Artists

Masterclass Artists and Performers

Nina Assimakopoulos

International Soloist, Flute Professor, West Virginia University

“In the hands of Nina Assimakopoulos, the flute is a kite, a nymph, a bolt of lightning.”- Rochester City Paper

Nina Assimakopoulos is credited with over 87 international world-premiere performances and commissions and has recorded 5 solo CDs, the most recent of which, Vayu (2015), was selected in to the first round of the Grammy nominations for Best Classical Solo Instrumental.

Assimakopoulos is active as an international soloist and masterclass presenter and is the recipient of numerous grants and awards, including the Aaron Copland Fund Grant for New Music Recording, two Fulbright Grants, and the National Society of Arts and Letters Career Award. As an orchestral musician, she has performed with the Munich City Opera, Bavarian Radio Symphony Academy Orchestra, Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, and Toledo Symphony Orchestra.

She is flute professor at West Virginia University where she has the privilege of working with a studio of wonderful undergraduate, masters, and doctoral students. She thanks her teachers Peter Lloyd and Paul Meisen as well as her students for their ongoing influence in her work as an artist and teacher. www.ninaassimakopoulos.info

Nicole Esposito

IFS Fall Flute Festival Performing Artist, Masterclass Presenter, and College Audition Panelist

A charismatic and versatile flutist, Nicole Esposito is the flute professor at the University of Iowa. She has achieved a career as a soloist, teacher, chamber and orchestral musician on an international level having been featured across the United States, Europe, Central and South America and Asia.

Esposito has held the Piccolo Fellowship at the Aspen Music Festival and has also been Principal Flute of the Ohio Light Opera. She has participated in a number of other music festivals including the Brevard Music Center, The Youth Orchestra of the Americas, and the National Orchestral Institute.

Professor Esposito holds degrees from Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Michigan. She has been a finalist or prizewinner in several prestigious competitions including the National Flute Association’s Young Artist, Piccolo Artist, and Orchestral Competitions, the WAMSO Competition sponsored by the Minnesota Orchestra, and the Houston Symphony Ima Hogg Competition. Additionally she has published articles on Banddirector.com, The Flutist Quarterly, Flute Focus and Flute Talk Magazines and can be heard on the Albany Records, MSR Classics and Con Brio Recordings labels. Her primary flute teachers include Jeanne Baxtresser, Amy Porter, Marianne Gedigian, Jennifer Steele, and Catherine Payne, with additional study with Mark Sparks, Alberto Almarza, and Doriot Anthony Dwyer.

Márk Fülep

IFS Performing Artist and Masterclass Presenter

Márk Fülep was born in Miskolc (Hungary) in 1977. He began learning the recorder with Doma Istvánné at the Egressy Béni Music School and then studied the flute with Cserfalviné Katalin Ferenczi. At the Béla Bartók Secondary School for Music in Miskolc he was a pupil of János Rácz and Tamás Siklósi. He passed the final examination in music with distinction and then studied with Henrik Pröhle at the Ferenc Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest, graduating with Summa Cum Laude in 2000. Master courses played an outstanding role during his studies: he attended about forty of them, several as a scholarship holder, given by the professors András Adorján, János Bálint, Benedek Csalog, Béla Drahos, Zoltán Gyöngyössy, Gergely Ittzés, István Matuz, Walter Auer, Mario Caroli, Michael – Martin Kofler, Alain Marion, Auréle Nicolet, Paula Robison, Yossi Arnheim etc.

His play and work have always won him professional appreciation: he was awarded the Hungarian Artisjus-Prize twice (1998, 2008), received the Annie Fischer scholarship three times (2004, 2005, 2006) and the László Lajtha-Prize once (2008). He won both the first and the special prize in Timisoara (2002) and got into the second run at the Budapest competition (2003). He was a member of the presidium of the Hungarian Flute Society in 2004.

Apart from performing the entire classical flute repertoire, he puts great emphasis on fostering Hungarian folk music tradition. Mr Fülep explores the potentials of his instrument in various musical styles: he is interested in Baroque ornamentation technique, modern blowing manners, improvised cadences and folk instruments alike. At his concerts he often plays different flutes and was the first in Hungary to give an alto recorder recital. He uses the circular breathing technique. Openness to contemporary music has always been his concern that is born out by several works composed to him. He works together with the Ensembles EAR and Marcato, gives concerts in Hungary and abroad and his play has been repeatedly recorded by the Hungarian Radio and Television. His inclination to experimentation and careful making of programmes has resulted in several exciting concerts. Márk Fülep has taught on secondary and university level and at the Crescendo Summer Academy of Arts in Sárospatak. Since 2000 he has been a teacher at the Leopold Mozart Music School of Budaörs and the founder of a flute ensemble there. Besides, he deals with instrumentations and arrangements, occasional publication and conducting a youth musical.

Since 2008 Márk Fülep has played on a Yamaha 14k gold flute of the Hungarian State.

Clinicians

Dan Parasky

IFS Fall Flute Festival Flute Choir Director, Music Entrepreneurship Clinician, and College Audition Panelist

Dan Parasky is a graduate with music degrees from Boston and Duquesne Universities. His private flute students have successfully auditioned for various honor ensembles, soloist competitions and workshops at the local, regional, national and international level. Mr. Parasky is on the faculty of both the Newlonsburg Music Academy and the P.Y.C.O. School of Music. He was the Temporary Instructor of Applied Flute at Slippery Rock University for the first half of the 2019 Spring Term.

Dan was the guest conductor of both the 2019 and 2014 Mid-Atlantic High School Flute Choir and he is finishing out his five year term as the Coordinator for the National Flute Association National High School Flute Choir in August 2019. He performs regularly as a founding member of the PM Woodwind Project - a flute and clarinet duo.

Cassandra Eisenreich

IFS Fall Flute Festival Eurhythmics Clinician and College Audition Panelist

Dr. Cassandra Eisenreich is Assistant Professor of Flute and Music Education at Slippery Rock University. She is the principal flutist with the Butler Symphony Orchestra, the chair of the NFA Pedagogy Committee, and a Trevor James Alto Flute Artist. She has had the opportunity to perform and record with top artists including Josh Groban, Idina Menzel, George Benson, Michael Feinstein, Dave Grusin, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Mark O’Connor, Terence Blanchard, Jon Secada, Patti Austin, Arturo Sandoval, Nestor Torres, Sammy Figueroa, Pharrell Williams, and groups including Evanescence, Take 6, and Tiempo Libre. She has performed and presented locally and internationally and regularly works with composers to premiere new pieces for solo flute and mixed chamber music. She serves as the director and lead teacher for the Early Childhood Music Community Engagement Initiative in collaboration with the Butler County Children's Center and SGA Preschool. Eisenreich partners with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra to provide meaningful musical experiences for children by directing the Discovery Time Adventures Eurhythmics room as a part of the PSO Fiddlesticks Concert Series. She has extensive training and teaching experience in Dalcroze Eurhythmics, Orff Schulwerk, Suzuki Flute, Conversational Solfege, World Music Drumming, Kindermusik, and Modern Band. www.CassandraEisenreich.com