Cello Archives - House Call Music - Bringing Music To You

Matt Wolf

Kevin — Wed, 06 Dec 2023 15:33:58 +0000

Matt Wolf is a classically trained cellist who collaborates and performs in all genres of music as a soloist and with ensembles. Some of the ensembles include a cultural ambassador orchestra that toured China, the Taro Trio which performed all over Chicago at cultural centers connecting classical and world music, and the Surabhi Ensemble, a world fusion music and dance collective. Matt is currently a performing artist with the Healing Arts Program at the University of Chicago Hospital where he provides guests/patients solace through musical performances. He is also an active member of the musical theater pit orchestra scene in and around Chicago.

Growing up Matt had the opportunity to learn and perform in the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra under Maestro Allen Tinkham while also working with Chicago Symphony Orchestra musicians. This early experience of finding the joy in learning music inspired Matt to continue passing on to other aspiring musicians what he had learned during his years with CYSO. Matt has taught all ages and levels of cello and piano. He finds it a true joy helping students identify goals and guiding them to find their most authentic musical voice and style.

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Hannah Novak

Kevin — Tue, 07 Nov 2023 22:00:36 +0000

Hannah began studying piano at an early age, but she soon switched her focus to the double bass. Upon finishing high school Hannah went to earn a Bachelor of Music degree at the Wheaton College Conservatory of Music where she studied with Lyric Opera bassist Andrew Anderson. During her time at Wheaton, Hannah performed the Koussevitzky double bass concerto with both the Brevard Music Center Orchestra and the Wheaton College Symphony Orchestra. After earning her undergraduate degree in double bass performance, Hannah was accepted to Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music to pursue a master’s degree where she studied with both Paul Ellison and Tim Pitts. After completing her master’s degree at the Shepherd School Hannah decided she didn’t have enough degrees, so she enrolled in DePaul University’s Graduate Performance Certificate program where she currently studies with Chicago Symphony Orchestra Principal double bassist Alexander Hanna. Over the past year Hannah has played as a regular member of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago bass section and as a substitute with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra

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Gita Srinivasan

Kevin — Wed, 06 Sep 2023 15:48:30 +0000

Gita Srinivasan is a native of Maysville, Kentucky and teaches cello, piano and violin with House Call Music. Gita began her cello career at the age of 11 under the tutelage of Coralie Runyon Jones and Dr. Suanne Blair. Today, Gita is pursuing a post- master’s certificate of performance at DePaul University under the tutelage of Stephen Balderston.
In the spring of 2023, Gita graduated from the master’s program at Illinois State University (ISU), where she thrived in the studio of Dr. Cora Swenson Lee. Gita was an ISU Graduate Merit Fellow who served for two years as the principal cellist of the ISU Symphony Orchestra; she cherished teaching in ISU’s chapter of String Project, as well as privately teaching through both String Project and ISU’s Community School for the Arts.
Gita previously studied under the tutelage of Dr. Amy Gillingham Culligan in the undergraduate music program at Northern Kentucky University (NKU), from which Gita graduated in 2021. She gave her solo debut in 2019 with the NKU Philharmonic Orchestra as a winner of the Fall 2018 NKU Concerto Competition. Gita discovered her passion for music instruction in her time at NKU—for three years, she privately taught cello students of all ages through NKU Music Preparatory. She was additionally a proud member of the NKU String Project teaching assistant team from 2019 to 2021. As a teaching assistant for NKU Early Childhood Programs, Gita also had the opportunity to teach children ages 2-6 music and dance from 2019 through the onset of the global pandemic.
Gita served as a 2019-20 fellow of the concert:nova “Next:Gen” program, designed by members of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra; as a fellow, she grew from a year of mentorship, workshops, and opportunities for creatively engaging performance. She has also received the competitive 3 Arts Scholarship for Cincinnati-area female musicians. Gita toured Europe with the Kentucky Ambassadors of Music in 2012 and toured Ireland in 2018 with the NKU Philharmonic Orchestra. She previously studied mechanical engineering at the University of California, Berkeley; her academic journey away from music ultimately led her back to her cello.

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Jesse Calcat

Kevin — Tue, 01 Feb 2022 22:29:25 +0000

Detroit native Jesse Calcat is a versatile multi-instrumentalist with over 20 years of professional teaching and performance experience across diverse musical settings. Having begun piano lessons at age 4 and strings in high school, Jesse began his college music studies focusing on both piano and viola performance. During his undergraduate studies, he studied viola with Glenn Mellow and Elizabeth Rowin, and piano with Leszek Bartkiewicz, Flavio Varani, and Mary Siciliano, graduating from Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan in 2005. While at Oakland University, he was a finalist on both viola and piano for the Oakland University Concerto Competition, and was awarded the MaTilDa Award for Chamber Music in 2005. Jesse went on to earn a Post-Graduate Certificate in Orchestral Studies (Viola) from Wayne State University in Detroit; he studied viola with Detroit Symphony Orchestra members James VanValkenburg and Caroline Coade, and received coachings from DSO members Hai-Xin Wu, Marian Tanau, Marcy Chanteaux, and Larry Hutchinson. While at WSU, Jesse was chosen as a Viola Mentor for the Detroit Symphony Civic Orchestra. Further graduate studies in viola continued when Jesse was awarded a full scholarship to the University of Florida for viola performance, where he was the violist in multiple graduate chamber ensembles, and studied with Jacksonville Symphony violist Colin Kiely. After his time at UF, Jesse gave in to an ever-growing calling to the cello, an instrument he had studied sporadically on the side since his teenage years. After significant preparation under the tutelage of Michigan Opera Theatre principal cellist, Nadine Deleury, Jesse was accepted to Bowling Green State University (Ohio) in 2013 on full scholarship, where he was also the cellist for the BGSU Graduate String Quartet. Studying with Alan Smith, he earned his Master’s of Music in Cello Performance in 2015.

A proponent of early music and historically-informed performance, Jesse studied viola da gamba and baroque cello with Enid Sutherland in Ann Arbor, and was the recipient of a private scholarship to the Oberlin Conservatory of Music’s Baroque Performance Institute, where he studied viola da gamba with Catharina Meints, and baroque viola with Jane Starkman. During his time at BGSU, he played both baroque cello and viola da gamba in the school’s Early Music Ensemble, and was a featured soloist performing the Porpora Cello Concerto in G Major.

Jesse’s performance credits are numerous, having performed in well over two dozen orchestras throughout the Midwest and Southern United States. He has performed in orchestral first violin, second violin, viola, and cello sections, having functioned as a section player, assistant principal, and principal. As a pianist, Jesse is a versatile and in-demand piano accompanist, having begun professionally accompanying instrumentalists, vocalists, choirs, and ensembles, while still a high school student. He currently is the piano accompanist for Suzuki Music School of Lincoln Park.

Jesse has studied and performed many types of music outside of Western classical music, and had strongly considered a career as an ethnomusicologist. As a teenager, he fell in love with traditional East Asian music, having taught himself the Chinese erhu and guzheng, initially using instruments he built himself. As an undergraduate, he played steel drums, as well as West and Central African traditional music under the tutelage of Mark Stone at Oakland University, and was a member of Bowling Green State Univeristy’s Kusuma Sari Balinese gamelan. Jesse has also been passionate about traditional Celtic music since childhood; he has performed on guitar, fiddle, viola, Celtic harp, guitar, vocals, and accordion in two Celtic bands, one of which he founded.

As a teacher, Jesse has been actively teaching private piano, violin, viola, and cello lessons since 2002, having taught both from his home, as well as in various music studios. He has taught students from the ages of 4 to 74, and focuses on using a custom-tailored approach to each student, based on their strengths, goals, musical and personal backgrounds.

Jesse works during the week as a manager at a downtown Chicago violin shop, and as a church organist and music director on the weekends. He is also a student at the Chicago School of Violin Making, studying the making and repair of violins, violas, and cellos. He is set to graduate the school’s three-year program in 2024. “

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