Yotam Haber
Yotam Haber was born in Holland and grew up in Israel, Nigeria, and Milwaukee. He is a recipient of a 2022 commission from Chamber Music America, the winner of the 2022 Third Annual Henri Lazarof International Commission Prize, the winner of the 2021 Benjamin Hadley Danks Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the 2020 Azrieli Music Prize, a 2017 Koussevitzky Commission for the Library of Congress, a 2013 Fromm Music Foundation commission, a 2013 NYFA award, the 2008 Rome Prize, and a 2005 John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship. In 2015, Haber's first monographic album of chamber music, Torus (Naxos), was hailed by New York's WQXR as "a snapshot of a soul influx – moving from life to the afterlife, from Israel to New Orleans - a composer looking for a sound and finding something powerful along the way."
Haber is Associate Professor of Composition at UMKC Conservatory, and Artistic Director Emeritus of MATA. He is a Fulbright Distinguished Senior Fellow in 2023-24 at the Jerusalem Academy. His music is published by RAI Trade.
Talea Ensemble
Recipients of the 2014 Chamber Music America/ASCAP Award for Adventurous Programming, Tales Ensemble has brought to life more than 30 commissions of major new works since it was founded in 2008. It has helped introduce NYC audiences to important works of such esteemed composers as Pierre Boulez, Georg Friedrich Haas, Beat Furrer, Pierluigi Billone, or Georges Aperghis. Recent festival engagements include performances at Lincoln Center Festival, lnternationales Musikinstitut Darmstadt, the Fromm Concerts at Harvard University, Warsaw Autumn Festival, Wien Modern, Chicago's Contempo series, Royaumont Voix Nouvelles, Vancouver New Music, and many others. Talea assumes an ongoing role in supporting a new generation of composers, and has undertaken residencies In music departments at Columbia, Harvard, Stanford, Cornell, New York University, and many others.
American Wild Ensemble
The American Wild Ensemble's Music in the American Wild Initiative began in 2016 with a performance tour of American national parks in honor of the National Park Service centennial. Since our initial tours performing in unconventional venues, from caves to mountaintops, American Wild Ensemble has continued to celebrate American places, historic figures, and events by commissioning new works and performing them in site-inspired and site-specific locations.
Taylor Ward
Bass-baritone John Taylor Ward performs regularly with the world's finest baroque musicians and ensembles. In 2016, he was featured in the US premiere of Claude Vivier's Kopernikus, directed by Peter Sellars at the Ojai Festival, and he began a series of recitals at Joe's Pub with Cantata Profana. In 2017 he made his debuts at the Salzburg, Berlin, and Luzerne Festpiele. Taylor holds a BM from the Eastman School of Music and an MMA from Yale School of Music; he is the founding Associate Artistic Director of the Lakes Area Music Festival, an Associate Artist of Heartbeat Opera, and an avid Sacred Harp singer.
Don-Paul Kahl
Saxophonist Don-Paul Kahl has performed throughout Europe, the United States, Australia, and Southeast Asia. An ardent supporter and advocate of contemporary and modem music, Don-Paul has been involved in the creation and performance of over 100 new works for saxophone by some of the most talented and award-winning young composers of our lime. He earned a Master of Music degree from the University of Florida and a Bachelor of Music degree from Susquehanna University. He is currently a doctoral candidate for the PhD in Artistic Research in collaboration with Leiden University (NL) and the Orpheus Institute (BE).