The Las Vegas Chamber Music Institute (LVCMI) was created to explore such artistic dialogues through a nurturing and immersive environment where both faculty and guest artists work intimately with the selected duos and string ensembles. 

Schedule

Sunday, Dec. 15
Arrival and orientation, faculty and participants meet-and-greet, campus tour

Monday, Dec. 16
Violin and piano lessons, rehearsals, technique workshop, opening concert in the evening

Tuesday, Dec. 17
Violin and piano lessons, chamber coaching, rehearsals, guest artist masterclass, Faculty Showcase Concert

Wednesday, Dec. 18 
Violin and piano lessons, chamber coaching, half-day trip to the Red Rock

Thursday, Dec. 19
Violin and piano lessons, chamber coaching, rehearsals, guest artist masterclass, Participant Concert

Friday, Dec. 20
Violin and piano lessons, chamber coaching, rehearsals, guest artist lecture/masterclass, Participant Concert

Saturday, Dec. 21
Duo Sonata Competition, Guest artist masterclass, group photos, winners' concert and closing ceremony

Sunday, Dec. 22
Departure

Distinguished Artists and Faculty

Distinguished Artist, Almita Vamos 

Almita Vamos is a graduate of the Juilliard School where she studied with Mischa Mischakoff and Louis Persinger. Almita Vamos has won the Presidential Award for Excellence in Teaching six times, the ASTA Distinguished Teacher of the Year Award, and has been featured on “Sunday Morning” CBS and in the New York Times best-selling book, Battle Hymn of a Tiger Mom by Amy Chua.

Vamos has served on the violin faculty of the Western Illinois University, University of Minnesota, Oberlin Conservatory, Northwestern University, and currently she is an artist teacher at Roosevelt University’s Chicago College of Performing Arts. Additionally, she has been teaching at the Music Institute of Chicago for over 35 years and spends summers teaching at the Chautauqua Music Festival. She has also taught at many other programs including Aspen, Bowdoin, Musicorda, Meadowmount, and was co-founder of the Weathersfield Music Festival.

Vamos’ students have won top prizes in many national competitions including the Klein, Stulberg, Johannssen, Sphinx, Leopold Mozart Competition, Corpus Christi, and Kingsville; and international competitions including the Tchaikovsky, Carl Flesch, Menuhin, Bach, (Leipzig), Szigeti, Kreisler, Neilsen, Paganini, Beijing, and Montreal (among many other others). Her former students are members of orchestras including the New York Philharmonic, Boston, St. Louis, San Francisco, Los Angeles, National, Minnesota, Hong Kong, Oslo, Chicago Symphony, and have served as concertmaster of the Orchestra de Paris, the Israeli Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Cleveland Symphony.

Former students include Rachel Barton Pine, Ben Beilman (Avery Fischer award winner), Simin Ganatra (Pacifica Quartet two Grammy Awards), Ryan Meehan (Calidore quartet), and other students have international solo and quartet careers.

Vamos was a member of the Lydian Trio and the Antioch Quartet, and has recorded under Coronet and Rizzoli labels. She has concertized throughout North, Central and South America, Europe and Asia. Her recitals in New York won praise from the New York Times and Herald Tribune. She won the Concert Artist Guild Award, among many other prizes, and has performed recitals at the 92nd Street Y, Town Hall and Carnegie Recital Hall. She continues to perform as a soloist and chamber musician in America and abroad.

Vamos and her husband Roland have commissioned and recorded works for violin and viola by living composers in Chicago. As a team they have taught students together and performed as a violin/viola duo for many years.

Violin Faculty, C. Nanette Chen

Violinist and Taiwan’s first ever woman violin performance doctor, Chen's experience spans the fields of music performance, education, and administration. She received a complete music education in Taiwan and studied under the famous "Taiwan’s godmother of violin" Lee Shu-Te.

After graduating from the Music Department of National Taiwan Normal University, she went to Indiana University (Bloomington) for her master's degree and then to the University of Maryland for a DMA in violin performance. During her playing career, in addition to regularly holding solo recitals, she is often invited to perform new works and record albums for composers at home and abroad.

She performs chamber music in cooperation with famous musical performers and performed concertos with all professional orchestras in Taiwan. After returning to Taiwan, she actively invested in talent cultivation and achieved remarkable results. She adhered to a rigorous teaching attitude to stimulate students' potential and cultivate students with both artistry and skills; and with this rich international experience, she explored talented students and helped them in the international music scene. The various stages of development have cultivated many international musicians for Taiwan. Tseng Yu-Chien (Benny) for example, who won the silver prize in the 15th "Tchaikovsky International Music Competition" (gold medal is not available), is one of the students instructed.

In terms of administrative experience, she served as the Dean of the National Taiwan Normal University School of Music (2018-2021), the Head of the Music Department (2015-2018) and was invited to serve as the board member of the Heifetz International Music Institute（2021-2023, and the Director of the Miaobei Art and Culture Center in Miaoli County (2020-2026). During her tenure as the dean of the college of music and the department, she carried out the renovation project of the department hall, updated and improved buildings and equipment, purchased musical instruments, and upgraded the teaching environment in an all-round way. At the same time, she also focused on the international links of higher education, creating an exchange network between Arizona State University, University of California San Diego, University of Malaya and the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts.