Faculty
Mimi Zweig, Director – Violin/Viola
Brenda Brenner – Violin
Sarah Kapustin – Violin/Chamber Music
Ching-Yi Lin – Violin
Pasha Sabouri – Violin
Roeland Jagers – Viola/Chamber Music
Brandon Vamos – Cello
Amir Eldan – Cello
Megan Yip – Cello
Master Classes
Atar Arad
Grigory Kalinovsky
Kerson Leong
Kevork Mardirossian
Susan Moses
James Przygocki
Sherry Sinift
Chamber Music
Pacifica Quartet
Fellows of the Professional Quartet Studies with the Pacifica Quartet and Atar Arad
Sarah Kapustin
Roeland Jagers
Andrew Braddock
Collaborative Pianists
Justin Bartlett
Chih-Yi Chen
Kyunghoon Kim
Melivia Raharjo
Gulrukh Shakirova
Mimi Zweig is Professor of Music in Violin at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music and Director of the Indiana University String Academy. She joined the Jacobs School of Music faculty in 1976. Zweig studied with Louis Krasner, Samuel Kissel, Raphael Bronstein, and Tadeusz Wroński. She has been a member of the Syracuse Symphony, American Symphony under Leopold Stokowski, and Indianapolis Symphony. She has developed pre-college string programs across the United States since 1972. Zweig has given master classes and pedagogy workshops in the United States, Mexico, Canada, Israel, Japan, Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Chile, and throughout Europe. Her innovative web-based teaching tool, Mimi Zweig StringPedagogy.com, is accessed worldwide. American Public Television released the Emmy-nominated documentary Circling Around —The Violin Virtuosi, featuring IU String Academy students, in Spring 2006. In 2019, Zweig was the recipient of the American String Teachers Association Artist Teacher Award. Her students have won numerous competitions and teach and perform worldwide.
Brenda Brenner is Professor of Music Education and Director of the Jacobs Academy at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music. She specializes in string music education, teaching applied violin, as well as courses in violin and string pedagogy. Brenner received a BM and BME from Wichita State University and an MM and DMA in violin performance from the Eastman School of Music. In addition to her appointment to the Music Education Department, she serves as co-director of the IU String Academy, a position she has held since 1993. Her String Academy students have been featured in concerts in major venues throughout the United States and have presented tours throughout Europe, Asia, and South America. As director of the Fairview Project – a program in which every first and second grader in a Title I school learns violin as part of the curriculum – Brenner researches the cognitive, academic, and social outcomes of early instrumental music instruction. An active performer of chamber music throughout the United States, Brenner partners with her husband, organist Christopher Young. She also teaches and conducts at the IU Summer String Academy and is Assistant Director of the IU Retreat for Professional Violinists and Violists. Brenner is an active international clinician, is a Past President of the American String Teachers Association, and is on the board of the Midwest Band and Orchestra Clinic.
Violist Roeland Jagers is a passionate chamber musician, teacher, and soloist. He was a founding member of the Rubens Quartet,laureate of several international competitions. The quartet enjoyed an active international career spanning 16 seasons in Europe, the United States and Israel. Currently Roeland is a member of Metamorphoses, a trio made up of international chamber musicians, clarinetist Jean Johnson and pianist Ilona Timchenko. Since 2019, Roeland has been principal violist of the North Netherlands Orchestra. In addition, he is a returning guest principal with orchestras, such as the Residentie Orkest and Amsterdam Sinfonietta. Roeland teaches viola and chamber music at the Indiana University Summer String Academy as well as the University of Oklahoma Summer String Academy. Recently, he wrote a brief chamber music method in which score study, leadership and rehearsal techniques are addressed. After his Bachelor of Music, Roeland received his Master of Music with honors at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague, with further studies at the Netherlands String Quartet Academy with further studies at the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler in Berlin. His viola studies were with Gisella Bergman, Ferdinand Erblich, Vladimir Mendelssohn and Eberhard Feltz, and chamber music with members of the Amadeus, Hagen, Juilliard and Borodin Quartets. Roeland plays a Giovanni Pistucci viola, on loan to him from the Nationaal Muziekinstrumenten Fonds in Amsterdam.
Sarah Kapustin’s musical activities have taken her across North and South America, Europe, Asia and Australia in performances as soloist, chamber and orchestral musician. A devoted and passionate chamber musician, Sarah has appeared at various international festivals, most notably Kuhmo, Giverny, Sitka, El Paso ProMusica, Peter de Grote, Chamberfest Cleveland and Marlboro, where she has performed with such distinguished artists as Claude Frank, Joseph Silverstein, David Soyer, and Kim Kashkashian. Sarah plays recitals regularly with pianists Jeannette Koekkoek and Shuann Chai, and her recordings of the Beethoven sonata cycle (with Koekkoek) and solo works by Bartók, Bach and Fulmer, among others, have received international acclaim. Sarah was the 1st violinist of the renowned Rubens Quartet from 2008 until the group’s final season in 2016. Sarah received a Master’s degree in violin performance at The Juilliard School with Robert Mann in 2005. She previously received a Bachelor of Music and an Artist Diploma from Indiana University as a pupil of Mauricio Fuks, and formerly studied with Mimi Zweig and James Przygocki. Increasingly sought after as a teacher, she is professor of violin at ArtEZ Conservatorium and the Sweelinck Academie (preparatory division of the Amsterdam Conservatory), and a guest teacher at Forum Musikae in Madrid. She has given masterclasses in the US, the Netherlands, France, Spain, Brazil, Columbia and Hong Kong, and is a faculty member of the Indiana University Summer String Academy. Currently Sarah resides in Zwolle, the Netherlands, where she is active as a chamber musician, soloist and concertmaster. She also performs and tours regularly with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Ensemble Resonanz and the Chamber Orchestra of Europe. Sarah plays on the ”Nico Richter and Hetta Rester” G.B. Rogeri, Brescia, ca. 1690, on loan to her from the Nationaal Muziekinstrumentenfonds in Amsterdam.
Brandon Vamos is professor of practice (cello) at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music and a member of the Pacifica Quartet, the school’s quartet-in-residence. He has appeared as soloist with orchestras worldwide and has collaborated with many distinguished artists, including Paul Katz, Michael Tree, Yo-Yo Ma, Menahem Pressler, and the Emerson Quartet, and has recorded for Cedille, Naxos, and Cacophony Records. Awarded a Performer’s Certificate at the Eastman School of Music, where he earned a Bachelor of Music degree as a student of Paul Katz, Vamos has also studied with distinguished artists such as Tanya Carey in Macomb, Ill., and Aldo Parisot at Yale University, where he earned a Master of Music degree. As a member of the Pacifica Quartet, he won a 2009 Grammy Award for Best Chamber Music Performance and the Cleveland Quartet Award, in addition to being named Musical America’s 2009 Ensemble of the Year.
Megan Yip currently teaches cello undergraduates at University of Michigan and serves on the faculty at Michigan Youth Performing Arts Pre-College Program. She previously taught undergraduates at Yale College and recently led a masterclass at Elly Bašić School of Music in Zagreb, Croatia. She is a guest artist with Versoi Ensemble, a collective of American and Finnish artists as agents of cultural diplomacy and was a member of Grammy-nominated ensemble, Yale Cellos. She continues to perform throughout the United States and internationally, with recent performances at Yellow Barn (Putney, VT), Prussia Cove (England), and Thy Chamber Music (Denmark). Ms. Yip recently returned after a year in Freiburg, Germany as a recipient of a Fulbright, and holds degrees from Yale School of Music and The Juilliard School. She is completing her Doctor of Musical Arts at the University of Michigan.
Violinist Ching-Yi Lin’s recent performances and masterclasses have taken her to the Barratt Due Institute of Music in Norway, the Shenyang and Xi’an Conservatories in China, Northwestern University, and the University of British Columbia. She’s also performed in New York on the Museum of Modern Art’s Summer Garden Series, at Sejong Center in South Korea, and in Taiwan at the National Concert Hall in Taipei. Her recent album on MSR Classics features sonatas for violin and piano by Charles Ives, William Bolcom, and John Corigliano. In reviewing the album, Gramophone noted the “panache and warmth” of Ms. Lin’s playing and described her interpretations as “a series of tender, lively, and challenging conversations.” A dedicated and creative teacher, Ching-Yi Lin is Associate Professor at Western Kentucky University and also serves on the faculty at the Indiana University Summer String Academy and the WKU Summer String Institute. She is also the concert master of Paducah Symphony.
In 2013, Ching-Yi was presented with the prestigious Jefferson Award for Public Service in Washington, DC, recognizing her work in bringing music into the lives of young people throughout her community. And in 2017, Ching-Yi received a Sisterhood grant from Western Kentucky University to direct student teachers and volunteers in teaching the violin to refugee children in Bowling Green, KY. In 2020, this program developed into a non-profit organization called Bridging Cultures with Music. Dr. Lin holds bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, and she undertook additional studies at the Vienna Conservatory. She plays on a violin made in 1863 by Jean-Baptiste Vuillaume.
Pasha Sabouri is one of the most sought after and respected American violin pedagogues of the new generation. He has performed in recitals and concerts in Holland, Sweden, Austria, Germany, UK, throughout the United States and Canada. A passionate educator and a published author whose acclaimed book “Upbeat” guides middle and high school students and their families on the road to professional musical education and career. His students are competing and featured in such competitions and media outlets as Menuhin Competition, Sphinx Competition, Dallas Symphony’s Lynn Harrell Competition, ENKOR Competition, and NPR’s From The Top, winning the coveted “Jack Kent Cooke” Award. Pasha Sabouri is the founder and Artistic Director of the Texas Strings Festival, and it’s affiliate Master Series – a year-round educational initiative which provides the students with extraordinary opportunity to be guided and inspired by leading musicians of the day. Throughout the years the students of TSF have had the privilege to work with such luminaries as Miriam Fried, Vadim Gluzman, Paul Kantor, Ida Kavafian, Jan Mark Sloman, Jinjoo Cho, Nadja Salerno Sonnenberg, Robin Wilson, Grigory Kalinovsky and William Hagen. He is also the founder and leader of Teachers’ Lounge – an online teachers collective designed to support and empower his colleagues with innovative ways of teaching and studio development.
Based in the San Francisco Bay Area, his primary focus is his highly successful private studio. Pasha Sabouri is on the faculty of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music Pre-College. He has also had the privilege to serve as Adjunct Professor at Concordia College as well as Artistic Director at the Concordia College Music Academy in Austin, Texas. Prior to this position, he was appointed Lecturer Violin Professor at Centenary College in Shreveport, Louisiana and has also been faculty at Encore Chamber Music Institute, Omaha Conservatory of Music Institute, the Brian Lewis Young Artist Program, and has adjudicated at Carnegie Hall NYO/2 program, Jack McGehee and UT Concerto Competitions.
Pasha Sabouri has appeared as a soloist at the opening of the Edinburgh Festival, performed with the Texas Chamber Orchestra, Las Vegas Philharmonic, Henderson Symphony and the Ottawa Sinfonette. He was awarded the first prize at the National Federation of Music Clubs Young Artist Competition, was named National Finalist for Music Teachers National Association, The Texas Young Artist and the Coeur D’Alene Competitions. He is a graduate of Cincinnati College Conservatory of Music and the University of Texas Butler School of Music, studying with Won-Bin Yim, Naoko Tanaka and Brian Lewis. His violin is a Johannes Cuypers 1793.
Violist Andrew Braddock’s teaching and performing career has recently taken him to the Sejong Center in Seoul, South Korea, the National Concert Hall in Taipei, Taiwan, and the International Viola Congress in Rotterdam. A passionate educator, he has given masterclasses at Vanderbilt University, the Chinese Culture University in Taipei, Taiwan, Bowling Green State University, and many others. He teaches at Western Kentucky University (WKU) and is the co-director of the WKU String Academy. In the summers, he teaches at the Indiana University Summer String Academy and directs the WKU Summer String Institute, an intensive summer camp for students ages 4 to 18 based around chamber music and orchestral performance. His creative teaching led him to co-found Bridging Cultures with Music, a 501(c)(3) organization that supports various pedagogical and outreach programs in his community and abroad.
Research, writing, and intellectual discovery are central to his artistic mission. His writings have appeared in publications such as The Strad and the Journal of the British Music Society. He is currently the editor of the American Suzuki Journal, a quarterly publication of the Suzuki Association of the Americas. From 2017 to 2021, Dr. Braddock was the editor of the Journal of the American Viola Society, the most prominent peer-reviewed publication for viola scholarship. The journal presents musicological and music theory research relating to the viola, in addition to pedagogical insights and current reviews. Most recently, Dr. Braddock spearheaded an issue devoted to the 40th anniversary of George Rochberg’s viola sonata, examining it from various musicological, historical, and theoretical perspectives. He previously served as the journal’s New Music Editor and on the board of the American Viola Society. He is the principal violist of the Paducah Symphony Orchestra, and he regularly plays with the Nashville Symphony and the Nashville Opera. He holds degrees from Indiana University, Vanderbilt University, and the University of Kentucky. His principal teachers are Atar Arad, Kathryn Plummer, and John Graham. He plays a viola made by Giovanni Pistucci, ca. 1920.