Violin Lessons With Dr. Sarah Pizzichemi

Dr. Sarah Pizzichemi has distinguished herself as a versatile artist with international performances as a soloist, chamber, and orchestral musician. Sarah’s touring in the United States and Canada have included performances at the Kennedy Center, the Aspen Music Festival, the Kitchener-Waterloo Chamber Music Society, Bass Concert Hall in Austin, Texas, and Benaroya Hall in Seattle Washington. Abroad, she has performed at the Casalmaggiore Music Festival in Casalmaggiore, Italy, Xi’an Jiaotong University in Xi’an, China, and Zhejiang University City College in Hangzhou, China. Recent collaborators in performance include world-class musicians such as the Miró Quartet, the Chiara String Quartet, and Marcy Stonikas.

Sarah is a founding member and 1st violinist of the Skyros Quartet. Skyros recently released Introspective Odyssey, the debut album for the quartet with Parma Recording’s Navona Label, to great acclaim. Gaplegate Classical-Modern Review exclaimed: “To hear all three of these works so well done is a rare treat. The Skyros Quartet makes more of the music than some others have done. They take to each piece with a ravishing, articulate, sonically appealing approach that has passion more than sentiment, fully coherent phrasing and a sort of introspective reading that is true to the album's title.” Sarah also serves as concertmaster of the Seattle Collaborative Orchestra, and was a member of the Lincoln Symphony Orchestra 1st violin section.

Making her solo violin debut with the Seattle Symphony in 2004, Sarah went on to receive a Bachelor of Music in Violin Performance from the University of Texas at Austin Sarah and Ernest Butler School of Music, and she continued her Master of Music in Chamber Music Performance at UT. Sarah earned her Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln as part of the graduate string quartet-in-residence. Her dissertation, Virtuoso Violinist Maud Powell: Enduring Champion for American Women in Professional Music, adds to research literature in the field of women in professional art music. Sarah’s main teachers and mentors include Brian Lewis, Sandy Yamamoto, Hyeyung Yoon, the Miró Quartet, the Chiara String Quartet, Sylvia Rosenberg, James Dunham, Earl Carlyss, Joan Tower, and the Penderecki, Muir, American, Takács, Pacifica, and Jupiter String Quartets.

A passionate educator and teaching artist, Sarah has maintained a private studio of violin students since 2001. She was on the teaching faculty as Instructor of Violin at Union College in Lincoln, Nebraska. Sarah worked as a Graduate Teaching Assistant in theory, chamber music, and outreach while at UNL. She taught for the UT String Project, and also for the Chamber Music in Public Schools program in Austin, Texas. Sarah received certification of training from the Suzuki Association of the Americas for Suzuki Violin and Viola, as well as Early Childhood Education. Sarah is an artistic director for ECCHO, Emerald City Chamber Music Organization, an in-school program for developing chamber musicians.