String Faculty Carter earned a B.F.A. from the University of Minnesota, an M.M. from Indiana University, and a D.M.A. from the University of Illinois. His cello teachers have included Robert Jamieson, Gary Hoffman, Janos Starker, and Tsuyoshi Tsutsumi. Prior to coming to St. Olaf, Carter was instructor of cello at Wichita State University and principal cello of the Wichita Symphony. He was a finalist in the First International Emmanuel Feuermann Solo Cello Competition, semifinalist in the 1985 Concert Artist Guild Competition, and semifinalist in the 1989 Erwin Bodky Competition for Early Music. He has performed as soloist with the Minnesota Orchestra under Neville Mariner, the Wichita Symphony, the Pueblo Symphony, the Kenwood Chamber Orchestra, the Bloomington Symphony, and the Northeast Chamber Orchestra. He has served on the faculty at the International Institute of Music in Taos, N.M., and participated in the Washington Island Music Festival. |
Anna Clift, cellist of the Artaria String Quartet, is adjunct professor of cello at Carleton College and St Olaf College in Northfield, MN where she also maintains her own private studio of young cellists. Additionally, she directs the Northfield Branch of the Artaria Chamber Music School, a highly regarded program founded by the Artaria String Quartet in St Paul dedicated to educating young musicians in the art of chamber music collaboration and performance. Anna received her Bachelor's degree in music performance from Indiana University, where she studied with world reknowned cellist Janos Starker, and her Master's degree from SUNY-Stony Brook, studying with the legendary cellist of the Beaux Arts Trio, Bernard Greenhouse. Other teachers and mentors have been Gary Hoffman, Paul Tortelier, and Menahem Pressler. Anna regularly performs in the cello sections of the Minnesota Orchestra and the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra. In addition to their European tours, she is a frequent collaborator on the Minnesota Orchestra's Sommerfest chamber music concerts, appearing with today's leading artists such as Gil Shaham, Sharon Isbin, and the Artemis Trio. |
Een earned a D.M.A. in violin performance and literature from the University of Illinois. She has studied violin with Theodore Brunson, Marilyn Box, Dorothy DeLay, Paul Rolland, Eduard Melkus, and Paul Kantor, and viola with Louis Kievman. Een has also studied chamber music with members of the Hungarian and Walden String quartets. She has a special research interest in the Norwegian folk Hardanger fiddle and has been featured on National Public Radio and on Norwegian National Television performing and talking about emigrant fiddle traditions. She is a member of the Minnesota Opera Orchestra, the Plymouth Festival Orchestra, and a frequent chamber music performer on violin and viola. Een has performed as a solo and chamber musician in Norway, France, Germany, Austria, Puerto Rico, and Costa Rica. |
Gray earned a B.M. from Wheaton College, an M.M. from the University of Michigan, and he received a chamber music certificate from the Eastman School of Music, where he pursued additions study on viola. His principal study was with Paul Makanowitzky and Sylvia Rosenberg (violin), with Atar Arad (viola), and with the Cleveland Quartet (in chamber music). Gray was the violist of the Casella String Quartet, winner of the 1981 Cleveland Quartet Competition and the 1983 Fischoff Chamber Music Competition. He has performed as a solo recitalist at the Ravinia Festival in Chicago and as a chamber musician at the Aspen Music Festival and the Steamboat Springs Festival in Colorado. Previously a member of the Rochester Philharmonic (N.Y.) and the Grand Rapids Symphony (Mich.), and concertmaster of the Bloomington Symphony (Minn.), Gray is currently a substitute member of the Minnesota Orchestra and the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra. He is also employed on the music staff of St. Andrew's Lutheran Church, Mahtomedi, Minn. In recent years he has been featured as a violin and viola soloist on many occasions with the St. Olaf Choir, St. Olaf Cantorei, and St. Olaf Orchestra. |
Niemisto received bachelor's and master's degrees from the University of Michigan. She was also a student at the National Music Camp, Interlochen. Neimisto was harp soloist with several symphonies in the Detroit area while in high school, as well as with the International Youth Symphony in Windsor, Canada. She has attended the Salzedo Harp Colony in Camden, Maine, and has played with the Canadian Broadcasting Company in Halifax, the Las Palmas Opera Festival Orchestra (Spain), the Wisconsin Chamber Symphony, and as a free-lance artist and teacher in Finland. She is currently harpist with the Rochester Symphony, the Austin Symphony, the LaCrosse Symphony, and is also on the faculty at Carleton College and Luther College. She has completed five teacher-training sessions in Suzuki harp instruction and has a private studio of about fifteen Suzuki students. |
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 Miriam Scholz-CarlsonInstructor of Music — Alexander Technique scholzca@stolaf.edu |
Ray Shows received his M.Mus in violin performance from Boston University (magna cum laude) and his B.mus from Florida State University. He made his solo violin debut with orchestra in his native Atlanta. A McKnight Fellowship prizewinner in 2004, Ray is a founding member of the Artaria String Quartet and for two decades has performed concerts in major concert halls in New York, Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Philadelphia, Atlanta, across the U.S. and in Europe. He has been a featured artist on ABC television, National Public Radio, Canadian Broadcasting and at the L’Epau Festival in France. An Artist/Teacher in Residence at the renowned Tanglewood Institute and at The Quartet Program, Shows is currently Artistic Director of the Artaria Chamber Music School and the newly created Saint Paul String Quartet Competition. His students attend major conservatories and are Schubert Club prizewinners. Appointed to multi-year teaching residencies at Boston College, Viterbo University, Florida State University and Baldwin-Wallace Conservatory, Shows is the recipient of prestigious grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, Chamber Music America, and the Heartland Fund. His principal teachers were Roman Totenberg and Gerardo Ribeiro. Eugene Lehner, Raphael Hillyer, and members of the Emerson, Cleveland, Budapest, Muir and La Salle Quartets have mentored him in chamber music. Ray plays on a rare Italian violin made in 1726 by David Tecchler. He has been serving on the faculty of St. Olaf since 2000. |
