Pierrot

Adria Sternstein Foster

Praised by the Washington Post for her “molten phrasing” and tone of “sheer iridescence,” Adria Sternstein Foster enjoys a multi-faceted musical career.

Adria is the Principal Flutist of the Kennedy Center Opera House Orchestra (KCOHO), the resident orchestra of the Opera House of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. In this role she performs for the Washington National Opera, Kennedy Center ballet programming and musical theater productions.

For many years Adria performed chamber music for flute, harp and strings throughout the Washington, DC metropolitan area with the IBIS Chamber Music Society. She has been heard on NPR’s Front Row Washington and appears in the 2017 documentary film Samuel Barber: Absolute Beauty.

Recordings include Vivaldi’s flute concerto “Il Gardellino” on the disc IBIS x 2, and Iridescence, a CD of works for flute and harp with KCOHO principal harpist Susan Robinson. In 2022 Adria toured South Africa along with a quintet of orchestra colleagues giving masterclasses and performing music for flute, harp, and strings sponsored by the Classical Movements organization.

A native of New York City, Adria attended LaGuardia High School of Music and the Arts and was a student of Bonnie Lichter at Juilliard’s Pre-College Division. She continued her education at Juilliard where she received both her bachelor’s and master’s degrees as a student of Julius Baker and Jeanne Baxtresser.

Adria is honored to have collaborated on Volume 2 of the indispensable publication for flutists, “Orchestral Excerpts for Flute with Piano Accompaniment,” with her mentor Jeanne Baxtresser, former Principal Flutist of the New York Philharmonic.

For more information please visit www.adriasfoster.com

Carrie Bean Stute

Cellist Carrie Bean Stute is co-founder and co-artistic director of the Washington, DC-based Chiarina Chamber Players, a chamber music series and flexible ensemble that has won critical acclaim for its artistry and innovative programming. Carrie’s chamber music performances have been broadcast on Classical WETA’s Front Row Washington. In DC, she performs with the National Symphony Orchestra, has served as an adjunct professor of music at George Washington University, and is currently assistant principal cellist of “The President’s Own” Marine Chamber Orchestra, where she performs in such diverse settings as the White House, area public schools, and for events hosted by the United Nations and State Department.

A performer who seeks out the voices of today, she collaborates with a growing set of composers, including Reinaldo Moya, Mary Kouyoumdjian, Juhi Bansal, and Kennedy Center composer-in-residence Carlos Simon. Carrie authored a doctoral dissertation on the cello works of Pēteris Vasks and in 2021 performed as soloist in the North American premiere of his Cello Concerto No. 2. She took part in the Carnegie Hall workshop “New Voices, New Music” and has performed chamber music at such venues as the Phillips Collection, Zankel Hall, Le Poisson Rouge, Roulette, and an in-house educational residency at the 92nd Street Y.

Carrie holds degrees from The Graduate Center at the City University of New York (Doctor of Musical Arts), Indiana University, and the Eastman School of Music. She was a fellow at the New World Symphony and Tanglewood Music Center. Forthcoming in 2024-25 are recordings of chamber music by Carlos Simon (with Domenic Salerni, Efi Hackmey, and Carl DuPont) and clarinet trios by Brahms and Beethoven (with Robert DiLutis and Rita Sloan).

David Jones

David Jones joined the Kennedy Center Opera House Orchestra as Principal Clarinet in 1998. He has also performed extensively with the National Symphony Orchestra, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Lyric Opera of Chicago and the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra as well being a member of the Contemporary Music Forum and a featured artist with the American Chamber Players, and the 20th Century Consort. Comfortable in many different musical situations, Mr. Jones has worked with Tony Bennett, Jose Carreras, Rosemary Clooney, Placido Domingo, Aretha Franklin, Yo-Yo Ma, The Manhattan Transfer, Jesse Norman, Luciano Pavarotti, David Sanborn, Rod Stewart and The Temptations as well as the national tours of Kiss Me Kate, Cinderella, Annie, Cabaret, A Chorus Line, The King and I, Showboat, West Side Story and The Wizard of Oz. He can also be heard on numerous radio and television commercials. Mr. Jones attended Northwestern University where he studied with Robert Marcellus, Clark Brody and Russell Dagon.

Efi Hackmey

Praised for his highly personal interpretations and “feather-light pianism” (Washington Classical Review), Efi Hackmey is recognized for his lyricism and beauty of tone. As Co-Founder and Co-Artistic Director of Chiarina Chamber Players he performs regularly on Chiarina’s concert series, which has won critical acclaim for its artistry and innovative programming, called “some of the most compelling chamber programs in town” by the Washington Post. Efi has performed at Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center’s Rose Studio, the Kennedy Center and Bargemusic, and in the Friends of Mozart series in NYC. In his native Israel he performed as soloist with the Haifa Symphony Orchestra, as well as at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art and Jerusalem Music Center. Efi is often featured on WETA Classical’s Front Row Washington.

A passionate chamber musician, Efi has collaborated with the Attacca Quartet, Imani Winds, clarinetists Ricardo Morales and Charles Neidich, baritone Randall Scarlata, cellist Marcy Rosen and violinists Catherine Cho, Todd Phillips and Nurit Bar-Josef, among others.

Efi’s recordings include the 2025 release of The Best Cuisine: Music of Carlos Simon on the Azica label, and the 2013 album Polish Violin Music on the Naxos label, among others.

Efi has served on the piano faculty at DePauw University, and he also taught at the Indiana University system. He holds a Doctor of Music degree from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, and degrees in piano and conducting from Tel Aviv University. He studied with Menahem Pressler, Pnina Salzman and Dina Turgeman, and has had additional coaching with Lazar Berman, Emanuel Ax, Richard Goode, Janos Starker and Jaime Laredo.

Ko Sugiyama

Violinist Ko Sugiyama is the Assistant Concertmaster of the Kennedy Center Opera House Orchestra, appointed by music director Philippe Auguin. In addition, he is a member of the Sun Valley Summer Symphony and the King St. Quartet (a National Symphony Orchestra Education Department In-School-Ensemble). Ko has performed at major US venues such as Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall, the 92nd St. Y's Kaufmann Concert Hall, the Kennedy Center, Phillips Collection, Smithsonian American Art Museum, National Gallery of Art, and Severance Hall. He received his bachelor's degree from the Cleveland Institute of Music and his master's degree from the Juilliard School while studying under Paul Kantor and Masao Kawasaki, respectively. Ko spent four years as a fellow with the New World Symphony in Miami Beach, FL. He is a faculty member at the NSO Summer Music Institute.

Nimrod David Pfeffer

Nimrod David Pfeffer is a conductor at The Metropolitan Opera, and Music Director of the Lyric Opera Company of Guatemala. 

His recent conducting engagements include The Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra, The San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, the Hungarian State Opera Orchestra, the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía in Valencia, The Juilliard Opera, and the Israeli Opera. 

This season he will make his Metropolitan Opera conducting debut with Le Nozze di Figaro, sharing the performances with the Met’s Music Director, Yannick Nézet-Séguin. Earlier this season he conducted the Israeli Opera’s opening production of Die Zauberflöte. 

In 2020/21 he was scheduled to make his original Met conducting debut, in Franco Zeffirelli's production of La Bohème; his Israel Philharmonic Orchestra conducting debut with Pinchas Zukerman as soloist; and his Hungarian National Philharmonic Orchestra conducting debut with Peter Frankel as soloist. These performances were postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

In 2016 Mr. Pfeffer was named Music Director of the Lyric Opera Company of Guatemala, after conducting the company's inaugural production of Verdi's Rigoletto. In the following seasons he conducted in Guatemala new productions of L’Elisir d’Amore, La Bohème, and La Traviata.

Mr. Pfeffer is also a concert pianist, who performs regularly as soloist with orchestra, recitalist, chamber musician, and vocal accompanist. His piano career highlights include his debut at Carnegie Hall’s Weill recital Hall in 2008; performances of the music of Chopin on the stage of The Metropolitan Opera in American Ballet Theatre's production of The Lady of the Camellias in 2010; a live solo recital broadcast from the Russian Kremlin in 2007; and his solo debut with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra in 2008, playing the World Premiere of Aharon Harlap's Second Piano Concerto, which resulted in a dedication to him of Mr. Harlap’s Symphonic Dances for Piano and Orchestra in 2015.

Mr. Pfeffer graduated from the Juilliard School’s Orchestral Conducting Program as a student of Alan Gilbert, and is a graduate of Mannes College of Music and The Metropolitan Opera's Lindemann Young Artist Development Program. He studied with Pnina Salzman, Gideon Hatzor, Vadim Monastyrski, Michael Wolpe, André Hajdu, Victor Rosenbaum, Byron Janis, David Hayes, Alan Gilbert, James Levine, and Richard Goode.