Rebecca Lee has become a familiar face in the Colorado Springs classical music scene. She has been with the Colorado Springs Philharmonic (and Symphony before that) as principal second violin for 14 years and is a founding member of the Hausmusik quartet which this season marks its 14th year. She is an almost native Coloradan having grown up in Longmont, Colorado.

She headed east for school where she received her bachelor's degree from Northwestern University and studied further in Oberlin, Ohio. Her teachers included Myron Kartman, Stephen Clapp, and Harold Wippler. This season's performance of the Saint-Saëns' Violin Concerto marks Rebecca's fourth collaboration with the Chamber Orchestra of the Springs.

From Stepping Out Magazine: Leslie Smith moved to Colorado Springs in 1985 and, at the urging of then Music Director Charles Ansbacher, began performing with the Colorado Springs Symphony. In 1991, CSSO Music Director Christopher Wilkins appointed her permanent second flute for the orchestra.

Smith maintains a private teaching studio in Colorado Springs and, for 15 years, has a part of [the] flute/harp duo, Sound of Elegance with Joni Martin. She is married to Colorado Springs Philharmonic Music Director Lawrence Leighton Smith.

Carol Wilson is currently organist at First Christian Church in Colorado Springs, Colorado. She received her Bachelor of Music degree in organ and piano performance at Colorado State University in 1973. Her Master of Music degree, also in organ and piano perforamnce, was earned at the University of Kansas in 1989. She has served as church organist and given concerts in Texas, Colorado, Wyoming, Missouri and Kansas. While in Kansas, she taught organ and piano and was university organist at Ottawa University. In addition to playing at First Christian Church, Carol teaches piano and organ, accompanies in the community, manages a concert series on the church's new pipe organ and is an active performer on organ and piano. She is a member of the American Guild of Organists, both Pikes Peak and Front Range Music Teachers Associations (q.v.).

From a writeup at the Colorado State website: "Sara McDaniel, pianist, is known throughout the western region as a performer, teacher, clinician, and adjudicator. Her performance specialty is chamber music, and she works with both instrumentalists and vocalists. She collaborates regularly with musicians of the Colorado Springs' Philharmonic, the United States Air Force Band of the Rockies, and faculty of Colorado Springs' colleges. She has been a soloist with the Chamber Orchestra of the Springs and the Colorado Springs Community Orchestra.

She has given piano pedagogy workshops and master classes throughout Colorado and many other states. In 2002, she was a major presenter at the National Conference on Piano Pedagogy. Teaching comprises a major part of her career, both in an independent studio and on the facility at University of Colorado Colorado Springs and Pikes Peak Community College. In 2001, she was Colorado's first nominee for Music Teachers National Association's Teacher of the Year."

Founder of the Colorado Springs Conservatory, Bio coming!

A vocal studies instructor with the Colorado Springs Conservatory; Bio coming!

The Pikes Peak Ringers is an auditioned community handbell choir. The group was established in 1991 by its director Kevin McChesney to provide an outlet for advanced ringers and to create performances that showcase the instrument of handbells with the highest quality presentation and musicianship. The group has performed a variety of styles of music - classical, traditional, pop, jazz, new age, contemporary, and original - and have developed a unique and influential style of visual as well as musical presentation. In addition to performances throughout the Pikes Peak region, they have been the feature group at national handbell events, have been involved with publishers in providing promotional recordings of new releases, and have made a performance CD offering a wide variety of first-rate handbell music entitled "By Request." Information concerning the group, concerts, and ordering information for their recording is available at http://www.PikesPeakRingers.org.

Susan Grace has performed solo and chamber recitals, and has appeared as soloist with orchestras in the United States, Europe, the former Soviet Union, China and Korea. She has, in addition, performed in numerous series and festivals, including the Phillips Collection in Washington, D.C., the Grand Teton Festival, Music at Oxford, and the Helmsley Festival in England. In addition, Ms. Grace and her husband, Michael, have toured with a concert titled Piano Music and Painting; these programs, which include slides of the paintings upon which the piano compositions are based, have been presented on numerous series, including those at the University of Lüneburg, Florida International University, Bucknell University, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, South Dakota State University and the Loveland Civic Music Association. These programs have also been chosen for presentation at national meetings of the College Music Society and the American Musicological Society. As a collaborative artist, Ms. Grace has performed with cellist Janos Starker, violinists Martin Chalifour, Glenn Dicterow and Jose-Luis Garcia, clarinetist David Shrifrin, soprano Martile Rowland and many other internationally known musicians.

Ms. Grace is Artist-in-Residence and Lecturer in Music at Colorado College, and Music Director of the Colorado College Summer Music Festival. She is a member of Quattro Mani, a two-piano ensemble that recently completed critically acclaimed tours of Spain and Asia and has performed with orchestras in Fort Worth, Colorado Springs, Cheyenne, Wyoming, and Chico, California. Their first recording was released in October, 2000, by Klavier Music Productions and a second CD of George Crumb's two-piano compositions was released in April, 2001, by Bridge Records. Both recordings have received national and international critical acclaim. Quattro Mani made their New York debut in Carnegie Recital Hall in January, 2001 on the MidAmerica Productions Series. They returned for the 2001-2002 season and have been invited back for a third time in 2002-2003.

Prior positions include principal accompanist and coach for the Central City Opera, the Colorado Opera Festival and the National Affiliate Artist Program. Ms. Grace has recorded for the Belgium National Radio, WFMT in Chicago, the Society of Composers, Wilson Audio, Klavier International, Klavier Music Productions and Bridge Records. She studied at the University of Iowa with John Simms and with Benjamin Kaplan in London.

Guest artists who performed with the Chamber Orchestra of the Springs in the past can be referenced by the season during which they performed: 2003/4, 2002/3 and 2001/2.