Garden Chamber Party: Sauvie Island Winds with WindSync

Artists

WindSync Wind Quintet

Garrett Hudson, flute
Emily Tsai, oboe
Graeme Steele Johnson, clarinet
Kara LaMoure, bassoon
Anni Hochhalter, horn

WindSync has established itself as a vibrant chamber ensemble performing wind quintet masterworks, adapting beloved music to their instrumentation, and championing new works by today’s composers. The quintet often eliminates the “fourth wall” between musicians and audience by performing from memory, creating an intimate connection. This personal performance style, combined with the ensemble’s three-pronged mission of artistry, education, and community-building, lends WindSync its reputation as ”a group of virtuosos who are also wonderful people, too” (Alison Young, Classical MPR).

WindSync launched an international touring career after winning the 2012 Concert Artists Guild Victor Elmaleh Competition and the 2016 Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition. In 2018, they were finalists at the M-Prize Chamber Arts Competition. WindSync has appeared in recital at the Library of Congress, Ravinia, Shanghai Oriental Arts Center, and Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall. Their commissions and premieres include The Cosmos, a concerto for wind quintet and orchestra by Pulitzer finalist Michael Gilbertson, and recent works by Ivan Trevino, Marc Mellits, Erberk Eryilmaz, and Akshaya Avril Tucker. Their album, All Worlds, All Times, was released on Bright Shiny Things in 2022, debuting at no. 2 on the Billboard Traditional Classical charts.

WindSync’s thematic programming responds to the people and places where they work. In their artistic hometown of Houston, they curate a four-concert season and present the Onstage Offstage Chamber Music Festival each April, spotlighting everyday public spaces as gathering places for culture. The ensemble’s educational work includes tour stops at public schools and ongoing collaborations with the social music programs Sistema Ravinia and Houston Youth Symphony Coda Music Program. WindSync has been featured in educational concerts presented by the Seattle Symphony, the Hobby Center, and Orli Shaham’s Bach Yard, and the ensemble’s concerts for young people reach over 5,000 students per year. In recognition of this work, they are the winners of the 2022 Ann Divine Fischoff Educator Award.

The members of WindSync have led masterclasses at New World Symphony, Eastman School of Music, Florida State University, and Northwestern University, among others. The quintet has also served as Ensemble-in-Residence for the Nevada Chamber Music Festival, the Chamber Music Festival of Lexington (KY), the National Museum of Wildlife Art, and the Grand Teton Music Festival.

Artist's Website

Upcoming Concerts & Events

• Peter and the Wolf with WindSync at Powell’s Books
• Peter and the Wolf with WindSync at Tualatin Public Library
• Sensory Friendly Concert with WindSync

Garrett Hudson Flute

Recognized by the Winnipeg Free Press for “shaking up the classical music world,” Garrett Hudson is known for his charismatic stage presence and highly personal voice on the flute. His roots lie in Winnipeg, Manitoba where he emerged at the age of 16 in a solo debut with the Winnipeg Symphony. Before embarking upon a dynamic career as an international soloist, instructor, and orchestral and chamber musician, Mr. Hudson held positions in North America’s leading professional training orchestras including the National Academy Orchestra of Canada and l’Orchestre de la Francophonie in Montreal, Quebec, and participated in other world-class training programs such as the Young Artists Program through Ottawa’s National Arts Center. Mr. Hudson completed a Bachelor of Music degree from the University of British Columbia, studying under Scottish flutist Lorna McGhee and earned his Master of Music degree from Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music under the tutelage of renowned flute pedagogue Leone Buyse. Since 2009 he has served as flutist with WindSync, an ensemble considered to be one of North America’s foremost emerging chamber forces and a recent Gold Medalist in the National Fischoff Chamber Music Competition and winner of the Concert Artists Guild international competition for artist management. Mr. Hudson currently serves as adjunct faculty of flute at Lonestar College in Houston, Texas.

Artist's Website

Emily Tsai Oboe

Quoted by DMV Classical as having “a consistently lovely tone and [taking] her melodic twists and turns with stylish assurance,” Emily Tsai began her musical studies at the age of four on the violin and started the oboe when she was ten. Based in the Washington, DC area, she is the Assistant Principal Oboe of the Washington National Opera and the Kennedy Center Opera House Orchestra. Along with her position at the Kennedy Center, Emily has also performed with the National Philharmonic, Maryland Lyric Opera, Allentown Symphony Orchestra, Alexandria Symphony and others in the DC area. She has made solo appearances with the Alba Music Festival Orchestra, the Amadeus Orchestra, the Paragon Philharmonia, and the Washington Asian Philharmonic among others. Emily is the adjunct oboe professor at St. Mary’s College in Maryland and holds a robust private studio in the DC area. Her main teachers include Mark Hill, Richard Killmer, and Malcolm Smith. She received her Bachelor of Music degree in Oboe Performance from the Eastman School of Music with a Performer’s Certificate and the Chamber Music Award, and her Bachelor of Science degree in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from the University of Rochester graduating Magna Cum Laude. She received her Master of Music from the University of Maryland where she was part of the Graduate Fellowship Quintet. In her downtime, Emily has completed a number of half marathons, a full marathon, an Olympic triathlon, and a Tough Mudder, and loves to go on various outdoor adventures with her husband, Karl. Inside, she can be found playing video games and spoiling her two adorable cats, Xenia and Perch.

Artist's Website

Graeme Steele Johnson Clarinet

Praised for his “elegant and rounded sound” and “gentle lyricism” (Albany Times-Union), Graeme Steele Johnson is an artist of uncommon imagination and versatility. Winner of the Hellam Young Artists’ Competition and the Yamaha Young Performing Artists Competition, he has established a multifaceted career as a clarinetist, writer, and arranger. His diverse artistic endeavors range from a TEDx talk comparing Mozart and Seinfeld, to his reconstruction of a forgotten 125-year-old work by Charles Martin Loeffler, to his performances of Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto on a rare elongated clarinet that he commissioned. He has appeared in recital at The Kennedy Center and Chicago’s Dame Myra Hess series, and as a chamber musician at Carnegie Hall, the Ravinia Festival, Chamber Music Northwest, Phoenix Chamber Music Festival, and Yellow Barn. His concerto appearances include the Vienna International Orchestra, Springfield Symphony Orchestra, Caroga Lake and Vermont Mozart Festival Orchestras, and the CME Chamber Orchestra.

Johnson has performed his original chamber arrangements around the country with such artists as Valerie Coleman, the Miró Quartet, and Han Lash. He holds graduate degrees from the Yale School of Music, where he was twice awarded the Alumni Association Prize; other recent accolades include the Saint Botolph Club Foundation’s Emerging Artist Award and the inaugural Lee Memorial Scholarship from the Center for Musical Excellence. His major teachers include David Shifrin, Nathan Williams, and Ricardo Morales, and he is now a doctoral candidate at the CUNY Graduate Center under the mentorship of Charles Neidich.

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Rémy Taghavi Bassoon

Rémy Taghavi is a highly sought-after bassoonist and educator based in the Northeast. Rémy is Principal Bassoon of the New Haven Symphony Orchestra and has performed with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Orchestra New England, the Las Vegas Philharmonic, and the Cape and Princeton Symphonies, among others. He is a Founder and Artistic Director of the Annapolis Chamber Music Festival, a member of the New York-based chamber ensembles Frisson and SoundMind, and an alumnus of Carnegie Hall’s teaching artist and chamber music program, Ensemble Connect. Mr. Taghavi is Assistant Professor of Bassoon at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where he also serves as the Woodwind Chamber Music Coordinator, and faculty at the Rocky Ridge Music Center’s Young Artist Seminar (Colorado). He completed degrees at the University of Southern California, the Juilliard School, and Stony Brook University. His primary teachers include Frank Morelli, Judith Farmer, and Norbert Nielubowski.

Anni Hochhalter Horn

Born in California and raised in Las Vegas, Nevada, Anni is an active musician and innovator in the arts field. Specializing in chamber music, she has launched an exciting career as a recitalist, instructor, and social entrepreneur. Anni graduated from the University of Southern California with a Bachelor of Music degree in French Horn Performance, studying with leading studio and orchestral musicians Rick Todd, James Thatcher, and Kristy Morrell, along with summers under Roger Kaza as a fellow at the Chautauqua Music Festival and Texas Music Festival. In 2009, Anni won first prize in the Yen Liang Young Artist Competition and performed Richard Strauss’ First Horn Concerto in E-flat Major with the Diablo Symphony. As a touring musician, she has performed with orchestras and chamber ensembles across North America, Europe, and Asia, and performs each summer as principal horn of the McCall Music Festival in McCall, Idaho. Anni is based in San Francisco, California and enjoys trail running and backpacking whenever possible. During the summer of 2020 she backpacked over 250 miles, including a 75 mile section of the Pacific Crest Trail in Washington, and in the last year has run two marathons. Anni currently serves as Executive Director and musician chair of WindSync.

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