Global performers to play Schumann, Elgar at La Sierra

A quintet of professional musicians whose performance careers have taken them around the world will bring their talents to La Sierra University's stage on Oct. 29.

The Jung Trio, sisters Ellen on violin, Julie on cello, and Jennie on piano, will join violinist Jason Uyeyama, La Sierra University's director of string studies, and violist Paul Reynolds in a chamber concert at 7 p.m. at La Sierra's Hole Memorial Auditorium. Tickets are $5 seniors, $10 general admission and $20 for family admission. Children age 12 and under are free.

The quintet will perform Edward Elgar's “Piano Quintet in A Minor Op. 84,” and Robert Schumann's “Piano Quintet in E-Flat Major Op. 44.”

For additional information call 951-785-2036. La Sierra University is located at 4500 Riverwalk Parkway, Riverside.

After more than 20 years of countless practice and performance sessions, the Jung Trio is a tight ensemble of violin, cello and piano. The world-traveling sisters live in Claremont, Costa Mesa and Diamond Bar. They each began taking music lessons when they were five years old. Jennie and Ellen started on the piano, but Ellen later switched to the violin. When their mother discovered something called a 'piano trio,' she enrolled Julie in cello lessons, Jennie Jung said. “Ever since Julie could string a few notes together we were playing as a trio. We started with hymns and progressed until we played out first official trio when we were about 9, 11, and 13 years old.”

The sisters' parents emigrated from Korea to Toronto, Canada where the girls were born and raised. Their parents determined to give the sisters, and later their younger brother, musical opportunities that had been unavailable to them in their native country.

Early in their career the Jung Trio won a number of high profile music competition prizes. Individually they also paved their own musical paths, ultimately winning performance awards, soloing, teaching and collaborating with top symphonies, festivals and other groups.

Pianist Jennie Jung debuted with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra at age 11. As a pianist, she has performed with several symphonies including the Korean Philharmonic and the Republic of Tartarstan Symphony in Russia. She has performed collaboratively around North America, Asia and Europe, and served as staff at the Aspen Summer Music Festival in Colorado.<br/><br/>Cellist and chamber musician Julie Jung has soloed with the Korean Philharmonic, the Republic of Tartarstan Symphony and the Toronto Symphony and participated in numerous festivals. She has played with many groups including the NEC Chamber Orchestra which toured Germany, and has performed with iPalpiti at Carnegie Hall, the Walt Disney Concert Hall and the Kimmel Center.

Violinist Ellen Jung has performed frequently as a soloist, chamber, and orchestral musician all over the world. She has been featured with the Korean Philharmonic, Republic of Tatarstan Symphony, North York Symphony Orchestra, the Korean-Canadian Symphony Orchestra, and both the University of Toronto Symphony and Chamber orchestras. A frequent performer of new music, she performed the world premiere of the “Trio for Horn, Piano, and Violin” by Norwegian composer Trygve Madsen, while featured as an artist at the International Horn Summit in Banff, Alberta, Canada.

As a professional trio, the Jung sisters' early successes included top prizes at the Canadian Music Competition, Kiwanis Music Festival and the CIBC National Music Festival. They have appeared on many television and radio broadcasts and given recitals in Korea, Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia, Chicago and Toronto. Their key performances include a debut at Walt Disney Concert Hall, a recital tour of South Korea, an appearance with the Korean Symphony Orchestra in Los Angeles and a concert tour of Kenya and Mauritius as representatives of the Kumho Cultural Foundation. During this tour the trio served as the first musical group to perform at the United Nations in Nairobi. The Jung Trio completed the Artist Diploma program at Yale University. They released their first album in 2009 on Groove Note Records and serve as trio-in-residence at Vanguard University in Costa Mesa.

Uyeyama and violist Reynolds also possess lengthy resumes of international performance with some of the world's top orchestras and festivals.<br/><br/>Uyeyama, a graduate of the renowned Julliard School in New York City, is a regular performer with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. He has also played with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, the Metamorphosen Chamber Orchestra and with the Los Angeles Philharmonic on its Asian tour. In 2009 Uyeyama gave his solo debut at the Robert and Margrit Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts at the University of California, Davis.

He earned a master's degree from Julliard where he studied with Masao Kawasaki and Itzhak Perlman.

Uyeyama's music festival appearances include those at widely known festivals in Aspen, Colo., Taos, New Mexico, Tanglewood Music Center near Stockbridge, Mass., and Festival Mozaic in San Luis Obispo. He is also music director of Community Kids Connection-Music, a collaborative program with Loma Linda University that provides free music lessons for underprivileged children in San Bernardino.

Reynolds, a soloist, chamber and festival musician and music professor, is principal violist with the Burlington Chamber Orchestra and the Green Mountain Opera Festival in Vermont. He previously served as principal violist with the Sarasota Opera Company, the National Chamber Orchestra in Washington D.C. and the New World Symphony in Miami. His numerous solo appearances and group performances include those with the National Repertory Orchestra, New World Symphony, and Kennedy Center Opera. His teaching career involves faculty placements and master classes at several universities including George Washington University, West Texas A&M University, and Georgetown University.

PR Contact: Larry Becker

Executive Director of University Relations

La Sierra University

Riverside, California

951.785.2460 (voice)