The Enescu Soirees Resume with a Seductive Program

The year’s first recital of the Enescu Soirees Online is offered by the exciting Eight Strings duo, formed by Romanian-American violinist Ion-Alexandru Malaimare and violist YooBin Lee, performing together with pianist Ji-Min Sung. The program features an unmissable gem of works by Rachmaninoff, Bach, Beethoven, Piazzolla, and Paganini. 

Watch on our FACEBOOK, YOUTUBE and WEBSITE from Thursday, January 28, 2 p.m. EST or anytime later!

Program:

S. Rachmaninoff - Trio Elegiaque No. 1

J. S. Bach - Prelude 

L. van Beethoven - Sonata No. 5, ‘Spring’, Mvt. 1 

A. Piazzolla - Le Grand Tango 

N. Paganini - ‘Cantabile’

Violinist Alex ‘Nica’ Malaimare studied at the National University of Music in Bucharest and took his Masters at the Royal Conservatory. He currently pursues a Doctoral degree at the University of Illinois, where he studies under the guidance of Stefan Milenkovich and Rudolf Haken. Alex was a student of celebrated Romanian violinist and mentor Stefan Gheorghiu and participated in masterclasses of important musicians like Almita Vamos, Rachel Barton-Pine, and the Chiara String Quartet. As soloist, he worked with first-rate orchestral and chamber groups and had the opportunity to collaborate with esteemed conductors such as Igor Coretti (Slovenia-Italy), Christian Badea (USA), and Donald Schleicher (USA), to name but a few. Alex has performed in recitals and concerts in well-known venues in Austria, Czech Republic, Belgium, Italy, Romania, Slovenia, United States. He owes a notable part of his development as a musician to a scholarship that afforded him to study at the “SoNoRo” Chamber Music workshops, thanks to which he could play alongside artists like Corinne Chapelle, Erik Schumann, Alexander Sitkovetsky, Adrian Brendel, David Cohen, Razvan Popovici, and Diana Ketler. In addition to winning prizes at violin competitions in Romania, Alex was triumphant at the Young Artist Competition of MTNA and the University of Illinois Concerto Competition. Most recently, he was awarded The Judges Special Recognition Award at Plowman Chamber Music Competition 2017, and the First Prize at New York Artists International Competition, both together with his quartet, with which he gave a recital on July 6th at Carnegie's Weill Hall. Most recently, Alex has been appointed Adjunct Instructor of Violin at the University of Illinois and has become a member of the Eykamp String Quartet of the University of Evansville, a Principal Second for the Evansville Philharmonic Orchestra, and a member of Lincoln Center Stage.    

Violist YooBin Lee, a native of Korea, is pursuing the Doctor of Musical Arts degree at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where she was a Teaching Assistant. She received a Bachelor's degree from Chungnam National University in Korea and an MA from the University of Michigan and Bowling Green State University. Her principal teachers have been Yizhak Schotten, Rudolf Haken, Elizabeth Freivogel, Matthew Daline, and Jupiter Stringquartet. As an avid soloist, chamber musician, and orchestral player, she performed as a principal violist in several ensembles and orchestras. Also, she was awarded First Prizes in the New York Artists International Competition, the Bowling Green Chamber Music Competition, the Korea Art Music Competition, as well as being a finalist in the MTNA Young Artist Competition in New York City. She served as a violin/viola instructor at Millikin University and is currently a visiting adjunct faculty at BGSU.

Ji-Min Sung, born in South Korea, received her first piano lessons at the age of five from her mother. At the age of seven she won a competition for the first time and has since won several prizes at various national piano competitions in Korea. She studied at Daejeon Arts High School and Chungnam National University to then move to the Karlsruhe University of Music to pursue her Master's degree in piano performance, under the guidance of Prof. Kaya Han. She attended several master classes with Françoise Thinat, Mattias Kirschnereit, Alexander Braginsky, Dr. Leslie Howard, Klaus Hellwig, Severin von Eckardstein, Kevin Kenner. After completing her master’s degree in Karlsruhe with the highest distinction, she continued her artistic training as part of the concert performance training at the University of Music and Theater in Hamburg under Prof. Ralf Nattkemper. As part of the training, she gave concerts with Symphoniker Hamburg, Bundeskanzler Helmut Schmidt Stiftung, among many others. She currently holds a piano faculty position at Chungnam National University