Noted for his “expressive warmth” (Chicago Classical Review), San Antonio-based violinist Brendan Speltz serves as Director of Artistic Programming for Chamber Connexions at The Orchestra San Antonio. A former member of the internationally acclaimed Escher String Quartet, he has appeared at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Aspen Music Festival, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Savannah Music Festival, and Wigmore Hall.

Committed to expanding the reach of classical music, Speltz has created innovative concert experiences across the U.S. and Canada, described by The New Yorker as “thrilling, poignant, unexpected, and utterly DIY.” He has toured with ensembles including A Far Cry, Ethel, Harlem Quartet, and the Manhattan Chamber Players, and has performed with the Mark Morris Dance Group, American Ballet Theatre, and Orchestra of St. Luke’s. He holds degrees from the University of Southern California and the Manhattan School of Music, and plays a 1925 Carl Becker violin.

Violist Pierre Lapointe is the violist and co-founder of the acclaimed Escher String Quartet. Lapointe earned a D.M.A. degree from the Manhattan School of Music in 2012 after writing a thesis about the unusual structure of Alexander Zemlinsky’s second string quartet. Almost simultaneously, Lapointe finished a two-year recording project of the complete cycle of quartets written by Zemlinsky for the Naxos label.

Lapointe received a prize in 2004 from the lieutenant governor of Quebec for his work at the Gatineau Music Conservatory. In March 2002, Lapointe performed one of his own compositions for the radio show “Jeunes Artistes” of Radio-Canada in Montreal to great acclaim. Lapointe was also awarded a gold medal in 2000 by the University of Ottawa for his undergraduate studies in composition and violin performance.

Born in Hull, Canada, Lapointe started violin lessons at age 5 with Yaela Hertz Berkson and studied violin with Calvin Sieb and composition with Steven Gellman at the University of Ottawa before devoting himself entirely to the viola.

As an educator, Lapointe is often invited by universities and music schools to coach chamber music groups and give master classes to viola students. He has taught at Stony Brook University, Manhattan School of Music Precollege and is presently an adjunct associate professor at SMU Meadows School of the Arts.

Nicholas Canellakis is one of today’s most sought-after and innovative cellists, whose career seamlessly blends traditional classical performance with boundary-pushing creative ventures. He performs internationally as a soloist and chamber musician and is also a composer/arranger, artistic curator, teacher, and filmmaker, with comedic digital content that has reached millions of views worldwide.

Recent highlights include concerto appearances with the Orlando, Virginia, Albany, Delaware, Stamford, Richardson, Lansing, and Bangor Symphonies, the Erie Philharmonic, The Orchestra Now, the New Haven Symphony as Artist-in-Residence, and the American Symphony Orchestra in Carnegie Hall. He tours extensively in recital throughout the U.S. with his longtime duo collaborator, pianist-composer Michael Stephen Brown.

A long-time artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Canellakis appears regularly in Alice Tully Hall and on international tours, including at Wigmore Hall, the Louvre, the Seoul Arts Center, and the National Concert Halls of Shanghai and Taipei. He is also a frequent guest at leading festivals such as Santa Fe, Music@Menlo, Bridgehampton, La Jolla, Moab, Chamberfest Cleveland, and Rockport. As Artistic Director of Chamber Music Sedona in Arizona, he has revitalized the organization with dynamic programming, education initiatives, and community engagement.

An avid teacher, Canellakis is on the cello faculty of the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, his alma mater.

His latest album, b(romance), featuring original works and arrangements with pianist Michael Stephen Brown, was released on First Hand Records in 2023. Also active as a filmmaker and comedian, his short films My New Cello and the award-winning Thin Walls were screened at major festivals, while his comedic shorts have earned over 40 million views online.

A graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music and New England Conservatory, he studied with Orlando Cole, Peter Wiley, Paul Katz, and Madeleine Golz. He performs on an 1840 Jean Baptiste Vuillaume cello.

Polish-American pianist Adam Golka (born 1987) first performed all of Beethoven's Piano Sonatas when he was 18 years-old, and in 2020-2021 Adam Golka performed the cycle of Beethoven's 32 Sonatas at the Bach Festival Society of Winter Park (Florida) and at Saint Thomas Church Fifth Avenue (NYC), in socially-distanced and live-stream formats. Adam's performances of each Sonata were complemented by 32 short films he created, known as 32@32 (available on YouTube), documenting his preparation for climbing the Everest of piano literature and featuring an amalgam of distinguished guests, from an astrophysicist to Alfred Brendel.

Adam Golka's principal teachers have been José Feghali, with whom he studied at Texas Christian University, and Leon Fleisher, at the Peabody Conservatory. Since finishing his formal studies, Adam has continued to develop his artistry through mentorship from Alfred Brendel, Richard Goode, Murray Perahia, Mitsuko Uchida, Evelyne Crochet, Ferenc Rados, Rita Wagner, and Sir András Schiff, who invited Adam to give recitals at the Klavier-Festival Ruhr and Tonhalle Zürich, for the "Sir András Schiff Selects" concert series. Adam has also given solo recitals in Tokyo's Musashino Hall, New York's Alice Tully Hall (presented by the Musicians Emergency Fund), and Amsterdam's Kleine Zaal in Het Concertgebouw.

As a concerto soloist, he has appeared with dozens of orchestras, including the BBC Scottish Symphony, NACO (Ottawa), Warsaw Philharmonic, NFM Leopoldinum, Shanghai Philharmonic, as well as the San Francisco, Atlanta, Houston, Dallas, Milwaukee, Indianapolis, New Jersey, and San Diego symphonies in the US, among many others. Adam has enjoyed collaborations with conductors such as Joseph Swensen, Donald Runnicles, Pinchas Zukerman, Mark Wigglesworth, and his brother, conductor Tomasz Golka. Adam gave his Carnegie Stern Auditorium début in 2010 with the New York Youth Symphony.

Chamber music is an integral part of Adam Golka's life, and he has performed repeatedly at the Krzyżowa-Music "Music for Europe" festival, which has included tour performances at the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and the Beethoven Bonn festivals, as well as Konzerthaus Berlin. He also performed at the Marlboro, Ravinia, Caramoor chamber music festivals in the US. Adam collaborates regularly with the Manhattan Chamber Players and in recital with baritone John Moore, pianist Yannick Rafalimanana, cellist Jonathan Swensen and violinist Itamar Zorman, with whom he recently debuted at The Wigmore Hall in London.

Adam's professional life began when he was awarded the first prize and audience prize at the 2nd China Shanghai International Piano Competition. In 2009, he won the Max I. Allen Fellowship from American Pianists Association. As a pedagogue, he acted as Artist-in-Residence for six school years at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts. Adam has recorded works by Beethoven, Schumann, and Brahms for London-based First Hand Records and he has premiered works composed for him by Richard Danielpour, Michael Brown, and Jarosław Gołębiowski.