Music Festival Summer Camp
Manhattan International Music Festival Summer Camp is popular with it’s professors for their outstanding teaching. We have invited renowned professors and musicians from the world’s top music schools: Manhattan Conservatory of Music, Curtis College of Music, Juilliard School of Music, Central Conservatory of Music in China, Shanghai Conservatory of Music, Sydney Conservatory, Indiana University Bloomington, Colburn School of Music, University of Maryland and Louisiana State University to teach and mentor students from all over the world.
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2026 will be the tenth time we’ve hosted this prestigious music event. Let’s look forward to reuniting in Shanghai and feeling the charm of music together.
Artistic Director/ Violin Professor
Mei Mei Wei has performed extensively throughout the United States, Europe, Australia and Asia as a soloist, chamber musician, and orchestra concertmaster. She appeared as soloist with many orchestras such as the Phoenix Symphony, the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra, the New York Chamber Orchestra, Shanghai Baroque Chamber Orchestra etc. She has played chamber music with world -class artists such as Shmuel Ashkenasi, Alexander Shtarkman, Kevork Mardirossian, Dennis Park and was invited to play chamber music with Vermeer Quartet at the summer music festival in Maine. Mei Mei Wei was a winner of the Artists International Violin Competition in New York, where she was invited to play solo recital at Carnegie Hall. Her performance was “highly praised” by the New York Concert Review. She has recently performed solo recitals and chamber music tours with her daughter Lily Wei Ye in Germany, Spain, Australia, China, South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Japan, and other countries as well. Mei Mei Wei held the positions of Associate Concertmaster of the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra, and First Violin Section of the Phoenix Symphony. Currently she is also Concertmaster/Artistic Director/Soloist of Four Seasons Chamber Orchestra in Washington DC. Mei Mei Wei earned her bachelor’s degree at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music, masters degree at the University of Southern California, and a doctor of musical arts degree at Louisiana State University. She was on the faculty of Louisiana State University, The Colburn School of Music, the Idyllwild Summer Music Festival in California, the Shanghai Conservatory of Music, and the Music School of East China Normal University. Her violin studies have been with Shu Zheng Tan, Shumel Ashkenasi, Kevork Mardirossian and Eduard Schmieder. After returning to China, where she resided from 2008-2020, she was invited to teach at the Shanghai Conservatory and China East Normal University. At the same time she was appointed as Music Director, Soloist, and Concertmaster of the Shanghai Baroque Chamber Orchestra. Over those 12 years, she successfully led the orchestra, playing at the most renowned concert halls in China, where she has gained popularity among Chinese audiences. Under her leadership, the orchestra has become one of the best chamber orchestras in China. In recognition of her achievements, she was selected as a “Specially Recruited Expert”, under the prestigious “Thousand People Plan”, sponsored by the Chinese government. As well, in celebration of its’ 75th Anniversary, the People’s Republic of China named Mei Mei Wei an “International Cultural Role Model”. Every summer she teaches at the Manhattan International Music Festival in Shanghai China where she is the Artistic Director and violin faculty member. She also teaches at the Montecito International Music Festival in California and Euro Music Festival & Academy in Poland. She gave violin master classes around the world such as Sydney Conservatory, Chugye University for the Art in Seoul and Louisiana State University etc. She currently resides in Rockville Maryland with her husband Philip Reynolds and her daughter Lily Wei Ye.
Violin/Viola Professor
Isaac Malkin received his training in Russia. His exceptional background derives from the rich tradition of the Russian violin school founded by Leopold Auer. This noble tradition encompasses technical perfection, beautiful tone, and passionate music-making. Jascha Heifetz, Nathan Milstein, and Misha Elman are among the outstanding performers whose virtuosity represents this heritage. Mr. Malkin has achieved recognition as a successful and highly sought-after violin teacher in Russia, Israel, and the United States. He has taught at the Israeli Conservatory in Tel Aviv, the University of California at San Diego, and the State University of New York at Purchase, among other schools. He has given numerous masterclasses in many different countries. Mr. Malkin’s students have become teachers, soloists, and members of chamber ensembles and orchestras. He has been highly praised by internationally known violinists and teachers such as Felix Andrievsky, Boris Belkin, Joseph Gingold, Henry Roth, Vladimir Spivakov, and Isaac Stern. He is also on the faculty of the Aaron Copland School of Music at Queens College, CUNY. Isaac Malkin is the author of a violin method that emphasizes ways of correcting specific technical problems. He founded the Academy of Strings at UCSD and is founding director of the Academy of Music Festival at Ramapo College, New Jersey.
Manhattan School of Music College faculty since 1989.
Manhattan School of Music Precollege faculty since 1988.
Assistant Artistic Director/ Violin Professor
Lily Wei Ye was born in Phoenix, Arizona. She is the daughter of Mei Mei Wei, a renowned violinist. She was introduced to the violin when she was six years old. In 2008, Lily moved to Shanghai and attended Concordia International School Shanghai, graduating in 2013. She participated in Concordia's APAC string festivals and became one of the soloists in her senior year.
Lily attended the Meadowmount School of Music in Westport, New York during the summers of 2012 to 2015. She won first prize in the Hong Kong International Youth Music Competition in 2015. In the same year, she placed second at the 19th International Violin Competition in Bari, Italy. In 2016, Lily attended the New York International Music Competition and Festival in Taiwan and received Gold.
Lily also attended the Aspen Music Festival in the summer of 2017 and studied with Cornelia Heard and Naoko Tanaka. She graduated with her Bachelor's Degree from the New School's Mannes College of Music. Lily recently received her Dual Master's Degree both in Classical Violin Performance and in Music Education at the Manhattan School of Music and Columbia University’s Teacher College respectively. She has played in the Lincoln Center and made her solo debut at Carnegie Hall in 2019. She has performed solo recitals at the UN Headquarters in NYC， The Shanghai Oriental Arts Center, and Shanghai Poly Grand Theatre since then. As a soloist, she also toured in Boston, New Orleans, North Carolina, and other cities in the U.S as well as South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Japan, and other countries in Asia. Early 2020, She was invited to play as a soloist with the New York Chamber Players Orchestra at the Cary Hall of DiMenna Center in Manhattan.
Currently, she is the Music Teacher of The Siena School in Maryland. Lily is also as Assistant Artistic-Director of the Manhattan International Music Festival
where she teaches and plays both solo and chamber music with world-class musicians.
Violin Professor
Born in Tel Aviv, Israel, Shmuel Ashkenasi attended the Musical Academy of Tel Aviv and gave his first public performance at the age of eight. After studying with Ilona Feher, he came to the United States to study with Efrem Zimbalist at the Curtis Institute of Music.
He won the Merriweather Post Competition, was a finalist in Belgium’s Queen Elisabeth Competition, and received second prize in the International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow. In 1969, he formed the famed Vermeer Quartet and remained its first violinist throughout the quartet’s 39-year career, gaining a reputation as one of the world’s outstanding chamber musicians.
Mr. Ashkenasi has toured the former Soviet Union twice and concertized extensively in Europe, Israel, the Far East, and the United States; and he has collaborated with Rudolf Serkin, Thomas Hampson, Murray Perahia, Peter Serkin, and Menahem Pressler. He has performed as soloist with many leading orchestras, including those of New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago, Los Angeles, Berlin, London, Moscow, and Tokyo.
Mr. Ashkenasi joined the faculty of the Curtis Institute of Music in 2007, and also teaches at Bard College.
Piano Professor
Alexander Shtarkman’s debut recitals in Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York City prompted strong words of praise from audiences and critics alike. Martin Bernheimer, Los Angeles Times, wrote “Alexander Shtarkman. Remember the name… He plays the piano with all the strength, flash, and eagerness that his age would suggest. He also plays with the sensitivity and mellow refinement one associates with certain grand old men of the keyboard, most of them Russian.” James Keller of The New Yorker staff wrote of Shtarkman’s 92nd Street Y appearance: “Shtarkman’s was a debut recital of importance. In fact, debuts just don’t come much better than this. Of the young pianists currently entering the international spotlight, Shtarkman is unquestionably among the most musicianly.”
Recital appearances in the United States include the Ambassador Foundation, Tilles Center for the Performing Arts, Tisch Center for the Performing Arts, Ravinia Festival’s Rising Stars Series, San Francisco Performances, Regional Arts Foundation at the Kravis Center, The Peace Center, and Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall. Orchestral appearances include the Dallas Symphony, Fort Worth Symphony, Fort Worth Chamber Orchestra, Chicago Sinfonietta at Orchestra Hall, Northwood Festival Orchestra, Marin Symphony, and the Chamber Orchestra of Albuquerque.
In August 1995, Shtarkman was awarded the First Prize of the Busoni International Piano Competition in Bolzano, Italy. As a result of this prize, he has been offered over sixty recitals and orchestral engagements in Europe within the next few seasons.
In addition to the Busoni Prize, Shtarkman is a major prize winner of the 1989 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition and the 1994 Tchaikovsky Piano Competition. He also won the First Prize of the First Taipei International Piano Competition and was engaged for numerous concerts throughout Asia.
Shtarkman performs and gives masterclasses in Europe, Asia, South and North Americas, and in Russia where he is a frequent guest performer at the prestigious Great and Small Halls of the Moscow Conservatory.
Since 2002 Shtarkman has been serving as a member of the Piano Faculty at the Peabody Conservatory.
Cello Professor
Cellist Darrett Adkins was born in Huron, S.D., and has made solo orchestral appearances with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s, Tokyo Philharmonic, New Hampshire Symphony, North Carolina Symphony, Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra, and Monadnock Festival Orchestra. He has also appeared in recitals in Tokyo, Yokohama, Oslo, and throughout the U.S. Adkins has been a member of a Flux string quartet, which specializes in cutting-edge music, and the Zephyr Trio and was a winner of the Bunkamura Orchard Hall Award and Presser Music Award. His recordings include chamber music on the Koch, CRI, Mode, Tzadic, RCA, and MMC labels.
Adkins has been on the visiting cello faculty at Baylor University since 2001 and is a former faculty member at Encore School for Strings. He holds a BM from Oberlin College, an MM from Rice University, and a DMA from Juilliard, and has studied with Joel Krosnick, Norman Fischer, and Cordelia Wikarski-Miedel. At Juilliard, he has been a member of the faculty in 2003, assistant faculty from 1999 to 2003, and has taught in Pre-College since 2002.
Cello Professor
Dennis Parker, Haymon Professor of Cello, has been on the faculty at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, La. for the past 32 years. Parker tours internationally as a soloist, recitalist, and educator. Recent seasons’ tours have taken him to, Korea, China, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, Mexico, Costa Rica, Romania, France, Italy, Brazil, and Ecuador, where he gave the premiere performance of Ecuadorian composer, Luis Humberto Salgado’s “Cello Concerto” (1975) in Guayaquil, Ecuador.
He received his training at Indiana University with Janos Starker and Yale University with cellist, Also Parisot. His early training was with Channing Robbins. He held the position of Principal Cello in Porto Alegre, Brazil (1982-84) and was a member of the Detroit Symphony (1986-88).
He is the author of “The Popper Manifesto”(2002), the only complete video recording and users-guide Instructional Manual to David Popper’s “High School of Cello Playing.” With more than 3,000 copies distributed worldwide, this is a widely used text on all continents. He has also released many CD recordings, as well as the world premiere of the Brazilian composer, Walter Burle Marx’s “Cello Concerto,”. His other recordings range from the crossover, and jazz-influenced music “Cello Matters” (music of David Baker, Liduino Pitombeira, Daniel Schnyder, Astor Piazzolla, to recordings of his own transcriptions for cello including Debussy’s “Sonata for Violin” Poulenc’s “Sonata for Flute” Enesco’s “Violin Sonata no.3.” He has premiered and recorded and published editions for his transcriptions to Mozart’s “Violin Concerto No.5” and “Sinfonia Concertante.” He has recorded for Centaur Records chamber music of composers Erwin Schullhoff, Gideon Klein, Hans Krasa, and Viktor Ullmann, all killed in the Holocaust. Another recording features the “Cello Sonata “and “Piano Trio” of Russian composer, Ivan Sokolov.
Parker is also a sculptor and woodworker, recycling humorous reconstructions from old, out-of-use musical instruments as well as other found objects. You can follow his work on Instagram @Dennisparkercelloetc and on YouTube.
Violin Professor at Shanghai Conservatory of Music
Viola Professor at Shanghai Conservatory of Music
Pianist & Violinist
Audrey Andrist, “a stunning pianist with incredible dexterity” (San Francisco Classical Voice), and James Stern, a violinist of “virtuosity and penetrating intelligence” (Washington Post) have been performing together for 37 years. The husband-and-wife team has played recitals across the U.S. and Canada, in Paris, in Munich, and throughout China. With clarinetist Nathan Williams, they formed the trio, Strata, also completing its third decade. With cellist Steve Honigberg they perform frequently as the Andrist-Stern-Honigberg Trio. Both well-known to Washington DC audiences, Andrist and Stern have appeared as part of the Smithsonian Chamber Players, VERGE ensemble, and 21st Century Consort, at such venues as the Library of Congress, National Gallery, Phillips Collection, and Smithsonian museums. Stern, a professor at University of Maryland, College Park, can be heard on an Albany Records release playing the complete Sonatas and Partitas by J.S. Bach. Andrist, an affiliate artist at University of Maryland, Baltimore County, has recorded major solo works by Robert Schumann for Centaur Records. A Canadian citizen, Andrist trained at the University of Regina with William Moore, himself a former student of Rosina Lhévinne and Cécile Genhart. She pursued graduate studies at Juilliard studying with Herbert Stessin. A busy soloist and chamber player, she has performed with the National Arts Centre Orchestra in Ottawa, and the Juilliard Orchestra in Alice Tully Hall. With the CBC Vancouver Orchestra, she and Maestro Mario Bernardi presented the world premiere of a piano concerto written especially for her by Canadian composer Andrew MacDonald. She is the first prize winner of the San Antonio International Competition, the Mozart International Competition, and the Juilliard Concerto Competition. She toured Canada performing extensively as the winner of the Eckhardt- Gramatté Competition, and has recorded for Summit Records, Albany Records, Capstone, CRI, New Dynamic Records, Innova, AUR, CBC Radio, and NPR’s Performance Today. Her recording, The Great Square of Pegasus (music by Andrew MacDonald with violinist Jasper Wood on the Centrediscs label) won the 2004 East Coast Music Award for Best Classical Album of the Year. Her 2011 disc Gumbo with clarinetist Rob Patterson won the Washington Area Music Award for Best Classical CD of the Year. A truly versatile and adventurous musician, Andrist has performed and recorded music for synthesizer, harmonium, and harpsichord, and has served as orchestral pianist in both Canada and New York. An ardent exponent of new music, she has over 75 world premieres to her credit, and has had many works composed for her and the ensembles with which she plays. She is the recipient of grants from the Canada Council and the Saskatchewan Arts Board, and has spent several summers as a Resident Artist at the Banff Center in Alberta. She is a member of the PostClassical Ensemble in Washington, DC and River Oaks Chamber Orchestra in Houston, Texas. Stern has performed at the Marlboro, Ravinia, Banff and Bowdoin festivals as well as at New York’s Alice Tully Hall and Carnegie Hall. He did all of his formal training at the Juilliard School where his teachers were Louise Behrend, Joseph Fuchs, and Lewis Kaplan. Strata, the trio that he and Andrist formed with clarinetist Nathan Williams, has received enthusiastic repeat engagements at San Francisco Composers Inc (for which they were listed as one of San Francisco Classical Voice’s “highlights of 2005”), the Piccolo Spoleto Festival and New York’s historic Maverick Concerts. Strata has recently commissioned new works from Kenneth Frazelle and the late Stephen Paulus, giving the world premieres at, respectively, the Secrest Artist Series in Winston Salem, North Carolina, and New York’s Merkin Concert Hall. In frequent appearances at the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center at the University of Maryland, Stern has brought innovative programming that includes performing in multiple capacities (as violist, pianist, conductor, reciter, and arranger), and providing program annotations that are integral to the performance. His numerous chamber music and new music recordings can be heard on Albany, Bridge, Centaur, CRI, Dorian/Sono Luminus, Enharmonic, New Focus, and New World. A passionately devoted teacher, Stern has served on the faculty of the Cleveland Institute of Music and the University of the Pacific Conservatory of Music. In summers he has performed and taught at the National Orchestral Institute, the Orfeo International Festival, the Schlern International Festival, ASTA International Workshops, California Summer Music, the Brian Lewis Young Artists Program, the Master Players Festival, and the Starling/Delay Violin Symposium at the Juilliard School.
Violin Professor
Chan Ho Yun is currently on the faculties of The Colburn School of Performing Arts, Westmont College and Claremont Graduate School and is the Executive Director/Founder of the Rainbow Music Academy, a non-profit organization bringing music to underprivileged children. He has been awarded the D.S.C.M. from Sydney Conservatorium of Music, M.M. from Southern Methodist University, and D.M.A. from the University of Southern California. His violin studies have been with Harry Curby, Alice Schoenfeld, Eduard Schmieder and Abram Shtern. Honored with the Big Brother Foundation Scholarship for studies in London and the Queen Elizabeth Silver Jubilee Music Award to study in the U.S., Dr. Yun performed chamber music concerts and conducted Master Classes at summer residencies at the Pan Pacific Music Festival, the Idyllwild Arts Summer Festival, Beverly Hills International Summer Music Festival, and the Bowdoin Summer Music Festival. Dr. Yun has performed extensively in solo and chamber music concerts, as well as being heard on radio broadcasts in Australia for ABC FM and 2MBS FM and in the U.S. for KUSC and K-Mozart. Dr. Yun has performed at major venues in Australia and the U.S. He has worked as a freelance musician playing with the Los Angeles Mozart Orchestra, Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra and the Pasadena Symphony. He is a former member of L.A. Musica Viva under the direction of Jim Tyler. Dr. Yun continues to collaborate regularly with prominent musicians in the Los Angeles area.
68 Xiupu Road, Pudong New Area, Shanghai
Name: Mei Mei Wei
Phone: +1 (332) 203-1297
Email: meimeiwei@yahoo.com
WeChat: meimeiwei3795
