Frisson Ensemble

Biography

Thomas Gallant, oboe / artistic director

Caeli Smith, violin and viola / associate director

Adelya Nartadjieva, violin

Julian Schwarz, cello

Sam Suggs, double bass

Bixby Kennedy, clarinet

Nuno Antunes, bass clarinet

Remy Taghavi, bassoon

Isabel Gleicher, flute

Erick Huckins, horn

Frisson is explosive! From New York City, Frisson features the best and brightest of classical music's rising stars. The ensemble showcases a myriad of rarely-performed masterworks, and the group expands and contracts into a variety of ensembles, including quintets, sextets, nonets, and a small chamber orchestra. The ensemble's recent highlights include performances at the Morgan Library and Museum in New York City and at the Bermuda Festival.

Thomas Gallant, oboe and artistic director 

Considered by many to be the most difficult of all the musical instruments, the oboe is often called the “ill wind that no one blows good.” Oboist Thomas Gallant is one of the world’s few virtuoso solo performers on this instrument and he has been praised by The New Yorker magazine as “a player who unites technical mastery with intentness, charm and wit.”

Gallant is a First Prize Winner of the Concert Artists Guild International New York Competition and one of very few musicians ever to win this competition as an oboe soloist. His solo and chamber music performances have taken him to David Geffen Hall, Weill Recital Hall and the Frick Collection in New York City, to Washington, DC, Los Angeles, Chicago, Philadelphia, to the Spoleto Festival in Italy, and to the Mostly Mozart Festival at Lincoln Center. He has appeared as guest soloist with the Kronos Quartet at the Ravinia Festival and has collaborated with flutist Jean-Pierre Rampal, with Cuarteto Casals from Spain, the Colorado, Calder, Tesla and Lark Quartets, Cuarteto Latinoamericano and with the Adaskin String Trio. Notable performances include a concert of solo and chamber music works for the oboe at the Library of Congress in Washington, DC, and tours across the United States as soloist with Camerata Bariloche from Argentina and the String Orchestra of New York City performing concerti by Bach and Vaughan-Williams. Upcoming concerts include tours of China and Europe.

Tom is dedicated to performing neglected and contemporary works for the oboe and has given the New York premieres of works for oboe and strings by Berio, Penderecki and Holst as well as the Washington, DC premiere of Elliot Carter’s Quartet for oboe and strings. He is a member of the trio Ensemble Schumann and Artistic Director of the chamber music group Frisson based in New York City.

Caeli Smith, viola and associate director

Violist Caeli Smith was born in Philadelphia and made her solo debut at age ten with the Philadelphia Classical Symphony. She holds Bachelor and Master of Music degrees from Juilliard, where she was a principal violist of the Juilliard Orchestra, and received the William Schuman Prize for Outstanding Achievement and Leadership in Music. Caeli was a prizewinner of Juilliard’s Concerto Competition and appeared as a soloist with the Juilliard Orchestra in Alice Tully Hall. 

She has collaborated with many distinguished performers in chamber music settings, including Leon Fleisher, Ani Kavafian, Roger Tapping, Catherine Cho, and André Watts. Caeli was a prizewinner of the Juilliard Concerto Competition and appeared as a soloist with the Juilliard Orchestra in Alice Tully Hall. 

Caeli has performed at Ravinia's Steans Music Institute, the Perlman Music Program's Chamber Music Workshop, the Verbier Academy, and has served as a principal violist of the Verbier Festival Orchestra. Caeli is a teaching assistant for the ACHT studio at Juilliard; a faculty member of the HeifetzPEG program of the Heifetz International Music Institute; and a Teaching Artist of the New York Philharmonic. As a teenager, she was a frequent performer and recurring cast member on NPR’s From The Top. Her print articles have appeared in Strings, Teen Strings, and Symphony magazines. Caeli was a fellow with Carnegie Hall’s Ensemble Connect for the 2018-2020 seasons. 

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