Kaleidoscopia Trio
On Tuesday, March 14th at 8pm in Old Cabell Hall, Kaleidoscopia Trio will be presenting a free string trio recital exploring and celebrating the works composed in times of struggle, death, and memorial. The program will include all works by under-represented composers including compositions such as Gideon Klein’s String Trio, which was composed in a concentration camp, to Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson’s Movement for String Trio, composed on his deathbed.
Kaleidoscopia features Andrea Dawson, violin; Ayn Balija, viola; and Christine Kralik, violoncello who are all on faculty during the summer at the Tennessee Governor’s School for the Arts.
Andrea Dawson: Violinist Andrea Dawson joined the MTSU Music Faculty in 2007. Her passion for teaching and for performing is evident in her activities over the past fifteen years. Dawson received her Masters in Music and Doctor of Musical Arts degrees from the Eastman School of Music, where she was awarded the coveted Performer’s Certificate. She also received a Bachelor of Arts in Anthropology, with a minor in French, and a Bachelor of Music in Violin Performance from Oberlin College. Before accepting the position at MTSU, Dawson served on the faculty of the University of Texas Pan American. At MTSU, she teaches violin and viola, string chamber music, string pedagogy, and string literature, and she conducts the Chamber Orchestra. Since 2008, she has also been a member of the faculty of the Tennessee Governor’s School for the Arts.
In 2021, Dawson published 24 Etudes for the Modern Violinist, Book I: Early Intermediate (as well as a version for viola) with Sleepy Puppy Press. The traditional canon of violin and viola pedagogy tends to focus on the tonalities and techniques of music written before 1900; Dawson’s book seeks to introduce intermediate violinists and violists to new techniques and sounds that they will encounter in more recent music, with twenty-four original compositions by Dawson. The second and third books of the series are in process. At the 2022 American Viola Society Festival and 47th International Viola Congress in Columbus, Georgia, Dawson presented her book with Tennessee Governor’s School for the Arts viola colleague Dr. Ayn Balija.
Associate Professor of Viola at the University of Virginia, Ayn Balija leads a musically rich life through performance and instruction. Maintaining a studio and coaching chamber music, she serves as the Principal Violist of the Charlottesville Symphony at the University of Virginia and violist of the Rivanna String Quartet.
As a professional violist, Dr. Balija performs solo, chamber, and orchestral works around the country. She soloed with the Charlottesville Symphony and Faculty Orchestra of the Tennessee Governor’s School for the Arts. While a member of the ProMusica Chamber Orchestra of Columbus, she performed Classical and commissioned works, recording two CDs under the Summit label. She regularly performs with the Richmond Symphony, Williamsburg Symphony, and Roanoke Symphony and adds collaborates for chamber music with the Tennessee Governors School for the Arts and Yachats Music Festival. Dr. Balija was invited to tour with the Pittsburgh Symphony on their East Coast Tour including a performance at Carnegie Hall. As a supporter and performer of new music, she was part of a consortium for Fernghetti, by Libby Larsen, commissioned and premiered Jorge Variego’s Enviaolo for viola and piano as well as performed and recorded numerous orchestral premieres.
Connecting holistically with her students and colleagues is an integral part of Dr. Balija’s teaching philosophy. Her students have pursued advanced musical degrees at the University of Maryland, University of North Texas, Eastman School of Music and Barnard College. She served as the interim viola instructor at James Madison University. Dr. Balija created Violapalooza, an annual, all-viola day, featuring guest viola artists including Kim Kashkashian, George Taylor, and Paul Neubauer. In addition to giving masterclasses and recitals, Dr. Balija presented at the American String Teachers Association, American Viola Society’s Viola Festival, International Viola Society’s 44th Congress in Wellington, New Zealand and published on the American Viola Society’s Teacher’s Toolbox page. Dr. Balija has performed and taught over the summer at Tennessee Governors School for the Arts (TN), Yachats Summer Music Festival (OR), North Carolina Chamber Music Festival (NC), Charlottesville Opera (VA), Staunton Music Festival (VA), Beyond the Notes (VA), and the Belvoir Camp for Girls (MA).
Ayn Balija holds a Bachelor of Music from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, Masters of Music from The Cleveland Institute of Music, and Doctorate of Musical Arts from James Madison University. Her principal mentors have been Peter Slowik, Jeffrey Irvine, and Karen Tuttle. When not studying music she can be found in her kitchen or garden.
Dr. Christine Renée Kralik is the Cello Instructor at the University of Mississippi where she teaches applied Low Strings and Music Appreciation courses. Previously she was the adjunct cello instructor at Angelo State University in San Angelo, Texas. Dr. Kralik is a thriving young professional cellist who received her Doctorate of Musical Arts with an emphasis in cello performance from Texas Tech University in May of 2018. She holds a Masters in Music from the Cleveland Institute of Music and a Bachelor of Music from the University of Utah, where she was also named as the Outstanding Senior. She studied cello performance with Jeffrey Lastrapes at Texas Tech University, Cleveland Orchestra cellist Richard Weiss at the Cleveland Institute of Music, and Utah Symphony cellist Pegsoon Whang at the University of Utah.
Dr. Kralik is the principal cellist of the North Mississippi Symphony and the LakeRidge Chamber Orchestra in West Texas. She was previously a member of the Lubbock, Amarillo, and Midland-Odessa Symphonies. Along with her active orchestral career, she has performed in numerous recitals with faculty and students all over the country, participated in premiere recording sessions, performed as a TMEA soloist, a cello soloist with ballet productions, string quartet outreach concerts, and many other collaborative performances.
Along with holding a busy performance schedule, Dr. Kralik finds great joy in teaching. She enjoys working with the cello and bass students of the University of Mississippi, as well as cello students in the surrounding area and from all over the world.
In the summer of 2018, Dr. Kralik joined the faculty at the Tennessee Governor’s School for the Arts, where she works closely with students in cello master classes and sectionals. Dr. Kralik enjoys performing in the exciting faculty chamber music series throughout the duration of the Governor’s School, performing works as various as the spectacular Brahms piano quartets, Shostakovich piano trio no.2, to Bartok string quartets, and Schoenberg’s Verklarte Nacht. Dr. Kralik also returned to teach cello for a third summer at the Interlochen Center for the Arts in Michigan. Dr. Kralik performs on a German Wilhelm Hammig cello dated 1907 and an unnamed French cello bow thought to be from the Pierre Simon School circa 1880.
The concert is part of a tour to Mississippi, Tennessee, and Virginia and is supported by the Eleanor Shea Music Trust.
Program: (subject to change)
Gideon Klein: String Trio
Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson: Movement for String Trio
Karim Al Zand: Canticle and Caprice
Grace-Evangeline Mason: Into the Abyss, I Throw Roses
Victoria Bond: Dancing on Glass