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Edward Carroll

Edward Carroll’s long and distinguished career has taken many twists and turns. It began as an orchestral musician at age 21 with his appointment to the Houston Symphony, detoured back to Juilliard (BM, MM) and New York City as a trumpet soloist making over 20 recordings on the Sony, Vox, MHS, and Newport Classic labels and performing with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, matured as he conducted his first concerts, detoured once again as he fulfilled a lifelong dream of moving to Europe assuming the position of principal trumpet of the Rotterdam Philharmonic, eventually embarked on what has become a distinguished teaching career and now, in the final quarter of his musical journey, returned to his life-long passion of conducting. Mr. Carroll has served on the faculties of the Rotterdam Conservatory, London’s Royal Academy of Music, McGill University, the Bard Conservatory, and the California Institute of the Arts. He has performed with conductors such as Leonard Bernstein, Bernard Haitink, Valery Gergiev, James Conlon, Esa-Pekka Salonen, and Simon Rattle in concert halls around the world, listing Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, Vienna’s Grosser Musikvereinsaal, Moscow’s Tchaikovsky Hall, New York’s Carnegie Hall, Boston’s Symphony Hall, and Tokyo’s Suntory Hall amongst his favorites. He has appeared as a soloist with the Rotterdam Philharmonic, the Netherlands Radio Chamber Orchestra, the London Sinfonietta, Virtuosi di Roma, the Gulbenkian Orchestra of Lisbon, the Hong Kong Philharmonic, and a variety of North American orchestras. Edward Carroll’s recordings conducting the Metamorphosis Ensemble of London (Cantoris) and Chamber Soloists of Washington (Sony) have received critical acclaim, as have his many performances conducting the Peruvian National Symphony and National Youth Orchestras. In addition to teaching and conducting, Edward Carroll is currently the director of the Center for Advanced Musical Studies (www.chosenvalemusic.org) where he presents the annual Chosen Vale International Seminars with friends such as Hakan Hardenberger, John Wallace, Markus Stockhausen, Mark Gould, Colin Currie, and Steve Reich. Author Alexander McGrattan states in his book THE TRUMPET (Yale University Press) that “the work of Ed Carroll has been seminal to the creation of a new generation of adventurous young trumpet players since his work at the Rotterdam Conservatory and the establishment of the Lake Placid Music Seminars in the mid-1990s in New York State.” Mr. Carroll feels otherwise but perhaps that can be left for another biography.

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Yang Xu

Xu Yang, the leader of contemporary ruan scholars in China, performer, educator, professor and doctoral supervisor at Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing, China. Ms. Xu is the associate director of ruan profession committee in China Nationalities Orchestra Society (CNOS), the committee of the national professional skill appraisal expert association, the executive director of Chinese Music Instrument Society, the committee of Chinese Music Instrument Qualification Exam Council, artist director of Ruan Family Orchestra at Central Conservatory of Music, the founder and executive director of Ruan Family at The Ocean of Music instrument company, the director of Xu Yang Ruan Family International Cultural Research Institute. She had studied with Pang Yuzhang, Lin Jiliang, Ning Yong. Yang has published few ruan text books and ruan recordings, such as "The best way to learn is learn from the best - Ruan Tutorial" Book 1 and 2, "Central Conservatory Ruan Qualification Exam Repertoire", "Chinese National Ruan Qualification Exam Repertoire", "Happy Learning Ruan - Study with Famous Teacher!", "The Rhythm of the mountain", etc. Over more than 40 Xu's students were winning in different national and international Chinese Music competitions, and many of the students have became ruan professor in different schools and also professional ruan players in the professional orchestras. In view of her outstanding artistic innovation ability and teaching achievements, Ms. Xu has won several awards, including selected into the ministry of education's program called "Outstanding Backbone Teacher Supporting Program" in 2009; the "Excellent Gardener Award" from the youth vanguard team of the central league and the foreign exchange center of the ministry of culture, the "Excellent Instructor Award" from "The Talented Musicians Raising Program" in 2016, central conservatory BOB excellent instructor, the title of "Outstanding Performer" in 2018.