2025
Jennifer Armor
Violin
Violinist and violist, Jennifer Armor has a passion for telling stories and performing joyfully. She was the winner of the 2024 Guelph Concerto Competition and will be performing the Beethoven Violin Concerto in their 2024/25 season. She shares a deep love of chamber music and in 2019 won the silver medal at the Fischoff National Chamber Competition with her string quartet.
Jennifer is currently pursuing her masters degree in Basel, Switzerland at The Basel Academy of Music studying under Alina Pogostkina and is enjoying many mountain escapades and lots of dark chocolate. She graduated from her bachelors degree at the Glenn Gould School of Music in Toronto, Canada in 2024 studying with Paul Kantor and Barry Shiffman, and has had masterclasses with renowned faculty such as Leonidas Kavakos, Noah Bendix-Balgley, David Kim, and Barnabas Kelemen.
In addition to her love of classical music, Jennifer is also an avid improviser and jazz vocalist and is studying jazz vocals as a minor at the academy.
Tristan Macaggi
Viola
Tristan Macaggi, an Italian-born violist from Las Vegas, Nevada, is a highly sought-after performer in orchestral, chamber music, and solo settings. He recently completed his studies under the tutelage of world-class violist Steven Dann at the Glenn Gould School. Tristan has collaborated with internationally celebrated musicians such as Grace Park, Krystof Chorzelski, Karen Dreyfus, Steven Tenenbom, Juan Miguel Hernandez, Pablo Hernan Benedi, Dimitri Murrath, David Alberman, Levon Chilingirian, Richard Lester, and Lech Antonio Uszynski.
Tristan Macaggi’s recent performance highlights include appearances across Ontario with the National Academy Orchestra of Canada under the baton of Alain Trudel. He has also collaborated with the Kelemen Quartet on works by Béla Bartók and participated in contemporary chamber music projects with the Kronos Quartet at the Royal Conservatory’s 21C Festival.
Tristan has performed with notable ensembles, including the Royal Conservatory Orchestra, Hamilton Philharmonic, Brantford Symphony Orchestra, and Las Vegas Philharmonic. During his summers, Tristan has attended the Domaine Forget Chamber Music Intensive, where he worked with members of the Arditti, Chiaroscuro, Chilingirian, and London Haydn Quartets.
Currently, Tristan is on viola faculty for the Young Artists Orchestra of Las Vegas, where he
shares his passion for music education with aspiring young musicians. He performs on a modern
viola crafted by Patrick Higgins
Leanne McGowan
Violin
​Australian violinist Leanne McGowan is currently a Master’s student at the Hanns Eisler Hochschule für Musik Berlin with Professor Stephan Picard. She is the winner of the Dorcas McClean Travelling Scholarship for Violinists, Queensland Symphony Orchestra’s Young Instrumentalists Prize and was awarded “Most Promising Player” at the Gisborne International Violin Competition, among many other prizes. She has performed as a soloist with the Queensland, Northern Rivers, Preston and South Melbourne Symphony Orchestras, Queensland Youth Symphony and Melbourne Conservatorium's Camerata Orchestra.
She has performed all throughout Australia, Europe and the United States, at festivals such as the Kronberg Academy “Chamber Music Connects the World”, Gstaad Academy Festival, MarvãoAcademy, Kronberg Violin & Viola Masterclasses, Festival Academy Budapest, Keshet Eilon Mastercourse, Villars Music Academy, New York String Orchestra Seminar and Aspen Music Festival. Leanne has toured with the Australian Chamber Orchestra and substitutes regularly with the Berlin Philharmonic.​
An avid chamber musician, Leanne has performed alongside musicians such as Antje Weithaas, Gidon Kremer, Miklos Perenyi, Henning Kraggerud, Tatjana Masurenko, Arnaud Sussman and Tessa Lark. She previously studied at the Colburn Conservatory of Music with Robert Lipsett and the Australian National Academy of Music with Dr Robin Wilson. She has received additional mentoring from Ana Chumanchenco, Christoph Poppen, Mihaela Martin, Kolja Blacher, Kristof Barati and Vadim Gluzman. When she is not playing the violin, Leanne loves to do anything outside, whether it be skiing, hiking or soaking up the sun in Berlin’s many parks.
David Liam Roberts
Cello
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The 2024-25 season includes two tours of central Canada with pianist Godwin Friesen (together they are known as Prairie Sons) as Prairie Debut touring artists. The upcoming season also includes appearances at the Copenhagen Summer Festival (Denmark) and Prince Edward County Festival (Ontario), as well as debuts in Calgary (Calgary Pro Musica) and Oslo (Norway) with the Rilian Trio. Recent engagements include debuts in Tromsø, Norway, as well as recitals presented by the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel in Belgium, Music Toronto and the Gallery Chamber Players of Niagara.
David Liam has studied with many of the foremost classical music pedagogues, including Steven Isserlis, Christian Tetzlaff, Donald Weilerstein and Joel Krosnick, having attended festivals such as the Perlman Music Program, Morningside Music Bridge, and International Music Seminar at Prussia Cove. He has also participated in the Open Chamber Music seminar at Prussia Cove. David Liam holds a Bachelors and Artist Diploma from the Glenn Gould School at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto, where he studied with Hans Jørgen Jensen and Andres Díaz. He his currently pursuing a Masters at the Basel Academy of Music in Switzerland, studying with the acclaimed
cellist Danjulo Ishizaka.
David Liam plays a cello crafted in Milan by Carlo Antonio Monzino VI in 1928 and a bow by W.E.
Hill & Sons, both generously loaned to him by CANIMEX, inc.
Winner of the 2021 Michael Measures Prize from the Canada Council for the Arts, Métis-Canadian
cellist David Liam Roberts enjoys an international career as a soloist and chamber musician.
Besides being named to CBC’s list of 30 Classical Musicians under 30, David Liam was awarded
both the 1st Prize and Grand Award at the 2018 National Music Festival of Canada and won 1st
Prize of the 2022 biennial WMC McLellan Competition after performing the Schumann Cello
Concerto as soloist with the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra in the competition’s final round. His
Rilian Trio recently won the 1st Prize, Audience Prize and Commission Prize at the 12th Trondheim
International Chamber Music Competition in Norway.
Sabina Sandvoss
Cello
Cellist, Sabina Sandvoss, was born into a musical family and received a cello on her fourth birthday. Since then she has enjoyed a musical life attending countless concerts and receiving many diverse artistic influences. Sabina studied in the Advanced Performance Program at Mount Royal Conservatory where she had the privilege to perform in masterclasses with cellists such as Laurence Lesser, Gustav Rivinius, Alan Harris, Melissa Kraut, Estelle Choi, Tanja Tetzlaff, Colin Carr, and Johannes Moser.
Sabina has successfully participated in numerous competitions including winning the Rotary C3 Concerto Competition and first prize in the Frank Simpson Concerto Competition. This granted the opportunity to perform both the Dvorak Cello Concerto and Tchaikovsky’s Rococo Variations in the spring of 2022.
Additionally, she has advanced to the Provincial and National levels in both the Calgary Performing Arts Festival and the Canadian Music Competition on numerous occasions. Sabina received her early tutelage from her mother, cellist, Beth Root Sandvoss and performs on a cello handcrafted by her father, Christopher Tilman Sandvoss.
Currently, Sabina is finishing her fourth year of a Bachelor of Music degree (Honours) at the renowned Glenn Gould School and has the privilege to study with world-class artist teachers Hans Jørgen Jensen and Andrés Díaz. She has been awarded The Ihnatowycz Emerging Artists Full Scholarship
Tilman Sandvoss
Viola
Tilman Sandvoss is an accomplished orchestral, chamber, and solo musician noted for having a luscious tone and profound musicality. He began his musical education at home with his father Christopher Sandvoss at the young age of five, and later continued his viola studies in the Academy and Advanced Performance Program at the Mount Royal Conservatory.
He has participated in international festivals including the Festival Academy Budapest, the Domaine Forget Academy and its Chamber Music Intensive program, as well as the International Musicians Seminar at Prussia Cove. In 2019 he was also the only violist to be invited to Germany to take part in the Goslar Internationale Konzertarbeitschwochen, where he studied with Elisabeth Kufferath, professor of violin at the Hochschule für Musik in Hannover and member of the Tetzlaff Quartet.
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Tilman has had the pleasure of working with many internationally distinguished artists and teachers such as Kim Kashkashian, Antoine Tamestit, Maxim Rysanov, Paul Coletti, Gerald Stanick, Andres Cardenes, Sharon Wei, and members of the Calidore, Kronos and Chiaroscuro Quartets, to name a few.
As a fan of new music, Tilman has both collaborated and given world premieres with composers such as Vincent Ho, Peter Jancewicz, Brian Current, Jörg Widmann, Julian Anderson and Huw Watkins.
Recently, Tilman has founded an international chamber music festival in Western Canada called Chisel Creek Classical, where he invites artists from around the world to perform and teach over a two week period.
Tilman received his Bachelors of Music degree (Honours) in viola performance at The Glenn Gould School in Toronto under the mentorship of violist Steven Dann. He is continuing his education at The Hochschule für Musik in Basel where he is pursuing his Masters degree in the class of violist Silvia Simionescu.
Tilman performs on a viola made by his father, master luthier Christopher Sandvoss.