VOLTA PIANO TRIO
Hailed by Gramophone magazine for its "warmly considered playing" and "shadings of exquisite sheen and vibrancy", the Volta Piano Trio, formerly known as the Icicle Creek Piano Trio, has established itself as one of the Pacific Northwest's premier chamber ensembles. The members of the Volta Piano Trio originate from the United States, United Kingdom, and Russia. Together or as individuals, Jennifer Caine Provine, Sally Singer Tuttle, and Oxana Ejokina have performed in venues such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Alice Tully Hall, the Phillips Collection, and the Royal Albert Hall, and have toured in Austria, Germany, France, Italy, and the U.K. Regionally and on the West Coast, they have performed solo or as a trio at Pacific Lutheran University, the University of Puget Sound, Cornish College of the Arts, the Seattle Sherman Clay Recital Hall, the Governor's Mansion in Olympia, Benaroya Hall in Seattle, Seattle Town Hall, the University of Santa Barbara, and Davies Hall in San Francisco, among others. In 2015, the Volta Piano Trio was selected as a finalist for The American Prize in Chamber Music Performance. The Trio has appeared on several Northwest chamber music series, and at chamber music festivals in Las Vegas, NV, Sag Harbor, NY, and Leavenworth and Walla Walla, WA. Recent highlights have included performances of Beethoven's Triple Concerto with the St. Petersburg Chamber Philharmonic in Russia and with the Washington Idaho Symphony.
The Trio was formerly Ensemble-in-Residence at the Icicle Creek Music Center in Leavenworth, Washington, where members directed performance and educational programs and maintained private studios. They currently perform frequently at the new Icicle Creek Center for the Arts, as part of a concert series directed by Oxana Ejokina.
The Volta Piano Trio's debut recording of Ravel and Schubert E-flat trios was released in 2008 under the Con Brio label, and was critically acclaimed by the American Record Guide, The Strad, Gramophone, Fanfare, and others. A second disc of trios by Haydn, Turina, and Shostakovich, released in 2010, has garnered rave reviews, including an endorsement by Fanfare as a "fantastic performance...a must for all chamber music lovers." The trio's recordings (both under the name Icicle Creek Piano Trio) and live performances have been featured on numerous radio stations across the country, including NPR's Performance Today, Seattle's KING FM, and Arizona's KBAQ.
Jennifer Caine Provine
Jennifer Caine Provine, violinist, was a first prize winner of the Yamaha Music Foundation of Europe Competition and recipient of several awards and grants including the Royal College of Music’s Isolde Menges Prize for solo Bach, Oxford University's Polonsky Foundation Grant and Joan Conway Scholarship in Performance, Harvard University's John Knowles Paine Traveling Fellowship, and the Frank Huntington Beebe Grant for Musicians. She has concertized throughout the U.S. and Europe in venues including the Phillips Collection, Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, and the Glinka Philharmonic Hall in St. Petersburg, where she performed Beethoven's Triple Concerto with the St. Petersburg Chamber Philharmonic. Jennifer is Associate Concertmaster of the Pacific Northwest Ballet Orchestra and violinist of the Volta Piano Trio (formerly Icicle Creek Piano Trio), with whom she has performed extensively throughout the Northwest and abroad, been heard on national radio stations, and recorded two discs on the Con Brio label to critical acclaim. As assistant director and resident violinist at the Icicle Creek Music Center from 2007-2010, she performed on the Canyon Wren Series and coached for and directed educational programs. Jennifer regularly appears on several Northwest chamber music series, including the Second City Chamber Series, the Walla Walla Chamber Music Festival, and the Icicle Creek International Chamber Music Festival, and performs frequently with the Seattle Symphony. She has also written freelance reviews for Strings Magazine's In Print column. Jennifer is a graduate of Harvard University with a Bachelor of Arts in Music and Slavic Languages and Literatures, and holds Masters Degrees from the Royal College of Music and Oxford University.
Oxana Ejokina
Russian-born pianist Oxana Ejokina appears frequently as guest recitalist and chamber musician on concert series across the United States and abroad. She has soloed with the Seattle Symphony, St. Petersburg Chamber Philharmonic and Tacoma Symphony, and performed in venues such as the Phillips Collection in Washington DC, Benaroya Hall in Seattle, Governor’s Mansion in Olympia, Davies Orchestra Hall in San Francisco, and Klassik Keyifler Festival in Turkey. A dedicated performer of new music, she has premiered works by Marilyn Shrude, Wayne Horvitz, Bern Herbolsheimer, and Laura Kaminsky, among others. She has been featured on multiple live radio broadcasts on such stations as WFMT-Chicago, KUOW and KING FM in Seattle, and Maine Public Radio. Her collaborations include concerts with the Seattle Chamber Players, Avalon String Quartet, pianist Christina Dahl, violinists Ian Swensen, Paul Kantor and Andrew Jennings, and cellists Johannes Moser and Anthony Elliott, among others.
Ejokina holds a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in piano performance from Stony Brook University. She is the pianist of the Volta Piano Trio, whose recordings for Con Brio label received accolades in multiple international music magazines, such as The Strad, Gramophone and American Record Guide. A sought-after teacher, Ejokina is Chair of the Piano Faculty and Assistant Professor of Music at Pacific Lutheran University. She has given piano and chamber music masterclasses in colleges and universities across the US and is in demand as an adjudicator. Additionally, she is Artistic Director of several flagship classical music programs at the Icicle Creek Center for the Arts, including the International Chamber Music Festival/Institute and Winter Piano Festival.
Sally Singer Tuttle
Cellist Sally Singer Tuttle, born in the UK, has given numerous performances of solo and chamber works in Europe and throughout the United States. She has performed as a soloist with the St. Petersburg Chamber Philharmonic, Russia (Beethoven’s Triple Concerto), the Pleven Philharmonic, Bulgaria, the Stony Brook Symphony Orchestra, New York, the Danbury Symphony, Connecticut and the Washington-Idaho Symphony Orchestra, amongst others. Sally has toured in Britain, Italy, France and Austria, and chamber performance highlights include the Tanglewood Music Center, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Alice Tully Hall, first prize in the John Ireland Chamber Music Competition, British National Television appearances and the Governor's Mansion, WA. A former member of the Vovka Ashkenazy Piano Trio, Sally has enjoyed performing chamber music with leading artists Ian Swensen, Nathaniel Rosen, Steven Doane, Anthony Elliott and Rachel Barton Pine. World premier performances include the works of composers Laura Kaminsky, Wayne Horvitz, Bern Herbolsheimer, Thomas Flaherty and Marilyn Shrude.
Sally is the Cellist and Artistic Director for the New York based organization Sankusem, which is dedicated to the exploration and performance of African Music written for classical instruments. She is also a member of the Volta Piano Trio (formerly the Icicle Creek Piano Trio), who released two CDs highly acclaimed by Gramophone, The Strad, and Fanfare magazines, the American Record Guide and others, under the label Con Brio recordings. Gramophone Magazine highlighted Sally’s "vividly expressive harmonics, which open the (Shostakovich Piano Trio No.2)", as being played with a "transforming sweep of gossamer beauty". Fanfare Magazine’s critic Jerry Dubins wrote, "I can honestly say that the (Trio’s) Shostakovich is another award winning performance that, in my opinion, demotes even the best of the rest to second class". Furthermore, a Seattle Times critic referred to her "protean precision" in a live performance of the Rachmaninov Sonata and the Journal of Arts in Bulgaria wrote of her Elgar concerto, "the sophisticated performance molded every sound and musical image with refinement. It was a performance of the highest caliber, which left long-lasting memories in the consciousness of every person in the audience".
Dr. Singer Tuttle is currently a faculty member at Whitman College, WA. She has given masterclasses in America, the UK and Australia and has judged young artist competitions throughout the States. She plays an English cello made by Samuel Bernard Fendt, 1835.