Meadowmount School of Music announces inaugural Gingold Chamber Fellows

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The Meadowmount School of Music has launched the Gingold Chamber Fellows initiative, to honour its long-time faculty member and violinist Josef Gingold.

The programme will support three exceptional students each summer through residencies at Meadowmount, providing expanded opportunities for advanced chamber music study, rehearsal and performance.

The 2026 fellows are violinist Sean Shao-Che Hsi, violist Kay Ito and cellist Noam Ginsparg.

The fellows will engage in intensive chamber music preparation and performance, as well as side-by-side performances with faculty, mentors and guest artists. Fellows will also serve in a mentoring role for some of Meadowmount’s youngest artists.

’Josef Gingold embodied the highest ideals of musicianship, mentorship, and generosity,’ commented Meadowmount’s artistic director, Janet Sung. ’This initiative honours his extraordinary legacy by investing in young artists who are eager to grow both individually and collaboratively through chamber music.’

Taiwan-born violinist Sean Shao-Che Hsi won second prize at the 2025 Odesa International Violin Competition and was a semi-finalist at both the Wieniawski International Violin Competition for Young Violinists and the Tchaikovsky International Competition for Young Musicians.

He holds a bachelor of music from the Juilliard School under Masao Kawasaki and recently completed his master of music degree at DePaul University, currently pursuing a performance certificate there with I-Hao Lee.

Kay Ito is a 19-year-old violist from Chicago. She started her musical journey on the violin and switched to the viola at the age of 15 and studied under Rose Armbrust Griffin. She studied under Ayane Kozasa and Caroline Coade at the Meadowmount School of Music, which she has attended from 2023-2025.

She is currently a second-year undergraduate student at the Curtis Institute of Music as the Grace Sherman Fellow, studying under Misha Amory and Hsin-Yun Huang. She also studies chamber music under members of the Dover Quartet. 

21-year-old cellist Noam Ginsparg is a student of Hans Jorgen Jesnsen at Bienen School of music and a Computer Science student at Weinberg College, Northwestern University. He is an alumnus of the Perlman Music Program, Meadowmount Music School, Kinhaven and Greenwood Junior programmes, as well as Bowdoin and Sewanee Summer Music Festivals.

He is a 2020 and 2022 YoungArts Winner, the 2025 winner of the American Opera Society of Chicago Award, and the second prize-winner of the 2025 Klein Competition.