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Jeremy Briggs Roberts serves as Music Director and Conductor of the Washington Idaho Symphony in Pullman, Washington. Prior to this appointment, Dr. Briggs Roberts served most recently as Music Director of the Icicle Creek Youth Symphony and Summer Symphony, Associate Conductor of the Philharmonisches Kammerorchester Berlin, Music Director of the University of Washington Opera for the 2004-2005 season, Associate Conductor of the University of Washington Symphony Orchestra, and Music Director of the University of Washington Baroque Ensemble and Contemporary Group. A member of the conducting faculty at the 2009 Marrowstone Summer Music Festival in Bellingham, Washington, he has led such ensembles as the Ensemble Orchestral de Paris, London Soloists Chamber Orchestra, Moscow Symphony Orchestra, Spokane Symphony, Thüringen Philharmonie, Sofia Festival Orchestra and the Bacau Philharmonic Orchestra, among others. His opera credits include productions of Cimarosa's Il Matrimonio Segreto, Poulenc's Dialogues des Carmélites, Offenbach's Orphée aux Enfers, Britten's Turn of the Screw, Ravel's L'enfant et les Sortilèges, Mozart's Cosi fan Tutte, Die Zauberflöte, Le Nozze de Figaro, and Der Schauspieldirektor, Salieri’s Prima la Musica e Poi le Parole, and Smetana's Bartered Bride.

Dr. Briggs Roberts was a prizewinner at the 2006 Vendôme Academy of Orchestral Conducting in Paris. He has studied and worked closely with many of today's leading conductors including Peter Erös, Janos Fürst, Gerard Schwarz, Jorma Panula, John Nelson, Gennady Rozhdestvensky, and Gianluigi Gelmetti. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science and Music from the University of Puget Sound and a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Orchestral Conducting from the University of Washington.

Born in Seoul, Korea, Rajung Yang began her piano studies at the age of four. She received her B.M. and M.M. in Piano from Seoul National University where she studied with Kwi-Hyun Kim and completed her dissertation on Nine Bagatelles by William Bolcom. In 2003, shemoved to the United States to continue her graduate study at the University of Michigan. Rajung received her second M.M. and D.M.A. in Piano Performance under tutorage of Arthur Greene and Logan Skelton. Additional studies include collaborative piano with Martin Katz and Katherine Collier, and harpsichord with Edward Parmentier.

Rajung has won several top prizes in national and international competitions including Ibla Grand Prize and Bartok-Kabalevsky-Prokofiev Competitions in Italy in 2005. Subsequent performances included her debut recital at New York Carnegie Hall, Boston, Washington D.C., Virginia, and other major venues in Italy. In 2007, she won the University of Michigan Concerto Competition and this resulted in an appearance with the University of Michigan Symphony Orchestra conducted by Kenneth Kiesler at Hill Auditorium in Ann Arbor. Rajung was also awarded third prize at the William Byrd International Competition in Michigan, where her performance of Paganini Rhapsody by Rachmaninoff gained the most favorable reception by local critics.

As a dedicated advocate for the 20th and 21st centuries’ music, Rajung has performed and premiered new works as either a soloist or collaborator in numerous festivals and conferences in US, Korea and Europe. Two of her dissertation recitals at the University of Michigan featured solely contemporary piano music by such composers as Maurice Ohana, Bright Sheng, William Bolcom, Nikolai Kapustin and George Crumb.

Rajung Yang is an Assistant Professor of Piano at the University of Idaho Lionel Hampton School of Music where she teaches Collaborative Piano. Prior to her appointment at the University of Idaho, Rajung taught at Adrian College in Michigan and the University of Michigan.

A Seattle native, she received her Bachelor's and Master's degrees in Violin Performance from the University of Michigan, and a Doctorate in Violin Performance from Michigan State University. At the University of Michigan she was a violin student of Camilla Wicks, and during her doctoral studies she was a student of I-Fu Wang. She studied chamber music with Ekhart Selheim, Jeffrey Solo and Martin Katz, and studied string pedagogy with Robert Culver. As a University of Michigan Graduate Teaching Assistant, she taught private violin and string pedagogy. She spent her summers studying and performing at U.S. and European music festivals, and teaching at Interlochen. In the early 1980's she attended Eastern Washington University and the University of Washington, and was a member of the Spokane Symphony.

In 1988 she joined the music faculty of Alma College (Alma, Michigan) where, until 1995, she was the Artist-in-Residence. Apart from teaching violin and viola, Arksey was the concertmaster of the Alma Symphony Orchestra, Assistant Principal of the Lansing Symphony and the founder and director of the Gratiot-Isabella Youth Orchestra. Since 1989 she has been a member of the Silver Bay String Quartet, a group which has a summer residency at the Silver Bay Association, Silver Bay, New York.

In 1995 she joined the music faculty of Washington State University where she teaches studio violin and viola, chamber music, string techniques, and music theory. She performs frequently as a soloist and chamber musician both on the Washington State University campus and throughout the state. She is the concertmaster of the Washington-Idaho Symphony and President of the Washington State American String Teachers Association. Dr. Arksey has served as a clinician and adjudicator at numerous competitions, master classes and festivals in Michigan, Washington, Idaho, and British Columbia. A member of the American Suzuki Association, she has been on the faculty of the Palouse Suzuki Institute since 1996.

Keri E. McCarthy currently teaches as Assistant Professor of Oboe and Music History at Washington State University, and at Hartwick College Summer Music Festival. Having returned to the United States after teaching oboe and music theory at Mahidol University in Thailand, Dr. McCarthy is continuing to cultivate an international reputation as a chamber musician, soloist, and clinician. She recently premiered works by Sean Shepherd and David Johnson at the International Double Reed Society Conferences in 2006 and 2007, and performed as solo English horn on Aaron Copland's Quiet City with the Washington-Idaho Symphony.  She completed a June 2008 solo tour of Southeast Asia premiering newly-commissioned works for oboe and piano from composers around the region.

In 2004 she completed her doctorate in Music Literature and Performance at Indiana University under the tutelage of Linda Strommen, Roger Roe, and Ted Baskin, having previously completed her Masters degree with Ronald Roseman at the Yale School of Music, and a Bachelors degree at Ithaca College where she studied with Mark Hill and Paige Morgan.

Keri currently performs as solo English hornist of the Washington-Idaho Symphony and has held oboe and English horn positions with the Salaya and Evansville Philharmonics and the Owensboro Symphony Orchestra. She has performed with the New Haven, Binghamton, Syracuse, Spokane and Louisville Symphonies, and the Nashville and Indianapolis Chamber Orchestras.

Walter Gray is in his 28th season as a member of the Seattle Symphony Orchestra and has been featured several times as a soloist, most recently in the world premier of a new concerto by David Kechley. “Gray played with his usual intensity and flair… the cello’s lyrical possibilities are realized.” (The Seattle Times) Mr. Gray attended the Curtis Institute of Music and was a founding member of the Kronos Quartet. He has been on the faculty of Western Washington University, Cornish College of the Arts and in 1998-99 he spent a highly successful year as a member of the Artist Faculty at the University of North Texas.

Mr. Gray has recorded for Delos, CRI, New Albion, Klavier and Mode. He has also served as Recording Producer for the London Symphony Orchestra, Seattle Symphony Orchestra, Northwest Chamber Orchestra, New Hampshire Music Festival Orchestra, and the New Performance Group. As a founding member of the new music ensemble Quake, Mr. Gray produced and performed on the CD Seven Mirrors, music of Chinary Ung, on New World Records. Quake was featured last spring in a performance at the Zagreb Biennale, Zagreb, Croatia.

During the summer Mr. Gray has performed at the Santa Barbara Chamber Music Festival. “The evening closed with a shatteringly beautiful rendition of Samuel Barber’s Sonata for Violoncello and Piano (1932) by cellist Walter Gray.” He has been Principal Cello with the New Hampshire Music Festival Orchestra for 22 years and recently premiered Voice of the Wood, a concerto for cello quartet and orchestra by Russell Peck. He has also participated in the Marrowstone, Waterloo, Mostly Mozart, Mt. Gretna, Olympic, Cabrillo, and Tidewater Music Festivals.

Ryan M. Hare, originally from Reno, Nevada, teaches composition, music theory, and studio bassoon at Washington State University, where he is an associate professor of music, and is Composer in Residence for the Washington Idaho Symphony. His compositions have been heard in numerous venues and festivals throughout the U.S., and also in Germany and Chile. Recent honors include a prestigious Artist Trust Fellowship and commissions and premieres by the Washington Idaho Symphony (Three Short Pieces for Orchestra) and by Affinity Chamber Players (Chamber Concerto), a specialist new-music ensemble based in Seattle. A compact disc of all recent music for bassoon solo and bassoon with electronics—including seven pieces written for Dr. Hare—is available on the Present Sounds label.

Ryan Hare earned his Doctor of Musical Arts in Composition from the University of Washington; his other degrees include a Master of Music in Composition from Ithaca College and a Bachelor of Arts in Music from Oregon State University. Prior to his arrival at WSU, Dr. Hare held appointments at the University of Washington, Seattle University, Seattle Pacific University, and Oregon State University, and taught composition and bassoon at Music Works Northwest, a community music school in Bellevue, WA. His principal teachers in composition have been Joël-François Durand, Richard Karpen, and Diane Thome at the University of Washington, Greg Woodward at Ithaca College, and Ron Jeffers at Oregon State University, with additional lessons from Shulamit Ran, Jacob Druckman, Brian Ferneyhough, and Paul-Heinz Dittrich. Dr. Hare's significant teachers for bassoon include Arthur Grossman, Lee Goodhew, Mike Curtis, and Seth Krimsky.

www.ryanhare.com