Gabriel Bolkosky is the executive director and
a founding member of The Phoenix Ensemble, a
nonprofit arts organization based in Ann Arbor and
dedicated to helping artists and the
educational community. His debut solo album featuring
both jazz and classical music, This and
That, was released in 2005.

Other recordings include explorations of klezmer with
the recent recording Into the Freylakh:
The Shape of Klez to Come, and of children’s folk
music with The Orchestra Is Here to Play, a
collaboration between The Phoenix Ensemble and the
children’s-music group Gemini, as well as
of nuevo tango with The Oblivion Project and new music
with his former group Non Sequitur.

He has been a guest artist, performer, and teacher at
schools and workshops throughout the
United States. He has also taught workshops on
improvisation and composition to nearly 5000
students in Aspen, Colorado, and at the Walden School
in New Hampshire. He has also served
as assistant director for Strings Attached, an
intensive string program for children in inner-city
Cleveland, and as assistant to Donald Weilerstein at
the Cleveland Institute of Music.

In Ann Arbor, Bolkosky directs one of The Phoenix
Ensemble’s signature events, an annual
amateur chamber-music festival held in May, and
maintains a private violin studio. For more
information see www.gabrielbolkosky.com.


Alicia Doudna is a native of Charleston,
Illinois.  She holds degrees both from the Cleveland
Institute of Music and the New England  Conservatory.
Her teachers have included John
Kendall, Mimi Zweig, David Updegraff, and Lucy
Stoltzman, and she has played in master
classes for artists such as Dorothy Delay and Ida
Kavafian.

She has studied chamber music with Itzhak Perlman, the
Cavani Quartet, and members of the
Juilliard  and Cleveland quartets.  An avid chamber
musician, she has performed throughout the
country at Kneisel Hall, the Yellow Barn Music School
and Festival, and the Perlman Music
Program, and with such artists as Cleveland Quartet
cellist Paul Katz and Juilliard Quartet
violinist Ronald Copes. She has also performed with
the Radius Ensemble of Boston and the
Suedama Ensemble of New York.

As a teacher, Alicia was the music director and
principal violin instructor of the Peninsula Strings
Program in Blue Hill, Maine, and  serves as the
assistant to Merry Peckham, Cavani Quartet
cellist and director of chamber music of the Perlman
Music Program in Shelter Island, New York.

She currently resides in Ann Arbor, Michigan, where
she works with The Phoenix Ensemble and
teaches privately.  





































Violist Rebecca Albers  has performed in seven
countries on three continents and has
appeared on national television in the United States
and China. As the 2002-03 winner of the
Juilliard School's Viola Competition, Rebecca made her
New York debut with the Juilliard
Orchestra performing the New York premiere of Samuel
Adler's Viola Concerto in Alice Tully
Hall at Lincoln Center. In the summer of 2004, she was
a winner of the Music Academy of the
West's Concerto Competition. There she performed
Alfred Schnittke's Viola Concerto with the
Music Academy's Festival Orchestra with Gerard
Schwartz conducting.

A native of Longmont, Colorado, Rebecca has won
numerous Colorado competitions and
awards including the Denver Young Artists Orchestra
Concerto Competition, the Boulder
Youth Symphony Concerto Competition, and the Longmont
Symphony Young Artists
Competition. In 2001 she was the western regional
winner of the National Federation of Music
Club's Wendell Irish Viola Award and in 2005 she was
awarded the Wayne Crouse Memorial
Award in viola performance at the Corpus Christi
International Competition for Piano and
Strings.

Rebecca has been a participant at the Marlboro Music
Festival, the International Musicians
Seminar and Open Chamber Music at Prussia Cove, Music
Academy of the West, the Taos
School of Music, the Sarasota Music Festival, ENCORE
School for Strings, and the Perlman
Music Program (PMP) including its residencies in
Sarasota, FL, and Shanghai, China. An
experienced chamber musician, she has performed
throughout the United States, France and
Switzerland, including performances with such artists
as Richard Goode, Yo-Yo Ma, Itzhak
Perlman, and members of the Guarneri, Juilliard and
St. Lawrence String Quartets. Rebecca is
a graduate student and teaching assistant of Heidi
Castleman and Hsin-Yun Huang at the
Juilliard School. Past teachers include James Maurer
and Ellie Albers LeRoux.
Cellist Mary Ann Ramos has appeared as soloist with
several orchestras, including the Gateway Festival
Orchestra, the University City Symphony, the Alton
Symphony, and the Kirkwood Symphony.  She holds
prizes in various competitions, among them the
Mexican National Cello Competition and the Music
Teachers National Association.  She has also
performed in a number of master classes given by
such artists as Truls Mork and Janos Starker.

Ms. Ramos has performed at festivals nationally
and internationally, including SummerMusic
Chamber Music Festivel (Iowa), Kneisel Hall
(Maine), Festival du Chambre du Larzac (France), and
Festival Artistico Coahuila (Mexico).  As a chamber
music coach, she has taught at festivals such as
PhoenixPhest!, Innsbrook Institute, Rocky Mountain
Summer Conservatory, and the Kneisel Hall Young
Musicians Program.

Mary Ann has also been involved in the Sphinx
organization for a number of years, as a
semi-finalist, as a member of the Sphinx Symphony,
and most recently in the Sphinx Laureates Concert at
Carnegie Hall.  

She completed her Bachelor's degree at the New
England Conservatory as a student of Laurence
Lesser, and her Master's degree at the Cleveland
Institute of Music, as a student of Richard Aaron.  
Ms. Ramos is currently working on a Doctorate at the
University of Michigan, studying with Anthony Elliott.