Violinist Sheryl Staples joined the New York Philharmonic as Principal Associate Concertmaster (The Elizabeth G. Beinecke Chair) in 1998, and made her solo debut with the Orchestra in 1999. Previously she was the associate concertmaster of The Cleveland Orchestra and concertmaster of the Pacific Symphony and Santa Barbara Chamber orchestras. She has appeared as soloist with more than 40 orchestras, including The Cleveland Orchestra and Los Angeles Philharmonic; participated in the Santa Fe, La Jolla, Brightstar, Martha’s Vineyard, and Seattle chamber music festivals; and been a faculty artist at the Aspen, Bowdoin, and Sarasota music festivals. She is a former member of The Cleveland Orchestra Piano Trio, and currently performs with the New York Philharmonic Ensembles and the Lyric Chamber Music Society. Ms. Staples was a scholarship student at the Crossroads School for Arts and Sciences, Young Musicians Foundation Scholar, and W.M. Keck Scholar at the Colburn School of Performing Arts, spending summers at the Encore School for Strings. She earned an artist diploma from the University of Southern California. Ms. Staples performs on the “Kartman” Guarnerius del Gesù, ca. 1728.

Find additional upcoming performances with Sheryl Staples

Violinist Michelle Kim has been Assistant Concertmaster (The William Petschek Family Chair) of the New York Philharmonic since 2001. She has performed as soloist with orchestras such as the New York Philharmonic, New Jersey Philharmonic, Santa Barbara Chamber Orchestra, and Pacific Symphony. An active chamber musician, Ms. Kim has collaborated with violinists Cho-Liang Lin, Christian Tetzlaff, and Pinchas Zukerman; cellists Mstislav Rostropovich, Lynn Harrell, and Gary Hoffman; and pianists Lang Lang and Yefim Bronfman. She has performed at the Santa Fe Chamber Music, La Jolla Chamber Music, Strings in the Mountain, and Bravo! Vail Valley Music festivals. She has also served as the first violinist of the Rossetti String Quartet, and was a Sterne Virtuoso Artist at Skidmore College in 2007–08. A former Presidential Scholar, Ms. Kim attended the University of Southern California’s Thornton School of Music as a Starling Foundation scholarship recipient. She has been a member of the faculty at the USC Thornton School of Music; Colburn School of Performing Arts; and University of California, Santa Barbara. Michelle Kim currently teaches at the Mannes College of Music.

Find additional upcoming performances with Michelle Kim

Robert Rinehart, who joined the New York Philharmonic’s viola section in 1992, is a familiar figure on the New York chamber-music scene. He has appeared at the Spoleto, Vancouver Chamber Music, and Santa Fe Chamber Music festivals, and with Chamber Music Northwest and The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. A founding member of the Ridge String Quartet, Mr. Rinehart has performed in every major music center in the United States, as well as in Canada, Australia, Japan, and in Europe. He has collaborated with Benny Goodman, Rudolf Firkusny, and the Guarneri String Quartet, among others, and his chamber music recordings have received a Grammy Award, two Grammy nominations, and the Diapason d’Or. A native of San Francisco, Mr. Rinehart studied violin at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music with Isadore Tinkleman, and at The Curtis Institute of Music with Jaime Laredo, David Cerone, and Ivan Galamian. He is on the faculty of the Manhattan School of Music.

Find additional upcoming performances with Robert Rinehart

Before joining the New York Philharmonic in 1997, cellist Eric Bartlett had already established himself as an artist of formidable talent and artistic integrity. He has appeared frequently as a member soloist with the world famous Orpheus Chamber Orchestra and is featured on several of their Deutsche Grammophon recordings. In addition to Orpheus, his solo appearances include the Cabrillo Festival, the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra, the Anchorage Symphony, the Hartford Chamber Orchestra, the Aspen and Juilliard Orchestras, and the New York Philharmonic’s “Horizons ‘84” series. Mr. Bartlett is the recipient of a Solo Recitalist’s Award from the National Endowment for the Arts and a special Performance Award as a finalist of the 1987 New England Conservatory/Piatigorsky Award. Recent solo appearances include the Cabrillo Music Festival, and the Brattleboro Music Center in Vermont.

Recognized as a leading performer of contemporary music, Mr. Bartlett has participated in more than 90 premieres with ensembles such as Speculum Musicae, the New York New Music Ensemble, the Group for Contemporary Music, and the Columbia String Quartet, and he has commissioned new works for the cello from American composers. During the summer of 2000, Mr. Bartlett was invited by Marin Alsop to be a featured soloist in the North American premiere of James McMillan’s Triduum, the middle third of which is a cello concerto. He has served as either Artist-President or Vice-President of Speculum Musicae since 1990. Mr. Bartlett has performed at the Mostly Mozart, Marlboro, Aspen, Adirondack, Grand Teton, and Waterloo music festivals, and has been a regular participant at the Bridgehampton Chamber Music Festival since 1996. Mr. Bartlett served as the principal cellist of the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra and co-principal of Orpheus from 1984 until 1997.

A native of Marlboro, Vermont, Mr. Bartlett’s early teachers included George Finckel and Blanche Honegger Moyse. From 1973 to 1975 he was a student of Leopold Teraspulsky at the University of Massachusetts. He was awarded full scholarships to both the Curtis Institute of Music and The Juilliard School and received both his Bachelor and Master of Music degrees from Juilliard, where he was a student of Leonard Rose and Channing Robbins.

Mr. Bartlett recorded the cello music of Larry Bell for North-South Records on a CD entitled River of Ponds (which includes a collaboration with narrator Robert J. Lurtsema) and has also recorded for CRI, Opus One, Bridge, Delos, and Deutsche Grammophon. He has served on the faculty of the University of Massachusetts and is currently an adjunct professor at The Juilliard School and the Manhattan School of Music. He lives in Bergen County, New Jersey, with his wife, Orpheus violist Sarah Clarke, and their son, Cory.

Find additional upcoming performances with Eric Bartlett

Satoshi Okamoto was an assistant principal double bassist in the San Antonio Symphony for eight years and a member of the New York City Ballet Orchestra for a year before joining the New York Philharmonic in September 2003. He received his master’s degree from The Juilliard School, and a bachelor’s degree from Tokyo University of Fine Arts. An eight-time Aspen Music Festival participant, he won the festival’s bass competition twice, in 1993 and 1997. He also became a finalist of the International Society of Bassist Solo Competition in 1997, and the Izuminomori International Double Bass Competition in 2001. His teachers include Philharmonic Principal Bass Eugene Levinson, Paul Ellison, Al Laszlo, Bruce Bransby, Yoshio Nagashima, and Osamu Yamamoto.

Erik Ralske joined the New York Philharmonic as third horn in September 1993 after eleven years of experience in principal positions in five different North American orchestras. These include six years as Associate Principal Horn with the Houston Symphony Orchestra, three years as Principal Horn with the Vancouver Symphony, and one season each as Principal Horn in the Florida Symphony and Tulsa Philharmonic orchestras. A native of Long Island, he received both his bachelor of music and master of music degrees from The Juilliard School, where he was a student of Ranier De Intinis (former New York Philharmonic third horn).

Along with his Philharmonic horn colleagues, Mr. Ralske has been featured as a soloist with the orchestra in nearly a dozen performances of Schumann’s Konzertstück for Four Horns — in New York as well as on tour in Europe and South America, with Kurt Masur conducting. Other recent solo engagements include appearances with the West Virginia Symphony, Jupiter Symphony, Texas Music Festival, and Nassau-Suffolk Wind Symphony. His 2004 solo appearance with the Tainan Symphony was televised throughout Taiwan.

Outside the orchestra, Mr. Ralske maintains a busy schedule as a chamber musician, teacher, and recording artist. He is a member of The Philharmonic Quintet of New York, which includes New York Philharmonic colleagues Robert Langevin (flute), Sherry Sylar (oboe), Mark Nuccio (clarinet), and Judith Leclair (bassoon). Together since 2001, they have toured in Asia and the United States, in addition to frequent performances in the New York metropolitan area. They anticipate the release of their first CD of a series later this year. In past seasons he has been a guest artist with The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Music Academy of the West, as well as the Seattle, Vancouver, and Bridgehampton Chamber Music Festivals. Mr. Ralske is on the faculty of the Manhattan School of Music and Mannes College of Music.

Erik Ralske has long been active in the recording industry, having performed on many movie soundtracks — from Oliver Stone’s Platoon (1986), to many recent releases, such as The Manchurian Candidate and Failure to Launch. He appears on a recent CD entitled Take 9, which combines the talents of the New York Philharmonic horn section and the American Horn Quartet.

Find additional upcoming performances with Erik Ralske

Howard Wall, a native of Pittsburgh, joined the horn section of the New York Philharmonic in March 1994. Previously, he was a member of The Philadelphia Orchestra for nearly 20 years. He is also a former member of both the Phoenix Symphony and the Denver Symphony Orchestra. He has appeared as soloist with the New York Philharmonic in Schumann’s Konzertstück for Four Horns in New York as well as in Europe and South America, and can be heard on the CD Take 9, featuring the New York Philharmonic horn section and the American Horn Quartet. Mr. Wall, who began playing the horn at age 10, earned his bachelor of arts degree in music performance at Carnegie Mellon University. His wife, Elmira Darvarova, is a former concertmaster of The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra.