CityMusic Cleveland Chamber Orchestra is celebrating its 20th season with the first concert of its 2023-2024 series, Symphonie Concertante. These performances will be held around the Northeast Ohio area between September 21-24 and will feature renowned violinists Kyung Sun Lee and Jung Min Amy Lee.

CityMusic’s 20th season arrives under the title It Is Music. “The season name seeks to engage with audiences in a way that transcends the tag of classical music, and focus instead on music as an art form that brings people together, beyond labels that might seem intimidating to people who haven't come to an orchestra concert before,” says CityMusic’s executive assistant and librarian, Guillermo Salas-Suárez. “This has been CityMusic's mission from its inception and that is why it has kept a philosophy of ‘free for all’ ever since.”

Symphonie Concertante features two celebrated black composers - George Walker, the first African American to win a Pulitzer Prize in Music, and Joseph Bologne, an 18th-century violinist and fencer. The performance will also include two pieces by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Toru Takemitsu, respectively.

CityMusic will be joined by associate concertmaster Jung Min Amy Lee of the Cleveland Orchestra. These performances will also feature Kyung Sun Lee, the very first soloist at CityMusic from the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University.

These concerts are free and open to the public, and will take place at the following venues:

Thursday, September 21 at 7:30p Fairmount Presbyterian Church in Cleveland Heights

Friday, September 22 at 7:30p Our Lady of Angels in Kamm’s Corner

Saturday, September 23 at 7:30p Shrine of St. Stanislaus in Slavic Village

Sunday, September 24 at 4:00p St. Noel Catholic Church in Willoughby Hills

CityMusic Cleveland is proud to be a staple of the classical music scene in Ohio for the past 20 years and would like to thank all of the donors and audience members that have supported the orchestra for the past two decades. They hope that this year will welcome those who enjoy orchestral music from each generation to their free and accessible concerts.

About the Featured Soloists

Kyung Sun Lee, Violin

Kyung Sun Lee was the first featured soloist of the CityMusic Cleveland Chamber Orchestra. She is a professor of music in violin at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music.

Kyung Sun captured a bronze medal in the 1993 Queen Elizabeth Competition, sixth prize in the 1994 Tchaikovsky Competition, first prizes at the Washington and D’Angelo International Competitions, and third prize in the Montreal International Competition, where she also won the Audience Favorite and Best Performance of the Commissioned Work prizes.

Subsequent to winning these awards, Lee has enjoyed ever-increasing popularity as a performer and received high critical acclaim:

“Exceptional tonal suavity and expressive intensity in equal measure.” — The Strad
“Godard's ‘Concerto Romantique’ could not have had a more outstanding soloist than Kyung Sun Lee.” — Harris Goldsmith, New York Concert Review Inc.
“Fluidity and grace; pathos and emotion.” — The Palm Beach Post
“Lee is the most musical, the most intelligent soloist to have played with the orchestra in quite a while.” — Tuscaloosa News
“Penetrating clarity, a strong sense of style and a technical supremacy that conquered all difficulties with unruffled ease.” — Miami Herald
“Beyond superb execution, she conveyed [Vieuxtemps’s Concerto No. 5] particular Romanticism expertly.” — Dennis Rooney, The Strad

In addition to being in demand as a soloist and chamber musician, Lee is an accomplished teacher and clinician. After becoming assistant professor of violin at Oberlin Conservatory in the fall of 2001, then associate professor at the University of Houston in the fall of 2006, she has been a professor at Seoul National University since 2009.

Lee taught for two summers at the Aspen Music Festival and has also been on the faculty at the Bowdoin Music Festival and the Heifetz International Institute. In recent years she has been in demand as a judge of violin competitions including the Joachim International Violin Competition Hannover, Seoul International Competition, and Singapore International Violin Competition.

She studied at Seoul National University, Peabody Conservatory, and Juilliard. Her teachers have included Sylvia Rosenberg, Robert Mann, and Dorothy Delay.

Lee plays a Joseph Guarnerius violin from 1723 and is the music director of Changwon International Chamber Music Festival and Seoul Virtuosi Chamber Orchestra.

Jung Min Amy Lee, Violin

Amy Lee joined The Cleveland Orchestra as associate concertmaster in March 2008. She enjoys a varied performing and teaching career, equally at home in both orchestral and chamber music settings. She also serves as an artist-in-residence at Kent State University in the Hugh A. Glauser School of Music.

Ms. Lee spends her summers as a faculty member at the Kent Blossom Music Festival in Kent, Ohio, and performs at various festivals, including Marlboro Music in Vermont.

An active chamber musician, Amy Lee is a member of several ensembles, including the Omni Quartet (omniquartet.com), Ensemble HD (ensemblehd.net), and Kent State’s Verve Chamber Players. Founded with fellow members of The Cleveland Orchestra, Alicia Koelz, Joanna Patterson Zakany, and Tanya Ell, the Omni Quartet performs regularly throughout Northeast Ohio. The quartet made their Philadelphia Chamber Music Society debut during the 2018-19 season. Ensemble HD is an innovative and forward-thinking group seeking to connect with a broad audience by performing at bars around the region and in concert halls. Their recently released album is titled Live at the Happy Dog. Members include Cleveland Orchestra members Ms. Lee, Joshua Smith, Frank Rosenwein, Tina Dahl, Joanna Patterson Zakany, and Charles Bernard. Ms. Lee was formerly a member of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center Two program, participating in tours, a digital concert series and recordings, and educational engagement programs.

As a soloist, Ms. Lee has appeared with orchestras world-wide, making her debut with the Philadelphia Orchestra at the age of 15. During her tenure with The Cleveland Orchestra, she has performed as soloist in Stravinsky’s Violin Concerto, Luigi Dallapiccola’s Tartiniana No. 1, Franz Waxman’s Carmen Fantasy, and Samuel Barber's Violin Concerto. She has also performed with the Flagstaff Symphony Orchestra, Santa Fe Pro Musica Chamber Orchestra, National Gallery Orchestra, and Germany’s Baden-Baden Philharmonic, among other ensembles.

Amy Lee holds a bachelor’s degree from the Curtis Institute of Music and a master’s degree from the Juilliard School. She is a former first-prize winner of San Francisco’s Irving M. Klein International String Competition and the Corpus Christi International Competition for piano and strings, via clevelandorchestra.com/discover/meet-the-musicians/first-violins/lee-jung-min-amy/.