2024 International Young Artists Competition Judges

Soo Lee (https://www.backtobachproject.org/)

Soo is CEO & Chief Executive Officer of “Back to BACH Project” non profit organization. She brings her passion to Bach to Bach after more than 15 years of teaching and guiding her own children on the cello. She is committed to bringing a new level of excitement and growth to the "Back to Bach" Project, that her son and founder, Noah, put in her leadership as he begins his undergraduate studies at Harvard University. She served as the praise worship director at Cornerstone Fellowship and the choir director at Vision Christian Fellowship. She is an examiner of the certificate advancement program at the ASTA American String Teacher Association since 2010. She has been the adjudicator for Cello Masterclass, Showcase Competition, and the Virtuosi Recital Competition at the National League of Performing Arts. Soo is the founding artistic director of the Heartstrings Cello Ensemble. She is on the Board of Directors at "From The Top," the syndicated NPR radio program, as well as their Alumni Leadership Committee. She has done her undergraduate and graduate studies at The Manhattan School of Music and Columbia University, respectively.

KATHRYN LOCKWOOD (www.kathrynlockwood.com/home)

Australian violist Kathryn Lockwood leads an active and varied career as performer, teacher, and artistic director. Since moving to the United States in 1991 Kathryn has played with a virtual who’s-who in the chamber music world and captured sought-after awards in the country including the Naumburg Chamber Music Award. Kathryn’s career launched straight out of graduate school at USC (CA) where she, along with three friends, formed the Pacifica Quartet. As a member of PQ she traveled the world concertizing and recording. After moving to New York in 2001 Kathryn soon claimed the viola chair of the internationally renowned Lark Quartet. Always evolving and thinking out of the box, Kathryn formed the innovative group duoJalal with percussionist and husband Yousif Sheronick.  

The accolades speak volumes to Kathryn’s virtuosic ability.  The Cleveland Plain Dealer proclaimed Kathryn as a “violist of exceptional talents,  "...Lockwood played the vociferous viola cadenza with mahogany beauty and vivid character" and the Toronto Star wrote: "Lockwood is all slow, sensuous allure with her bowing arm one moment, a tempest of notes the next”. A violist in high demand, Kathryn has played with Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Music from Copland House, members of the Emerson Quartet and jazz legend John Patitucci.  

Kathryn’s creative mind led her to be appointed Artistic Director, a position she still holds, of the innovative series Four Seasons in Music at the Sands Point Preserve Conservancy. This very special series presents four magical concerts annually in the stunning location of the former Guggenheim Estate with historic mansions and waterfront grounds. Each concert is a unique program of chamber music and poetry, inspired by themes throughout the year. The repertoire chosen for each concert ranges from Bach and Mozart to today’s culturally diverse composers. Each concert is roughly divided into equal thirds representing classical repertoire, new music including commissions, and world influenced music.

Kathryn is also the Artistic Director for the "Music@MoMA" Series. This series which has been running since 2017 is an intimate salon style chamber music series.  It is hosted by a philanthropic couple in their gorgeous apartment at the Museum Tower at the MoMA on 53rd Street. Each concert is followed by a dinner party and takes the guests back to a time when chamber music was enjoyed in a chamber.

Kathryn is proud to announce a new position as co-artistic director where duoJalal is ensemble in residence, for the Telluride MusicFest.  A festival housed in a gorgeous mountain home situated at 10,000 feet!  Click HERE

With duoJalal, Kathryn has recorded two albums. The first in 2010 "A different world" on Innova Records with music of Philip Glass (who extracted a viola solo from his opera “Madrigal” and adapted it for duoJalal), and commissions from Kenji Bunch, Derek Bermel and John Patitucci. In 2016, “Shadow & Light” on Bridge Records with commissions by Evan Ziporyn and Ljova. As a member of Lark Quartet, she concertized regularly including a tour of Sweden and with a focus on new music released three CD's on Bridge records. An "All Jennifer Higdon" CD featuring Gary Graffman, "Composing America" featuring a commission by Paul Moravec and pianist Jeremy Denk; and “A Farewell Celebration” featuring all new commissions by John Harbison, Kenji Bunch, Andrew Waggoner and Anna Weesner. Kathryn also recorded with Lark, “Klap Ur Handz” on Endeavor Records with a new commission by Daniel Bernard Roumain “DBR”. In 2005 Kathryn released a solo recital CD of Viola Music by Inessa Zaretsky, "Fireoptics", about which Strad declared "Lockwood is absolutely inside the music's idiom finding appropriate tonal shadings". 

As an original member of Pacifica Quartet, Kathryn performed at Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall, Ravinia's Bennett Gordon Hall, Corcoran Gallery, St. Lawrence Center, and University of Thessaloniki / Greece. She was heard live on NPR’s Performance Today during a two week residency of daily broadcasts and collaborated with violist Michael Tree on an all Dvorak CD released by Cedille Records. 

Kathryn is currently tenured faculty at and at the John Cali School of Music at Montclair State University, previously serving on the faculty at University of Massachusetts/Amherst, Rutgers University in NJ, Northwestern University, University of Chicago, Music Institute of Chicago, and National Music Camp in Australia. Recently appointed Curator of the Immersive Residency Program at Montclair State University, she oversees weeklong residency visits of internationally renowned artists and groups. She earned her Master's Degree with Donald McInnes at the University of Southern California, and her Bachelor of Music Degree from the Queensland Conservatorium of Music with Elizabeth Morgan. Kathryn plays on an unknown Italian viola from the 18th Century Brescian School and performs during the summer for the Broyhill Chamber Ensemble in NC, Elm City ChamberFest in CT and at the Telluride ChamberFest in CO.

MINA PERRY (www.minaperry.com)

Mina Hirobe-Perry has performed in recitals as soloist, chamber musician in Germany, Belgium, Italy, Austria, Ireland, Luxembourg, North America, China, Taiwan, South Korea and Japan. She also enjoys concertizing two piano/four hand repertoire. She earned her Bachelor and Master Degrees with honor at Musashino Academia Musicae in Tokyo, where she studied with Prof. Tetsushige Maruyama and Prof. Konstantin Ganev, who was the assistant professor of the eminent pedagogue Heinrich Neuhaus at Moscow Conservatory. After three years of concertizing throughout Japan and teaching piano privately, she moved to Germany where she earned her Artist Diploma and served as a correpetitor at the Hochschule für Musik Detmold. She continued advanced study at the Glenn Gould School of Music in Toronto, Canada.

Ms. Perry’s priority is to enable her students to discover their unique style in music making, along with developing their technique for beautiful sound production.  As a dedicated teacher, her students have won numerous competitions locally and nationally, including three CAPMT (MTNA California division) state winners. Her students also have been accepted to prestigious music conservatories and universities such as Juilliard, Manhattan, San Francisco, Eastman, Cleveland, Peabody, USC, UCLA, Indiana, and Hochschüle für Musik Hanns Eisler Berlin.

In 2013, Ms. Perry founded the Southern California Music Institute, a non-profit organization 501(c)(3), where she serves as the president. The institute’s mission is to provide an opportunity for all youth to receive a quality musical guidance. In conjunction with the institute, she founded the John Perry Academy of Music International Piano Festival, which is a summer program that is carefully designed for exceptionally gifted young students. She was also a Founder and Director of the Honors Piano Performance Seminar at the Colburn School of Performing Arts in Los Angeles, where she taught private piano lessons, two piano/four hand ensemble, and piano chamber music. Currently, she focuses on guiding exceptionally gifted young pianists at her private studio in Princeton, NJ.

In summer, Ms. Perry enjoys performing and teaching at summer festivals world wide such as Summer Music on the Shannon in Ireland, Academie Internationale de Courchevel in France, Vianden International Music Festival in Luxembourg, Amalfi Coast Music Festival in Italy, Duxbury Music Festival in Massachusetts, Hotchkiss School Summer Portal Piano Program in Connecticut, and John Perry Academy Summer festival in California. She is also frequently invited to give master classes as well as to judge piano competitions nationally and internationally. 

KYLE RITENAUER (www.kyleritenauer.com)

New York City-based conductor Kyle Ritenauer is a rising presence in the classical music world. Kyle is on faculty at the Manhattan School of Music as a member of the conducting staff, Director of Orchestras at the John J. Cali School of Music at Montclair State University, and regularly serves as Cover Conductor for the National Symphony Orchestra (Washington, DC) and the New York Philharmonic.

Kyle’s 2023-24 season is headlined by a production of Francis Poulenc’s Dialogue des Carmélites with the Cali Opera Program at Montclair State University, where he serves as principal conductor. Also at the Cali School Kyle will lead a full season of concerts including Tchaikovsky’s Symphony no, 5, Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite (1919), Mahler’s Symphony no. 4, Bernstein’s Westside Story, Ravel’s Bolero, and will host guest artist Eric Whitacre. At the Manhattan School of Music, Kyle’s season is highlighted by a program featuring Copland’s Appalachian Spring alongside Wynton Marsalis’s A Fiddler’s Tale. Close to Kyle’s heart are the four world premiere commissions that will come to life with the MSM Percussion Ensemble programmed alongside Alberto Ginastera’s epic work for dramatic soprano and percussion orchestra, Cantata para America Magica.

Kyle is currently entering his second year as principal conductor of the Cali Opera Program and Director of the Cali Orchestra at Montclair State University. In his first season, Kyle led productions of Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi and Michael Ching’s Buoso’s Ghost. In the world of opera, Kyle has worked as associate conductor with organizations such as Opera de Montreal with Orchestre Mertopolitain, and the Des Moines Metro Opera with the Des Moines Symphony. Kyle has also premiered several productions of new operas and is very much at home with contemporary opera.

Throughout his career, Kyle has appeared as guest conductor with the Elgin Symphony, the Norwalk Symphony, the Hudson Valley Philharmonic, Symphony New Hampshire, and Carnegie Hall’s Ensemble Connect. In the role of cover conductor, Ritenauer has worked with the National Symphony Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic, the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre Métropolitain (Montreal), American Composers Orchestra, the Utah Symphony, the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, and the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. 

Well versed in the world of ballet, Kyle, while serving as assistant conductor of the Juilliard Orchestra, stepped in on a moment's notice to lead the orchestra and dancers through a successful performance of Stravinsky’s Le sacre du printemps at Lincoln Center. He has also led productions of Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker as guest conductor with the Norwalk Symphony Orchestra on numerous occasions (2018, 2019, and 2021). In the world of contemporary ballet Kyle served as principal conductor for productions of Richard Danielpour’s Cassandra’s Curse (world premiere) and Aaron J. Kernis’s On Distant Shores with RIOULT Dance NY at New York City’s Joyce Theater.

Ritenauer has led orchestras in a myriad of genres, including collaborations with Broadway superstars Kelli O’Hara and Matthew Morrison, and giants of contemporary music such as John Adams, Claire Chase and Richard Danielpour. He was particularly honored to conduct a Juilliard School workshop of American Symphony by Jon Batiste, former bandleader of the Stephen Colbert Late Show. Kyle recently worked with The Knights (New York City) to workshop ATTENTION! in collaboration with mandolinist and composer Chris Thile.

Kyle is a passionate teaching artist and holds a particular fondness for bringing classical music to underserved communities. Through the Bridge Arts Ensemble, an ensemble which he founded in 2015, Ritenauer curated interactive, grade-specific concerts and workshops for 50,000 students across the Adirondack region of New York State on a yearly basis.

Kyle has had the honor and priviledge to assist conductors such as Gustavo Dudamel, Gianandrea Noseda, David Robertson, Stanislav Kochanovsky, Carlos Miguel Prieto, Gemma New, Jader Bignamini, John Adams, and Marin Alsop among others. Kyle served for many year as the assistant conductor of New York City’s Camerata Notturna, a group that supported Kyle through a large part of his development as a young conductor.

Kyle is a student of David Robertson and a graduate of The Juilliard School’s Orchestral Conducting Program where, upon graduation, he received the Charles Schiff Conducting Prize for outstanding achievement. He also attended the Aspen Conducting Academy as a student of Robert Spano, and spent nine summers at The Pierre Monteux School studying with Michael Jinbo.

Soyeon Park Yoo

Pianist Soyeon Park Yoo is a soloist, chamber musician and educator.  She has performed concertos with the Hope College Symphonette, Orchestra of St. Vincent and the Good Samaritan Symphony Orchestra.  She has also presented performances at Lincoln Center, Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, Northwestern University, Bradley University, Hope College,Gustavus Adolphus College, Montclair State University, Aspen Music Festival, and Las Vegas Music Festival.

Soyeon Yoo received her Bachelor of Music in Piano Performance from the Juilliard School and went on to receive a Master of Music in Piano Performance with emphasis on Piano Pedagogy from the Peabody Conservatory of Music.  At Northwestern, she received her Doctor of Music degree in Piano Performance.  With passion for teaching, Dr. Yoo taught private lessons in the Northwestern University Music Academy and undergraduate classes in the Northwestern University Bienen School of Music, Roosevelt University in Chicago College of Performing Arts and Hope College.  She joined the Montclair State University Cali School of Music as an adjunct professor in Keyboard Musicianship.  In addition, she is an active chamber musician and adjudicator in Chicago and New York Tri-State area.