Thomas Loewenheim is a modern renaissance man: a unique musician who enjoys an international career, combining cello performance, conducting, and teaching at the highest levels.  He has toured North America, Europe, the Middle East, and the Far East, performing with orchestras, giving recitals, and playing chamber music, and has been broadcast over the national radio networks in Austria, Canada, Israel, and the United States.

Loewenheim is currently Professor of Cello and Director of Orchestras at the California State University, Fresno, and the Music Director and conductor of the Youth Orchestras of Fresno.  Recently he received the Fresno State Provost's Award for Excellence in Teaching (2016), the California Music Educators Association John Swain College/University Educator Award (2015), the Ella Odorfer Educator of the Year Horizon Award from the Fresno Arts Council (2012), the Fresno State Provost's Award for Promising New Faculty (2011), and Special Recognition from the Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi for his service to the university and the community (2011).  Previously he taught at the Indiana University String Academy and the Memorial University of Newfoundland (MUN), and served as music director and conductor of the Musical Arts Youth Orchestra (MAYO) in south-central Indiana.

As a conductor, Loewenheim has earned a reputation for getting the most out of any orchestra, whether coming in for a single performance or festival week, as at the Hong Kong International School Choral and Orchestra Festival, or building an orchestra over a period of years, as at MUN or for MAYO.  He founded the iMAYO festival in Bloomington, Indiana, and was a co-founder of the international Tuckamore chamber music festival in St. John’s, Newfoundland.

Through his own performing, working with some of the great musicians of our day, and his cumulative experience as a teacher, Loewenheim has synthesized an approach to teaching and conducting which produces a technical confidence that rapidly enables music-making at a sophisticated level.  He is currently demonstrating this approach in his master classes around the world.

Loewenheim is also an active researcher, who has been rediscovering lost masterpieces, then performing and editing them.  He has been the dedicatee of a number of cello works, most unaccompanied.

Loewenheim earned a doctorate in cello performance from the renowned Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University, where he studied with Janos Starker and Tsuyoshi Tsutsumi, and was mentored in conducting by David Effron.  He received a master’s degree from the University of Michigan under Erling Blöndal Bengtsson and a bachelor’s degree from the Rubin Academy for Music and Dance in Jerusalem.  He also took part in master classes with Yo-Yo Ma, Mischa Maisky, Antonio Meneses, Arto Noras, Aldo Parisot, William Pleeth, and Menahem Pressler, among others.  He plays a Jean Baptiste Vuillaume cello, made in 1848.

Cynthia Stuart currently serves as Vice President of the CalASTA Fresno Section.  For years she has been in charge of organizing Fresno ASTA’s Chamber Music Workshop, held annually in the spring.  She maintains a home studio for students who usually range in age from six to eighteen and is currently meeting with all of these students on Face time and Skype—finding herself both frustrated with the limitations of remote teaching and grateful that something exists to keep her connected with her students.  She performs with the Fresno Philharmonic Orchestra as assistant principal second violin and serves as the chair of the Players’ Committee of Symphony Musicians of Fresno (representing the musicians of the FPO).    She also plays in the Fresno Community Chorus Orchestra as principle second violin.  She is a long-time member of the local chamber music ensemble, Moment Musical, playing both violin and viola, and performed for many seasons with the chamber group Orpheus, which this season ended the performing aspect of the organization with the passing of its founder, Jack Fortner.  She has also performed in various past opera orchestras in the area.  Cynthia also plays for weddings and other events with the local string group Philharmonia Strings.     

Lianna Elmore has established herself as a formidable performer and educator, harnessing her strong roots in the Fresno music community. Coming from a musical family, she began studying violin at age 5 with her mother, Cynthia Stuart and went on to study with her aunt, Claudia Shiuh. Through college Ms. Elmore worked under the mentorship of Jassen Todorov and Dr. Limor Toren-Immerman, and has participated in master classes with Guillaume Sutre, Corey Cerovsek, Vadim Gluzman, and Rachael Barton Pine, among other artists. She spent a year studying chamber music with the Alexander String Quartet at San Francisco State University and earned her B.A. and M.A. in violin performance at Fresno State where she acted as concertmaster of the orchestra and was a founding member of the Fresno State New Music Ensemble.

Throughout her education Ms. Elmore has earned various accolades, including first prize in the 2011 Hildred Minich competition, first prize in the 2012 ASTA Regional Solo competition, and second prize in the 2017 Bell T. Ritchie competition. In 2013 she was selected to be the featured soloist in the Orpheus concert series, “The Next Generation”, at the inaugural concert.

As a professional, Ms. Elmore has built a career in chamber music, orchestral music, and music education. She has been a principal violinist with the Fresno chamber music group, Moment Musical, since 2012 and in 2018 she founded The Tower Quartet, where she acts as first violinist. She is a member of the Fresno Philharmonic and co-associate concertmaster of the Sequoia Symphony. She has also expanded her experience to other musical genres, often performing with her eclectic gypsy rock band, Before Perils. Ms. Elmore has a growing private studio and acts as a string tech for Clovis East High School and Reyburn Intermediate.