Based in Sofia, Bulgaria since 1992, American cellist Geoffrey Dean has emerged as one of that country's most sought-after instrumentalists. He has performed at many prestigious European music centers, including the Opera Bastille, Gasteig, Sibelius Academy, and Enescu Filharmonica, and as soloist with leading Bulgarian orchestras such as the Philharmonics of Sofia, Plovdiv, Pazardjik, Shumen, and Vidin. In 1997 he joined the world-renowned Dimov Quartet, and has also performed with the Ardenza Trio, the Sofia Quartet, and the Sofia Philharmonic Orchestra.

Mr. Dean is a graduate of the North Carolina School of the Arts and the Indiana University School of Music, where he studied with Robert Marsh and Tsuyoshi Tsutsumi, respectively. His studies with a number of other cellists, including David Kadarauch in San Francisco, CA and Brent Wissick in Chapel Hill, NC; William Pleeth in England and Channing Robbins in Maine; and more recently with Anatoli Krustev and Anssi Karttunen, have also had an important role in various stages of his cellistic development.

Mr. Dean is a founding music faculty member at the American University in Bulgaria and its Fine Arts Program Coordinator. He has presented demonstrations and masterclasses at universities in Greece, Turkey, and the United States, and has spent past summers as Dean of Students at the Killington Music Festival in Vermont, USA.

zora yo, cello

Ms. Yo holds a Master of Music degree in Cello Performance and Literature from Louisiana  State University and a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from National Kaohsiung Normal  University. Her primary mentors during her studies were Dennis Parker, Lee-Wen Dai, and Ya Wen Hsueh.

As a soloist, Ms. Yo has been selected to work closely with Gustav Rivinius and Tsuyoshi  Ysutsumi in their master classes. As a cellist with an enormous passion for chamber music, Ms.  Yo appeared as a chamber musician in several music festivals, such as the Kirishima  International Music Festival in Japan and the Sweden Aurora Chamber Music Festival (ACM) in  Sweden. As an orchestral musician, Ms. Yo has traveled with the Formosa Philharmonic, and  performed two concerts with the ensemble during a festival in France upon the invitation of Les  rencontres musicales de Chaon.

Ms. Yo has a love for teaching and promoting music in various ways. Since 2013, she has been a private instructor of cello and piano in Taiwan and the USA. She has served as a cello instructor in the Illinois String Academy (ISA) since 2021. Ms. Yo attended the Teachers Education Program during college and designed a curriculum which has been very successful in combining performance-based and teacher education courses. During a practicum within her Methods Course, she designed an innovative musical board game for a music class in National Feng-Shan Senior High School, where she received overwhelming responses from students. Currently, Ms. Yo is pursuing her Artist Diploma at the University of Illinois Urbana Champaign with Daniel McDonough of the Jupiter String Quartet.

Nina Gordon is Associate Professor of Cello and Chamber music at Illinois Wesleyan University and former Principal Cellist with the Illinois Symphony Orchestra.

Prior to coming to Illinois, Nina Gordon was Principal Cellist of the Kansas City Symphony and the Kansas City Chamber Orchestra, and taught Cello and Chamber Music at the University of Missouri, Kansas City. Her education includes the Moscow Conservatory (Russia), the University of Tel-Aviv (Israel), and the University of Kansas, Lawrence, where she received her DMA.  Among her teachers were Natalia Shakhovskaya (Russia), Michael Haran (Israel), George Ricci and Edward Laut (USA).

Nina Gordon is the Founder and Music Director of the annual IWU Summer Music Programs which include IWU Chamber Music Festival and IWU Cello Camp.  She is also a faculty member at the Ameropa Chamber Music Festival in Prague, Czech Republic, the International Chamber Music Festival ICMC in Positano, Italy, and the International Chamber Music Academy in Kyustendil, Bulgaria for young and talented musicians.

 ji yon shim anderson, cello

Awarded Doctor in Musical Arts at University of Illinois (Champaign-Urbana), the highest prize “Virtuosité” at “Haute Conservatoire de Musique de Genève” (Switzerland), and first prize in several competitions in Brazil, Dr. Shim-Anderson is passionate about how innovation and diversity can be applied to orchestral programs, chamber music, and cello performances. Being part of numerous chamber groups in Europe, Brazil, South Korea, and the United States has gifted her with a wealth of experience she loves to share. In 2021, her contemporary chamber music group “Hespérides das Américas”, helped produce a full-length documentary celebrating Brazilian female composer Kilza Setti. Dr. Shim-Anderson has taught cello and chamber music at Eastern Illinois University, in several Brazilian institutions and universities, and at various music camps. She has also performed as a soloist with orchestras and recorded chamber music projects featuring works by living composers.