BENJAMIN BEILMAN, violin


Benjamin Beilman is one of the leading violinists of his generation. He has won international praise for his passionate performances and deep rich tone which the Washington Post called “mightily impressive,” and The New York Times described as “muscular with a glint of violence.” The Times has also praised his “handsome technique, burnished sound, and quiet confidence,” and the Strad described his playing as “pure poetry.”


Beilman’s 2023-24 season includes his debut with the St. Louis Symphony under Cristian Macelaru, and returns to the Minnesota Orchestra with Elim Chan, the Oregon Symphony with David Danzmayr, and the Pacific Symphony, whom he will play-direct in a program of Vivaldi. The same season will also see six weeks of performances in Europe, including concerts with the SWR Symphonieorchester Stuttgart alongside Elim Chan, a return to the Kölner Philharmonie with the Deutsche Radio Philharmonie Saarbrücken, and appearances at the Grafenegg Festival, Festpielhaus St. Pölten, and the Musikverein in Vienna with the Tonkünstler Orchester and Tabita Berglund. Beilman will also return to play-direct the London Chamber Orchestra, and will reunite with Ryan Bancroft in making his debut with BBC National Orchestra of Wales, and with Roderick Cox in returning to Orchestre National Montpellier Occitanie. He will also continue his performances of the Britten Concerto with the Estonian National Symphony.


In April 2022, Beilman became one of the youngest artists to be appointed to the faculty of the Curtis Institute of Music, and in March 2024 will lead a Curtis string ensemble in a national tour. 


In recent seasons Beilman’s commitment to and passion for contemporary music, has led to new works written for him by Frederic Rzewski (commissioned by Music Accord), and Gabriella Smith (commissioned by the Schubert Club in St. Paul, and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music). He has also given multiple performances of Jennifer Higdon’s violin concerto, and recorded Thomas Larcher’s concerto with Hannu Lintu and the Tonkünstler Orchester, as well as premiered Chris Rogerson’s Violin Concerto (“The Little Prince”) with the Kansas City Symphony and Gemma New. 
In past seasons, Beilman has performed with many major orchestras worldwide including the Chicago Symphony, Philadelphia Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, Rotterdam Philharmonic, London Philharmonic, Trondheim Symphony, Oslo Philharmonic, Taipei Symphony, Frankfurt Radio Symphony, Zurich Tonhalle, Sydney Symphony, and Houston Symphony. He has also toured Australia in recital under Musica Aviva, including stops in in Melbourne, Sydney, Newcastle, Adelaide, Brisbane, Canberra, and Sydney. 


Conductors with whom he works include Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Cristian Măcelaru, Lahav Shani, Krzysztof Urbański, Ryan Bancroft, Matthias Pintscher, Gemma New, Karina Canellakis, Jonathon Heyward, Juraj Valčuha, Han-Na Chang, Elim Chan, Roderick Cox, Rafael Payare, Osmo Vänskä, and Giancarlo Guerrero.
In recital and chamber music, Beilman performs regularly at the major halls across the world, including Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Kölner Philharmonie, Berlin Philharmonie, Wigmore Hall, Louvre (Paris), Bunka Kaikan (Tokyo) and at festivals he has performed at Verbier, Aix-en-Provence Easter, Prague Dvorak, Robeco Summer Concerts (Amsterdam), Music@Menlo, Marlboro and Seattle Chamber Music, amongst others. He also continues to perform with Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. 
Beilman studied at the Curtis Institute of Music with Ida Kavafian and Pamela Frank, and with Christian Tetzlaff at the Kronberg Academy, and has received many prestigious accolades including a Borletti-Buitoni Trust Fellowship, an Avery Fisher Career Grant and a London Music Masters Award. He has also recorded works by Stravinsky, Janáček and Schubert for Warner Classics. He perfoms with the ex-Balaković F. X. Tourte bow (c. 1820), and plays the “Ysaÿe” Guarneri del Gesù from 1740, generously on loan from the Nippon Music Foundation.
GLORIA CHIEN, piano


Taiwanese-born pianist Gloria Chien has one of the most diverse musical lives as a noted performer, concert presenter, and educator. She made her orchestral debut at the age of sixteen with the Boston Symphony Orchestra with Thomas Dausgaard, and she performed again with the BSO with Keith Lockhart. She was subsequently selected by the The Boston Globe as one of its Superior Pianists of the year, “who appears to excel in everything.” In recent seasons, she has performed as a recitalist and chamber musician at Alice Tully Hall, the Library of Congress, the Phillips Collection, the Dresden Chamber Music Festival, and the National Concert Hall in Taiwan. She performs frequently with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. In 2009, she launched String Theory, a chamber music series in Chattanooga, Tennessee that has become one of the region’s premier classical music presenters.  The following year she was appointed Director of the Chamber Music Institute at Music@Menlo, a position she held for the next decade. In 2017, she joined her husband, violinist Soovin Kim, as artistic director of the Lake Champlain Chamber Music Festival in Burlington, Vermont. The duo became artistic directors at Chamber Music Northwest in Portland, OR in 2020. They were named recipients of Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s Award for Extraordinary Service in 2021 for their efforts during the pandemic.Most recently, Gloria released two albums - her Gloria Chien LIVE from the Music@Menlo LIVE label and Here With You with acclaimed clarinetist Anthony McGill on Cedille Records. Gloria received her bachelor, masters and doctoral degrees at the New England Conservatory of Music with Wha Kyung Byun and Russell Sherman. She is Artist-in-Residence at Lee University in Cleveland, Tennessee, and she is a Steinway Artist.


Poiesis Quartet
The Poiesis Quartet is the 2023 Grand Prize winner of the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition. Having formed just eight months earlier during Oberlin Conservatory's Advanced String Quartet Seminar, Poiesis also received Fischoff’s Senior Strings Gold Medal and the Lift Every Voice prizes, as well as Gold Medal and BIPOC Prize at the 2023 St. Paul String Quartet Competition. In May 2024, Poiesis joined the Concert Artists Guild roster for North American management as the winners of the Louis & Susan Meisel Competition. Currently, Poiesis is the Graduate String Quartet in Residence at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music (CCM) studying under the Ariel Quartet. For the 2024-25 season, they also serve as the ensemble-in-residence of concertnova, a Cincinnati-based collective which presents multi-sensorial and interdisciplinary concert experiences. Other highlights of the 2024-25 season include appearances on chamber music series in Asheville, NC and San Antonio, TX, the world premiere at CCM of two new quartets by Brian Raphael Nabors and Kitty Brazelton, and the October 2024 release of the ensemble's debut album, as we are, in collaboration with Nancy Maultsby on the Bright Shiny Things label.






In January 2023, the Quartet completed an international tour in Uruguay with artistic residencies in Punta del Diablo and Punta del Este’s premier concert series, Conciertos del Este. Performances included the world premiere of Alejandro Melo’s composition “Elegy” which was dedicated to the Quartet. As part of their Fischoff Gold Medal and Grand prizes, Poiesis embarked on a tour of both the Midwestern U.S. and Emilia-Romagna, Italy. Highlights included the Italian premier of Kevin Lau's String Quartet no. 3, a collaboration with clarinetist Claudio Mansutti, a recording of Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson's Calvary Quartet at Guarneri Hall in Chicago, educational outreach at five middle and high schools in Des Moines, IA and South Bend, IN, and a feature on the Dame Myra Hess Concert Series broadcast live on Chicago's WFMT.  Poiesis presented the opening concert of the Rocky River Chamber Music Society's 65th season, including the Cleveland premiere of a new song cycle by Cleveland Orchestra trombonist Rick Stout with illustrious mezzo-soprano Nancy Maultsby. For this performance, the quartet was lauded as "agile collaborators" with an “extraordinary, honeyed group sound” (Cleveland Classical). In the 2023-24 season, Poiesis made their debuts on series including the Schneider Concerts in New York City, the Kent Blossom Music Festival, and the Faculty Chamber Series at Baldwin Wallace University.






Poiesis regularly coaches with the Ariel Quartet as well as CCM faculty members Nick Photinos, Kristin Lee, and Ayane Kozasa. As graduates of Oberlin, they have previously been mentored by Sibbi Bernhardsson of the Pacifica Quartet and by members of the Verona Quartet. Additionally, Poiesis is grateful to have worked with Kirsten Docter of the Cavani Quartet, Sandy Yamamoto of the Miró Quartet, Philip Setzer and Paul Watkins of the Emerson Quartet, Matt Albert of Eighth Blackbird, and renowned violinist Jinjoo Cho. 






Comprised of violinists Sarah Ma (21) and Max Ball (22), cellist Drew Dansby (23), and violist Jasper de Boor (23), members of the Poiesis Quartet have attended programs such as Kneisel Hall, the Perlman Music Program, Verbier Festival Orchestra, Aspen Music Festival, and Madeline Island Chamber Music’s Fellowship program. The Poiesis are a group of interdisciplinary musicians: In addition to their performance degrees from Oberlin, Drew also received a B.A. in Chemistry, and Sarah holds two minors in Comparative American Studies and Gender, Sexuality, & Feminist Studies. Jasper graduated as a double major in viola and violin performance with a minor in baroque violin, and Max pursued a minor in jazz studies. When not playing chamber music, Poiesis loves to learn new languages on Duolingo, share delicious ice cream cakes, and take long walks on the beach.


The name Poiesis is derived from the ancient Greek word ποιεῖν, which means "to make"; particularly, to create something that has never been made before. 


As a string quartet made up of inter- and multi-disciplinary young artists, the Poiesis Quartet seeks to program music of all styles and genres and expand the traditional quartet setting with an emphasis on platforming works by emerging and underrepresented composers. Poiesis strives to create unique moments of synchronicity, sensitivity, and verve in each performance.