Meet the Members
Jonathan Mak
Piano
Pianist Jonathan Mak is from Toronto, Canada. He began his studies with Aster Lai, and under her guidance, made his orchestra debut with the Canadian Sinfonietta at the age of four.
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Jonathan is currently pursuing a Doctor of Musical Arts at Rice University with Jon Kimura Parker. Under the tutelage of Boris Slutsky, he recently completed his Master’s degree and Master of Musical Arts degree in piano performance at the Yale School of Music. He studied with Daniel Shapiro at the Cleveland Institute of Music, where he earned a Bachelor’s degree in piano performance, as well as minors in viola performance and German.
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His recent accomplishments include First Prize: The Isabel Overton Bader, Clifford Overton and Francoise Landry Prize at the Bader & Overton Canadian Piano Competition, the Grand Prize at the Plowman Chamber Music Competition, and the 3rd prize in the OSM competition, performing with the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal. Other awards include the Canada Council for the Arts-Michael Measures award and the 2021 Sylva Gelber Music Foundation Award. He has also participated in the Van Cliburn, Dublin, and Maj Lind International Piano Competitions.
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Jonathan has performed with numerous orchestras, most notably the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra in Bulgaria, Manchester Camerata, Orchestra Filarmonica di Udine, and Krakow Philharmonic Orchestra, and has also given recitals in Italy, Bulgaria, Manchester, China, Vienna, and Poland.
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He has been invited to perform at various festivals including the Bravo! Vail Festival in Colorado, the Festival of the Sound in Ontario, Ottawa Chamberfest, and the Edinburgh International Festival. He has attended various summer festivals, including the Aspen Summer Music Festival, Kneisel Hall Music Festival, and the Sarasota Music Festival.
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An advocate for community outreach, Jonathan is a member of DACAMERA’s Young Artist Program, a fellowship program for emerging professional instrumentalists, vocalists, and composers that serves the Houston community.
Jeongwon Claire An
Violin
South Korean violinist Jeongwon (Claire) An is joining the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra in September 2023 as a member of the first violin section.
She performed the U.S. premiere of Yevhen Stankovych’s “Almost Serenade” for Two Violins in recital with Oleh Krysa, and performed chamber music with Jon Kimura Parker, James Dunham, and Norman Fischer. She has performed at international festivals including Mozarteum Sommerakademie, IMS Prussia Cove, Aspen Music Festival, and New York String Orchestra Seminar (NYSOS), and in concert venues like the Carnegie Hall, Kennedy Center, Walt Disney Concert Hall, and various halls in Asia.
As a chamber music enthusiast, Jeongwon received the Peter Salaff Prize in Chamber Music from the Eastman School of Music. She has given world premiere performances of Masatoshi Mitsumoto “Concertino for Violin and Orchestra” (2020, CalState LA Symphony / Olympia Youth Orchestra), and Michael Daugherty’s “The Old Man and the Sea” Piano Trio (2016, MTAC’s Friend of Today’s Music Program).
An advocate for community outreach, Jeongwon was a member of DACAMERA’s Young Artist Program in 2022-2023, a fellowship program for emerging professional instrumentalists, vocalists, and composers that serves the Houston community. She also served as a mentor of YOLA (Youth Orchestra Los Angeles), LA Philharmonic’s El Sistema music education program.
Jeongwon has studied and worked with inspiring master musicians such as Pierre Amoyal, Steven Doane, James Dunham, Anthony Marwood, Donald Weilerstein, and Kathleen Winkler, and will always be a student of her loving mentors, Fung Ho, Paul Kantor, and Oleh Krysa. She is currently playing on a 1703 G.B. Rogeri violin, generously on loan from the Maestro Foundation.
David Dietz
Cello
Cellist David Dietz has performed across the US and Europe and is experienced in a variety of settings as both a performer and a teacher. He currently resides in Houston, Texas. David received his Bachelor’s Degree and Performer Diploma at Indiana University and recently completed his master’s degree at Rice University in 2022. This past summer he was a teaching fellow at the Encore Chamber Music Festival in Cleveland, Ohio where he performed chamber music alongside the Verona Quartet and Sibbi Bernhardsson. In the 2022-2023 season, David will make appearances with Trio Menil, MUSIQA Houston, Aperio Ensemble, Classical C.A.R.M.A., DACAMERA Young Artists, Monarch Chamber Players, Ars Lyrica Houston, the Houston Grand Opera Orchestra, the Houston Cello Quartet and the Klangspuren Festival in Innsbruck, Austria.
