LAURA KOBAYASHI

HAROLD LEVIN

Laura Kobayashi leads a varied career as a performer and pedagogue. She currently resides in Northern Virginia and performs as a member of the Main Street Chamber Players and the Kobayashi/Gray Duo.  She is also a founding member of the Main Street Music Studios located where she maintains a private studio of  students.

With duo partner/pianist, Dr. Susan Keith Gray, Dr. Kobayashi performs regularly through the United States. The Duo has also performed abroad in Wales, Thailand, South Africa, Norway, Brazil, Venezuela, Guyana, Suriname, Trinidad, and St. Lucia and has presented guest artist master classes, workshops and clinics in all of those countries. The Duo recently recorded its third CD of music by women composers which will all be world premieres in addition to two other CDs previously recorded of works by women composers--Feminissimo! Women Playing Music by Women (2008) and Boldly Expressive! Music by Women (2000) for the Albany Records label.  Eight of the works on the two previous CDs are world premiere recordings, including Grande Sonate, Op. 8 by 19th century French composer Marie Grandval, which the Duo edited for Hildegard Publishing Company. Both of their previous CDs have been broadcast on national public radio throughout North America, in the European Union and Australia and have received rave reviews from The Strad magazine, Strings magazine and Fanfare magazine. 

In addition to her Duo partnership, Dr. Kobayashi has appeared as a soloist with a number of professional and university/college orchestras throughout the United States and overseas with the Salta Chamber Orchestra of Argentina and the Chiang Rai Youth Orchestra of Thailand.  As an active chamber musician, she has performed abroad in Argentina and Puerto Rico and in the United States, at the Piccolo Spoleto Festival in Charleston, South Carolina; the National Museum of Women in the Arts, the Embassy of Bulgaria and the Arts Club of Washington, all in Washington, D.C. and the Montpelier Arts Center in Maryland as well as numerous other concert venues throughout the United States. 

Throughout her career Dr. Kobayashi has received several awards including the VASTA (Virginia State Chapter of ASTA) Outstanding String Teacher Award and the “Excellence in Teaching” Award by the Division of Music and College of Creative Arts at West Virginia University. Past teaching positions include West Virginia University, University of Nebraska at Omaha, University of Georgia and the Preparatory Department at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. In addition, she has participated and served on the faculties of numerous music festivals in the United States, Norway, Brazil and Argentina.   As a dedicated private teacher, Dr. Kobayashi has expanded her pedagogical knowledge by recently becoming certified in Levels 1 - 3 in the Paul Rolland Pedagogy.  Prior to her teaching career, Dr. Kobayashi was a professional orchestral musician and played as a member of the second violin section in the San Francisco Opera Orchestra. Outside of her teaching and performing activities, Dr. Kobayashi is also an active member of ASTA (American String Teachers Association) and has served as a National Chair for the ASTA National Solo Competition, the ASTA CAP Program  (Certificate Advancement Program) and the Potter's Violins Instrument Awards, among others.

Dr. Kobayashi’s current and former students have been accepted to participate in ASTA’S National High School Honors Orchestra, the American High School Honors Performance Series at Carnegie Hall, All-Virginia Orchestra, Northern Virginia and North Central Virginia Senior Regional Orchestras, West Virginia All-State Orchestra and Nebraska All-State Orchestra. In addition, a number of her students have performed in public master classes for international concert violinists: Jamie Laredo, James Ehnes, Arabella Steinbacher, Oleh Krysa, and Timothy Fain; concertmasters of major symphony orchestras: David Kim (Philadelphia Orchestra) and Valentin Zhuk (Netherlands Radio Symphony Orchestra) and notable pedagogues: Charles Castleman (The University of Miami), Paul Kantor (Rice University), Andrew Jennings (formerly of University of Michigan) and Marilyn McDonald (formerly of Oberlin Conservatory).  Dr. Kobayashi's students have also been accepted into undergraduate and graduate music programs pursuing degrees in music performance, music education and composition at The Juilliard School, Jacobs School of Music (Indiana University), The Hartt School (University of Hartford), Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, Shepherd School of Music (Rice University), Oberlin Conservatory of Music, Boston University, Ithaca College, Florida State University, University of Georgia and University of South Carolina. In addition, many of her former students have been hired as public school music teachers and Professors of Violin and orchestral conductors on the collegiate and professional level throughout the United States.

Dr. Kobayashi studied violin with Dorothy DeLay, Andrew Jennings, Paul Kantor and Denes Zsigmondy and performed in the master classes for Nathan Milstein, Ruggiero Ricci, Arthur Grumiaux, and Gyorgy Pauk. Chamber music studies have been with members of the Juilliard, Tokyo and American String Quartets as well as with collaborative pianists Robert McDonald and Samuel Sanders. Dr. Kobayashi earned degrees from The Juilliard School and Yale University and the Doctor of Musical Arts from The University of Michigan.

Contact Dr. Kobayashi:  lkviolin@verizon.net

Harold Levin pursues a creative career that intersects the worlds of performance, conducting, teaching, and composition.  After important formative training with Farrell Reese, Donald Valentine, Roland Vamos, and David Holland, he received degrees in viola performance - a Bachelor of Science from Ball State University, Master of Music from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, and DMA from Rutgers University.  His teachers included Robert Slaughter, Raymond Stilwell, Donald McInnes, and Michael Tree. Additionally, he studied composition with Ernesto Pellegrini, Joel Hoffman, and Charles Wuorinen, and received chamber music coaching from members of both the LaSalle and Guarneri Quartets.

After four seasons as a violist in the Louisville Orchestra, Dr. Levin was appointed to viola and conducting positions at the University of Nebraska, University of Memphis, Western Illinois University, and Ball State University.  One-year appointments include Bucknell, West Virginia, and Marywood Universities.  Simultaneously with his teaching positions, he has held the principal chairs in the Lincoln Symphony, Nebraska Chamber Orchestra, Princeton Symphony, Muncie Symphony, and Orchestra of Northern New York.  He has also appeared with the orchestras of Cincinnati, Omaha, Memphis, Long Island, Orlando, Jacksonville, Monterey, and Berkeley. His former students hold orchestra, college, and public school positions across the country.

Dr. Levin’s summer festival history includes the National Repertory Orchestra, Lake Placid Sinfonietta, Breckenridge Institute, Bay View, Bedford Springs, Tennessee Governor’s School, Crane Youth Music, Rutgers Summerfest, Cape Cod Chamber Music, Interlochen, Plymouth Chamber Music, and Cabrillo.

A dedicated teacher of young musicians, he has served as Music Director of youth orchestras in Indiana, Nebraska, New Jersey, and Florida. While conductor of the Florida Symphony Youth Orchestra, he held a staff conducting position with the Orlando Philharmonic, where he conducted over 40 Children’s Concerts, Pops, and on the Orchestra’s FOCUS Series.

Harold Levin is a commissioned and published composer, whose music is represented by Jomar Press.  His works for voice, chamber ensembles, band, and orchestra, have been performed across the country and in Europe.  Additionally, his Clarinet Quartet, Alto Saxophone Sonata, Saxophone Quartet, and Five Pieces for Clarinet, Viola, and Trumpet, have all been recorded commercially.  As both violist and conductor, he has commissioned and premiered many works for solo viola, chamber ensembles, and orchestra.

For two weeks each summer, he teaches, performs, and conducts at theBlue Mountain Festival. 

Contact Dr. Levin: haroldplevin@gmail.com