The North Dakota Museum of Art is set to host a series of enchanting musical events, featuring extraordinary performances by prodigious talents. This year's lineup includes the mesmerizing Alisa Sadikova on harp, the dynamic duo of Rebecca Fischer on violin and Simone Dinnerstein on piano, and the soulful guitar mastery of Jason Vieaux. These artists, each acclaimed in their own right, promise to deliver an unforgettable experience of classical music, blending their unique styles and profound skill to create a symphony of strings that will captivate audiences.

A Symphony of Strings: Celebrating Musical Prodigies at the North Dakota Museum of Art

The eclectic and highly polished Beo String Quartet, founded in 2015, has created a niche for itself as a daring, genre-defying ensemble. Rigorously trained in the classical tradition, violinists Jason Neukom and Andrew Giordano, violist Sean Neukom, and cellist Ryan Ash also know their way around contemporary expression, including the use of electronics, live sound processing, and spatial audio manipulation. Their performances of Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, or Shostakovich have been compared to those of the best among 21 st century international string quartets.

Beo String Quartet

University of North Dakota

With a 35-year trajectory in the world of chamber music, Spanish Brass is one of the most dynamic and established groups on the international musical stage.

Spanish Brass

Jade Jackson was born and raised in the small central coast town of Santa Margarita. Family and music have always been the center of her life. As a young girl, her father was always playing songwriter-heavy records in the home. Both the family restaurant that she worked at and the house that always had a guitar accessible.

Jade Jackson

Long before Tennessee Jet began crisscrossing America as a one-man band, playing nightly shows full of fuzz guitar, primal percussion, and songs that split the difference between country and raw rock & roll, he traveled the interstates of Oklahoma with his bronc-riding father and barrel-racing mother. Sitting on the bench seat of an old Ford pickup truck pulling a horse trailer while heading to the next rodeo, he’d watch the grasslands of his home state fly past the windshield at highway speed. Country music was always on the radio back then, and those songs — honest, heartfelt classics by icons like Willie Nelson and Dwight Yoakam, both of whom he’d eventually join on tour — left a permanent mark.

Tennessee Jet

Based in Minnesota, but with roots in Tennessee, Chastity Brown grew up surrounded by country and soul music. In the full gospel church of her childhood, she played saxophone and drums and found her singing voice and a passion for music. Her first show was in Knoxville, TN, and then it was on to Minneapolis. Since then, she’s been featured on NPR’s “Favorite Sessions,” CMT, American Songwriter, the London Times, Paste Magazine and others. Chastity has toured the U.S. and abroad, appearing on the U.K.’s Later…with Jools Holland.

Chastity Brown

North Dakota Museum of Art

 Nick and Tyler were born and raised in Imperial, a small town in Southwestern Nebraska, just a stone’s throw from the Colorado border. They began writing and performing together before relocating to their mother’s birthplace of Portland, Oregon. Tyler, the youngest (lead vocals, baritone guitar, harmonica) and Nick, the oldest (backing vocals, lead guitar) discovered their love of music after digging their dad’s old dreadnaught guitar out of the basement and teaching themselves to play along to Johnny Cash, Bob Seger and the Beatles on vinyl.

The Talbott Brothers

The Portland band Glitterfox has released five singles in just six months under their new record label Kill Rock Stars, with two more singles arriving this spring. The band’s been growing steadily since “Drive” came out in August 2023, with their indie rock cocktail that deftly balances nostalgia-fueled anthems with Southern shine.

Glitterfox

Alisa Sadikova is a prodigy classical harpist from Saint Petersburg, Russia. From 2010 to 2018, she studied at the Special Music School of Saint Petersburg Conservatory, with Karina Maleeva; during 2018–2021, she attended Cambridge Musica Mundi High School in Waterloo, Belgium, with Catherine Michel; from August 2021 to the present, she started her bachelor’s degree at the Juilliard School in New York, USA, with Nancy Allen. Alisa is a winner of many international competitions: Absolute First Prize at the International Youth Contest in New York, USA (2010); First Prize at the International Competition of Music Talent in Hanstätten, Germany (2011); Absolute First Prize at the International Competition in Helsinki, Finland (2011); The Yuri Temirkanov Prize (2012); Scholarship holder and owner of an Individual Grant from the Vladimir Spivakov Foundation (2015); 3rd Prize at The Young Talents of Russia (2017); 4th Prize at The 20th International Harp Contest in Israel (2018); First Prize at The Scandinavian International Instrumental Music Competition (2023); Absolute First Prize at the World Grand Prix International Music Contest (2023); First Degree Winner at the Eleventh Sibelius International Instrumental Music Competition (2023); First Degree Winner at the Clara Schuman International Competition (2023); recipient of a Study Grant from the Guzik Foundation (2021–2022), (2022–2023), (2023-2024);  A soloist of the World Harp Congress in Australia (2014), and in Hong Kong (2017); participated as a soloist in the international tour with Sarah Brightman (26 concerts in 16 countries) “Royal Christmas Gala”.

Alisa Sadikova, Harp

Praised for her “beautiful tone and nuanced phrasing” (Boston Musical Intelligencer), violinist Rebecca Fischer is sought after as a highly expressive, intuitive performer of solo, chamber music and chamber orchestra repertoire. Garnering attention for her compelling programs of solo violin and singing violinist music, Ms. Fischer has premiered solo works by composers Lisa Bielawa, Missy Mazzoli, Nico Muhly, Paola Prestini, Mathew Fuerst, Augusta Read Thomas, Byron Au Yong, Pierre Jalbert and others. Recent solo recital engagements include Columbia University’s Miller Theater Pop-Up series, The Stone, and the University of Oregon. She is the concertmaster of Ensemble Baroklyn, a group run by pianist Simone Dinnerstein specializing in the music of Bach, and she performs regularly with other ensembles based in New York City. Ms. Fischer is also a member of The Afield, a multidisciplinary collaboration with visual artist/writer Anthony Hawley combining new and original compositions for violin, voice, and electronics with video and other media. The Afield has performed at the Harare International Festival of the Arts in Zimbabwe, Carnegie Hall, and the Atlanta Contemporary Museum, and has published work in Art Papers.

Rebecca Fischer, Violin Simone Dinnerstein, Piano

Grammy-winner Jason Vieaux, “among the elite of today’s classical guitarists” (Gramophone), is described by NPR as “perhaps the most precise and soulful classical guitarist of his generation.”

North Dakota Museum of Art

Feb 9, 2025

Alisa Sadikova, Harp

Mar 23, 2025

Rebecca Fischer, Violin Simone Dinnerstein, Piano

Apr 13, 2025

Jason Vieaux, Classical Guitar

Nov 17, 2024

Beo String Quartet

Sep 15, 2024

Spanish Brass

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North Dakota Museum of Art