Marina Piccinini
Founder and Director
Internationally renowned flutist Marina Piccinini brings a vibrant spirit and global perspective to all of her artistic and cultural endeavours. Raised in a multi-national, multi-lingual household, she draws upon this rich background to infuse her music with depth, vitality, and imagination. A 36th-generation Shaolin Fighting Monk, she embraces an ethos of self-discovery, discipline, joy, and boundless possibility.
Celebrated for expanding the flute repertoire, Piccinini’s programs are among the most wide-ranging of today’s leading artists. She has premiered concertos and solo works by Aaron Jay Kernis, John Harbison, Lukas Foss, Paquito D’Rivera, Marc-André Dalbavie, Kalevi Aho, Christopher Theofanidis, and Tebogo Monnakgotla, with a new concerto by Clarice Assad forthcoming.
Her extensive career includes solo appearances with the Boston, Vienna, Montreal, Tokyo, Toronto, and National Symphonies, and with the London, Rotterdam, and Hong Kong Philharmonics. She has performed at major venues such as the Salzburg Festival, Wigmore Hall, Vienna’s Konzerthaus, Avery Fisher Hall, and the Mostly Mozart Festival at Lincoln Center. She has collaborated with leading conductors including Seiji Ozawa, Kurt Masur, Pierre Boulez, and Esa-Pekka Salonen.
A devoted chamber musician, Piccinini performs with the Pacifica, Brentano, and Takács Quartets, pianists Mitsuko Uchida and Andreas Haefliger, and as a founding member of Tre Voci (flute, viola, harp). She is also a resident artist at the Marlboro Festival, one of the world’s foremost centers of chamber music collaboration. Her recordings appear on the Avie, Claves, and ECM labels.
In 2023, Piccinini co-founded the Zauberklang Festival in Uri, Switzerland, with Andreas Haefliger, where she also serves as Cultural Ambassador. She is the founder and director of the Marina Piccinini Institute (MPI) and was the first flutist to receive the Avery Fisher Career Grant. She serves on the faculty of the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University.
Katy Wherry
Etude of the Week, Daily Warm-Ups
A flutist whose passion for varying genres of music has provided her with opportunities to give performances and teach masterclasses around the world. She has performed with renowned artists such as Sir James Galway, LeVar Burton, Marina Piccinini, Christina Jennings, Brook Ferguson and others. Katy is a regular performer with the Colorado Symphony Orchestra and plays in many chamber groups in different styles including jazz, rock, pop and open improvisation. As a recording artist she has been featured on albums as a soloist, podcasts, video game soundtracks and more.
As founder of Etude of the Week - the popular online flute community with now over 7,500 members, Katy has found her purpose in empowering people with a passion for music to discover and pursue their individual musical paths. Her coaching program For the Love of Flute supports flutists in their pursuit of their love of the flute so that more people feel encouraged to share their passion with the world.
Hannah Tassler
Staff
Hannah Tassler has performed with ensembles such as the Hawaii Symphony, Boulder Philharmonic, Colorado Symphony, and New World Symphony, and has worked with conductors and directors including Michael Tilson Thomas, Peter Sellars, Marin Alsop, Miguel Harth-Bedoya, and Stéphane Denève.
Hannah earned a Master of Music in Flute Performance from Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music, where she studied with Leone Buyse and Marianne Gedigian, and completed her Bachelor of Music from the Peabody Conservatory at Johns Hopkins University, studying with Marina Piccinini. Other teachers also include Brook Ferguson, Aaron Goldman, Erica Peel, and Laurie Sokoloff. Her achievements include the Azalia H. Thomas Prize, the Britton Johnson Award in Flute, and induction into the Pi Kappa Lambda Society. This summer Hannah will participate in the prestigious Marlboro Festival in Vermont.
Hui-Chuan Chen
Staff Pianist
A native of Taiwan, pianist Hui-Chuan Chen began piano lessons at age four and made her debut performance at six. She won numerous prizes at competitions including the Wonderlic piano competition in Baltimore, Concerto Competition of International Music Festival in Siena, Italy, Kaohsiung City Competition, Kawai Piano Competition, the University Piano Concerto Competition of NTNU, Taiwan.
Hui-Chuan holds a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the Peabody Conservatory of the Johns Hopkins University where she is also a faculty member in the preparatory division. She also serves on the faculty of the University of Maryland Baltimore City, Washington Conservatory of Music and the Heifetz International Music Festival in Virginia. Dr. Chen is the Studio Pianist for the Piccinini Flute studio.
Giorgio Consolati
Orchestral master class
Praised for his “lustrous tone” by Musical America, Italian flutist Giorgio Consolati has performed at venues such as Carnegie Hall, David Geffen Hall, the Kimmel Center, the Marlboro Music Festival, as well as in Italy, Germany, and China. Giorgio has won prizes in numerous competitions, including the 9th De Lorenzo International Flute Competition and the National Society of Arts and Letters Woodwind Competition. He is currently the principal flute of the York Symphony Orchestra and serves as Marina Piccinini's teaching assistant at the Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University, where he also teaches flute minors and chamber music. Giorgio earned the prestigious Artist Diploma at Peabody as a student of Marina Piccinini and studied with Carol Wincenc at The Juilliard School, where he was a proud recipient of a Kovner Fellowship.