, Rachel has commissioned over 25 works including a cello concerto by Stewart Goodyear recently premiered with the NAC Orchestra, and an album of Canadian women composers released on Centrediscs. Rachel plays a 17th century cello from Northern Italy.
Theresa Rudolph is Assistant Principal Viola of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, and a member of the Santa Fe Opera Orchestra. Theresa began her orchestral career as the youngest member of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra at the age of 21. She has also performed with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra and the Cleveland Orchestra.
A passionate chamber musician, Theresa has performed throughout North America, appearing in festivals such as the Great Lakes and Santa Fe Chamber Music Festivals, Ottawa Chamberfest, and New Music Detroit. Frequently heard on series throughout Ontario, she performs regularly as a member of the TSO Chamber Soloists, and has been featured on CBC/Radio-Canada.
Increasingly sought-after as a teacher, Theresa maintains a robust studio at the University of Toronto, and is the Viola Faculty of the Taylor Academy at the Royal Conservatory of Music. She has been a guest clinician at the Universities of Montreal, Western Ontario, and Ottawa, and is the Viola Coach of the Toronto Symphony Youth Orchestra. Theresa holds a Bachelor of Music degree from the Cleveland Institute of Music, where she studied with Robert Vernon. While at CIM, she toured and recorded with the Musicians from Ravinia, was a prizewinner at the prestigious Fischoff Competition, and performed in Carnegie Hall.
Yolanda Bruno is, according to CBC Music, one of the “hottest young musicians” in Canada. She’s won a slew of awards and competitions, has performed as a soloist all over Europe and North America and joined the Toronto Symphony Orchestra in 2019. She’s played for the Queen at Buckingham Palace and backed-up the Australian heavy metal band Parkway Drive at a recording session in Ottawa.
Yet her most memorable musical experiences have happened in unexpected places—playing for children in a parking lot in South-East London, giving a concert in a high-security penitentiary, playing for strangers on street corners or in parks, subways, airports, hospitals.
She believes in the power of music to break down barriers of all kinds—personal, cultural, even political. Yolanda grew up in Ottawa and music was part of life before she was even born. Her mom went into labour while playing a concert, and became Yolanda’s first, and probably most important, teacher. After studies at McGill and the Guildhall School (London), she returned to Canada and launched a whirlwind professional career full of musical adventures. She masterminded a Kickstarter campaign with pianist Isabelle David to cover the costs of their first CD, The Wild Swans. It features music by eleven women composers, spanning ten centuries, including several world premieres. During the pandemic, she gave over 50 free performances as part of a project she calls “Music for Your Blues.” Children, retirees, folks in classrooms and seniors’ centres joined her for online concerts combining music with stories and poetry. For Yolanda, playing (on her nearly 300 year-old Domenico Montagnana) violin is about spinning sound, carving notes to make them speak as words—communication that is both intimate and provocative.