Artists and Bios
Steven J. Lubiarz
Sandra Halleran
Greg Kostraba
Robert Garcia
Steven
J.
Lubiarz, Violin / Artistic Director
A native of Troy, Michigan,
Steven moved to Canada in 2003 to join the second violin section of the
Calgary
Philharmonic Orchestra
and the Bell'arte Strings. Prior to moving to Canada he was a member of
the New World Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Michael Tilson
Thomas in
Miami Beach, Florida. While completing his Master of Music in Violin
Performance and Orchestral Studies at Roosevelt University's Chicago
College of Performing Arts, Steven was a student of Cyrus Forough and
Joseph
Golan and was a member of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago.
Steven, who has been playing the violin since he was five years old,
has
performed in the Czech Republic, Austria, and throughout Japan. He
received a Bachelor of Music from DePauw University where he was a
student of
Stephen Boe and Dan Rizner. In addition to performing, Steven is the
Artistic Director of the St. Roch Chamber Music Festival in Caseville,
Michigan.
He has also been an active teacher for the past decade in New York,
Florida, Indiana, Michigan, Illinois and continues his love of teaching
today at
the Mount Royal College Conservatory in Calgary, Alberta, Canada.
Steven performs on an
1897 Leandro Bisiach, which was a gift from his first teacher, the late
Anne Dodge.
Originally from Rochester, New York, Sandra Halleran is an active freelance musician and cello teacher in the Rochester area. She is currently teaching traditional and Suzuki cello lessons and classes at both The Hochstein School of Music and The Kanack School of Music in Rochester, NY. She is also on the string faculty at Nazareth College. Ms. Halleran has previously held teaching positions at The Eastman School of Music, The University of Akron, and The Community Arts Program at the Coral Gables Congregational Church in Miami, FL.
Ms. Halleran has held principle cello positions with the New World Symphony in Miami Beach, FL (2002-2004), the Wheeling Symphony in West Virginia (2002) and the Spoleto Festival Orchestra in Charleston, SC(2002-2004). She has also performed with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra (2000-2002), the National Ballet of Canada (2003), the Rochester Broadway Theater League (2002), The Rochester Oratorio Society (2005) and the Greater Rochester Women’s Philharmonic (1993-present).
Ms. Halleran received her Master’s Degree from the Eastman School of Music in 2002, where she studied with Steve Doane, Rosemary Elliot, and Kathleen Murphy Kemp. She was also a student in the Orchestral Studies Diploma Program at Eastman. In addition to her master’s degree, Ms. Halleran holds a bachelor’s degree from Rice University, where she studied with Paul Katz and Desmond Hoebig. Ms. Halleran has studied additionally with Richard Weiss and Steven Geber of the Cleveland Orchestra, Carey Cheney of the Southwestern Ontario Suzuki Conference, Pamela Devenport of the University of Hartford Suzuki Program, Ingrid Bock of the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, and Carter Brey of the New York Philharmonic.
Ms. Halleran is also an active chamber musician. She has performed chamber music with musicians from the New World Symphony and also frequently in Rochester with The Ontario Ensemble and The Genesee String Quartet. While attending the Eastman School of Music, she was a chamber music assistant for the Ying Quartet, the quartet in residence at Eastman. She is also a former member of the Marini String Quartet in Akron, Ohio, and is the current director of the professional freelance ensemble, The Marini String Ensemble.
In her free time, Ms. Halleran enjoys walking on the canal path, reading, chatting with and traveling to visit her many friends around the country, and caring for her cat, Molly, her three goldfish (Pepe, Nina and Madeline) and her five unnamed tetras.
Greg Kostraba has successfully combined a career as a radio
professional and concert pianist. At the Fourth Van Cliburn
International Piano Competition for Outstanding Amateurs in June 2004,
Greg's performances were called “mesmerizing” (Fort
Worth
Star-Telegram) and “boldly hewn” (Dallas Morning
News), and
garnered him semifinalist status. His January 2006 performance of
Kaintuck’ by William Grant Still with the Toledo Symphony
Orchestra, Chelsea Tipton II conducting, was broadcast nationwide on
National Public Radio’s Performance Today.
As Classical Music Director and Senior Radio Host at WGTE Public Broadcasting in Toledo, Ohio, Greg is responsible for programming classical music. He is also the host of Afternoon Classics, Live from FM 91, and FM 91 In Concert. Prior to joining WGTE, Greg was the Program Director at KRPS in Pittsburg, Kansas. He also worked at WGUC in Cincinnati and WBAA at Purdue University.
Dr. Kostraba holds masters and doctoral degrees in piano performance from the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music and a degree in international relations from American University in Washington, D. C. He has studied piano and chamber music with Dorothy Bolognini, Alan Mandel, Richard Morris, Sandra Rivers, and the late Richard Fields, and participated in master classes with Eugene Istomin as well as members of the La Salle, Audubon, and Tokyo String Quartets. When he's not playing or listening to classical music, Greg enjoys big band music, especially recordings of his father, trumpeter Dan Terry. Most Tuesday nights, you can find him with his father at John’s Korner Bar and Grill in South Toledo, where he plays piano with the Rusty’s Jazz Cafe Orchestra. A Subdeacon at St. George Orthodox Cathedral in Rossford, Ohio, Greg enjoys spending time with his wife and two daughters.
When not playing his horn, Robert
Garcia is the Director of
Graduate Admissions at Columbia College Chicago, the largest private
arts and
communication college in the world. Prior to that he was the Director
of
Graduate Admissions and Financial Aid at Northwestern Univerity's
Medill School
of Journalism in
Although not a professional musician,
Robert continues to
perform regularly as a member of the Lakeside Pride Musical Ensembles -
a large
community music group based in
Robert, who is a native of El Paso, Texas, showed an interest in contemporary art and classical music at a very early age and was listening to the likes of Mozart and Beethoven - not to mention Stravinsky and Schoenberg - for as long as he can remember. His strong interest in “New Music" led him to seek-out student composers while in college and graduate school and encourage them to include parts for him in their music. The most notable of these collaborations was with the composer Chris Lastovicka, and can be found on the recording, "Fortune Has Turned," available at http://aharipress.com/fortune.html.