Meet Our Artists

Amellia Sie

Based in Chicago, violinist and violist Amelia Sie is a virtuosic and adventurous performer on both Baroque and modern instruments. As a historical performer, she has appeared on stage with Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, Les Arts Florissants, and Carmel Bach Festival, among others. Equally comfortable on the modern violin, Amelia made her first public appearance with the Seattle Festival Orchestra at the young age of 8 and has since performed as a soloist with orchestras including the Seattle Symphony and the Coeur D’Alene Symphony.

Along with Alyssa Campbell, Jimmy Drancsak, and Chelsea Bernstein, Amelia is a founding member of the Arrow Quartet, a historically informed ensemble that explores and performs music across genres with the goals of expanding the historical performance music canon and creating a more inclusive concert experience. Engagements include performances for the MidSummer Music Series in Nova Scotia, GEMS Midtown Concerts, Roger Williams University, and The Cambridge Society for Early Music.

Amelia is sought-after for her exuberant, fiery performances and diverse programming. Previous engagements include solo recitals with Gotham Early Music Scene, Early Music America, and The Bohemians: Musician’s Club of New York, as well as solo performances with the Albany Symphony and Juilliard415. This 2025-26 season, Amelia looks forward to performances with Ars Musica Chicago, Bach in the City, Handel and Haydn Society, and Smithsonian Academy Orchestra.

Amelia received her BM and MM in Violin Performance from New England Conservatory, where she studied with Paul Biss, Miriam Fried, and Soovin Kim. She graduated from the Juilliard School in 2023 with a MM in Historical Performance, where she studied with Cynthia Roberts, Elizabeth Blumenstock, and Rachel Podger. Amelia is honored to have been named a Mercury Chamber Orchestra Mercury-Juilliard Fellow for the 2023-24 concert year, as well as a Handel+Haydn Society Stone Fellow for the 2023-24 and 2024-25 concert years.

Amelia proudly performs on a Peter Westerlund modern violin and a Timothy Johnson baroque violin.

ameliasie.com

Photography: Denver Dizon

rachel smith

With equal passions for early and new music, Rachel is a freelance musician, a substitute teacher at Chicago Public Schools, an arts administrator and a full-time hustler based in Chicago and Rochester, NY. She appears regularly as a violist with the Camerata Chicago orchestra and as a baroque violinist with Martin David’s Bella Voce Sinfonia, and most recently she joined the Concert Opera of Greater Chicago for their first opera with a full orchestral ensemble. She is the director of her own early music band Ensemble Meliora, which is based in NYC and performed their debut project in June at the Boston Early Music Festival’s Fringe Concert Series. She holds a BM in viola performance and a Certificate of Achievement in Performance Practice from the Eastman School of Music, and is a recent alumn of the Tafelmusik Baroque Summer Institute in Toronto. She was a member of Eastman’s Musica Nova ensemble, where she worked with conductors Georgia Mills, Luke Poeppel, and Brad Lubman. She is also a member of the 2024 Bang on a Can Summer Festival fellowship cohort, and has worked with musicians and composers such as Nick Photinos, David Lang, Sahara von Hattenberger, Alexey Lugunov, and many more. Rachel enjoys performing both on violin and viola in many different styles, and loves the collaboration between colleagues for old music, new music, and everything in between!

Photography: Clara Smallwood

Melissa Trier Kirk

Melissa Trier Kirk is a member of the Chicago Lyric Opera Orchestra and the Santa Fe Opera Orchestra. She began her career as principal viola of the Fort Wayne Philharmonic, where she was featured as a frequent soloist and chamber musician, and she’s performed with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Haymarket Opera Orchestra, and Music of the Baroque.

As a chamber musician, Kirk has been heard on the International Music Foundation’s Rush Hour Concert series, WFMT’s Chamber Music series, The Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival and the San Miguel Chapel Chamber Music Series.

Her primary teachers were violists Robert Swan and Robert Vernon. Kirk holds a bachelor-of-music degree from Northwestern University.

For over 40 years, Kirk helped to plan and perform with the Bach Week Festival, predecessor to Bach in The City. She was a founding member of Chicago’s first period orchestra, The City Musick. She and husband, bassoonist, Lewis Kirk often volunteer for Sharing Notes, an organization whose purpose is to bring live music to patients in hospitals and rehabilitation centers.

Photography: Devon Cass

Ana kim

Indiana-native Ana Kim is recently appointed as Assistant Principal cellist at the Lyric Opera of Chicago. She also plays with various ensembles, including Philharmonia Baroque, Music of the Baroque, and Trinity Baroque Orchestras.

Ana had performed in festivals such as Midsummer’s Music, Oregon Bach, Yellow Barn, Verbier Academy, and Music@ Menlo. She has received a Doctorate degree at the University of Southern California and has studied Historical Performance at Juilliard. Her teachers include János Starker, Ralph Kirshbaum, and Laurence Lesser.

Ana has taught at Pacific Union College and the Browning School in New York. She has recently given masterclasses in Honolulu through the Hawaii Music Teachers Association and regularly gives classes at DePaul, Chicago, and Roosevelt Universities.

ian hallas

Ian Hallas joined the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in the summer of 2023 after auditioning for Music Director Emeritus for Life Riccardo Muti. He previously held principal positions in both the Lyric Opera of Chicago and the Santa Fe Opera. He holds a bachelor’s degree with distinction in research and creativity from Rice University and a master’s degree from the University of Southern California. His principal teachers include Paul Ellison and David Allen Moore.

Hallas has performed with many of the top orchestras around the country. He is an award-winning fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center, being recognized with TMC’s prestigious Maurice Schwartz Prize in 2013. He was an invited guest chamber musician at the Spoleto Festival USA, where he performed with the St. Lawrence Quartet and members of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. Other festivals he has attended include the Aspen Music Festival, Music Academy of the West, and Domaine Forget Summer Music Academy.

As an educator, Ian served on the faculty of Northwestern’s Bienen School of Music and maintains a private studio out of Evanston, where he lives with his family. He has previously taught at the National Music Festival and the National Orchestral Institute.

Photography: Todd Rosenberg

ryan berndt

Trumpeter Ryan Berndt is acclaimed for his artistry on both modern and baroque trumpet, praised by Gramophone Magazine as “versatile, superb, and committed.” He currently serves as Principal Trumpet of Chicago’s Haymarket Opera Company and performs regularly with Apollo’s Fire, bringing stylistic precision and expressive depth to historically informed performances.

Ryan’s career spans chamber music, orchestral playing, and studio recording. He spent eleven seasons with the Gaudete Brass Quintet, performing nationally and internationally, and has since become an active freelancer and recording artist. His trumpet playing is featured on Netflix and Amazon Prime, most notably in American Traitor: The Trial of Axis Sally starring Al Pacino. He has also collaborated with ensembles such as the Silk Road Ensemble with Yo-Yo Ma, Tempesta di Mare, the Zohn Collective, and the Baroque Performance Institute at Oberlin College.

As an educator, Ryan has presented masterclasses and performances at leading institutions, including the Juilliard School, Eastman School of Music, Colburn Conservatory, and the Manhattan School of Music. He has also taught at Roosevelt University, Interlochen Arts Camp, and the Merit School of Music in Chicago, where he is dedicated to mentoring the next generation of musicians.

Ryan is a recording artist with Cedille Records, a Schilke Artist, and an Ambassador for Denis Wick. His principal teachers include Mark Ridenour (Chicago Symphony Orchestra) and Dale White (St. John’s University). He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Trumpet Performance and Music Education from St. John’s University, a Master of Music in Performance and Literature from the University of Notre Dame, and an Artist Diploma in Orchestral Studies from Roosevelt University’s Chicago College of Performing Arts.

https://m.facebook.com/ryan.berndt/

Photography: Ryan Berndt

jason J. moy

Jason J. Moy is Artistic Director of Ars Musica Chicago, and one of the most sought-after early keyboard specialists in the Midwest. He serves as Artist-Faculty of Early Keyboard Instruments at Roosevelt University’s Chicago College of Performing Arts, and as Director of the Baroque Ensemble at DePaul University, where he was awarded the School of Music’s first-ever endowed chair as the Monsignor Kenneth J. Velo Distinguished Professor of Music. Jason received his Early Music training at McGill University and counts Hank Knox, Ketil Haugsand, Andrew Lawrence-King, and the late Bruce Haynes among his most influential mentors and teachers. He is a founding member of the award-winning baroque ensemble Trio Speranza, principal keyboardist of the Bach Week Festival Orchestra, and is a frequent guest soloist and continuo player with such esteemed ensembles as the Newberry Consort, Haymarket Opera Company, Grant Park Symphony Orchestra, Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, South Bend Symphony Orchestra, and Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra.

Jacob reed

Jacob is Lecturer in Harpsichord at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and Renate M. Thilenius Memorial Scholar in Piano and Organ at the University of Chicago’s Rockefeller Memorial Chapel, where he is a PhD student in Music History and Theory. He plays basso continuo on organ and harpsichord with ensembles including the Newberry Consort, Haymarket Opera, Bella Voce, and others across the Chicagoland area.

In 2023–24, Jacob performed Bach at Bond, a weekly series presenting the complete organ works of J.S. Bach following the liturgical calendar. The previous year, he performed the complete organ works of César Franck to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the composer’s birth. He is currently surveying the complete harpsichord works of J.S. Bach on his blog, Left On Reed.

As an undergraduate at Yale, he studied organ with Thomas Murray and harpsichord with Arthur Haas. He then graduated with an MM in organ performance from Yale’s School of Music/Institute of Sacred Music, where he studied with Martin Jean and served as Organ Scholar at Grace Church in New York City. He was the recipient of the ISM's 2018 Robert Baker Scholarship, and the YSM's 2019 Julia R. Sherman Memorial Prize for excellence in organ playing.

Jacob has served as artist-in-residence as organist and pianist at the Uncommon Music Festival in Sitka, Alaska and now serves on its board of directors. Jacob’s performance experience also extends to opera of all eras. In addition to playing harpsichord and organ continuo in Baroque opera productions across the U.S., Jacob has served as piano accompanist (lessons, classes, and recitals) for the Yale Opera Program, and performed in John Cage’s Europera 5 under director Yuval Sharon. He also accompanies a variety of instruments, singers, and ensembles on piano, and can be talked into picking up a cello or viola da gamba if you ask nicely.

jacobreedorgan.com

Photography: Jason Smith

richard webster

Richard Webster is Music Director of Chicago's  Bach in the City, a new endeavor at St. Vincent DePaul Church, and the successor to Bach Week Festival that he had directed for 50 years, based in Evanston. He is currently Lecturer in the Institute of Sacred Music (ISM) at Yale University, having retired in 2022 as Director of Music and Organist at Trinity Church, Copley Square, Boston. During  2023-24 he served as Interim Director of Music at St. Paul's Choir School, Harvard Square, Cambridge, Massachusetts. 

As a composer he completes several commissioned works a year. His hymn arrangements for brass, percussion, organ and congregation are heard across the world, including the CBC's Christmas and Easter broadcasts and BBC's "Songs of Praise." Richard's works are published by six different houses, including Advent Press, that publishes his music exclusively. 

While at Trinity, Boston, he cofounded the Trinity Choristers and led the choirs on five tours of England, with residencies at York Minster; Westminster Abbey; Durham, Ely, Lincoln, Chichester, Salisbury, Wells, Winchester and St. Paul’s Cathedrals. During his tenure, Trinity's 1926 Skinner nave organ was successfully renovated and a new 4-manual Skinner replica console added.

He is an honorary Fellow of the Royal School of Church Music (FRSCM), and holds the Doctor of Music degree, honoris causa, from the University of the South at Sewanee.

Webster has performed and recorded as organist with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. He is the Organist and Choirmaster Emeritus of St. Luke's Church in Evanston, where, from 1974 to 2003 he directed a widely respected choral program. The restoration of St. Luke's celebrated 1922 Ernest M. Skinner organ, Opus 327, was accomplished under his leadership.

A passionate runner, Richard has completed 47 marathons, including 21 Boston Marathons.