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Judges ~ 2010 Hellam Competition

Dr. Wei-Han Su
Kirsten Weingartner Weiss
John Atteberry

Dr. Wei-Han Su
Associate Professor of Piano
Missouri State University

Wei-Han Su’s concert activities have taken him to the major cities of the United States, England, Russia, Italy, Korea, Malaysia and Taiwan. He has performed in such prestigious venues as the Purcell Room at the South Bank Centre, England, and the Grand Hall of the Moscow Conservatory. In 1991, he made his orchestral debut at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, London under the baton of Sir Simon Rattle.

Su was a featured recitalist at the Walnut Hill Summer Music Festival in Boston, Massachusetts in 1999 and 2004. He has made guest appearances at universities and colleges in the U.S., Korea and Malaysia, and has presented recitals on concert series in Los Angeles and Washington, D.C. As a concerto soloist, he has appeared with the Orchestra Filarmonica Italiana, Cambridge Chamber Orchestra, and Springfield Symphony Orchestra among others. His compact disc recording of the music of Charles Ives with tenor Andrew Childs was released on the Centaur label in 2006.

The recipient of numerous awards and honors including the Ian Fleming Education Award and the Craxton Memorial Prize, Su received the Bachelor of Arts degree with Honors from Cambridge University, the Master of Music degree and the Performer’s Diploma from the Royal College of Music, London, and the Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the Peabody Conservatory. His principal teachers include Boris Slutsky, Yu Chun Yee, Joyce Rathbone, and Yonty Solomon. He is currently Associate Professor of Piano at Missouri State University, where he is the recipient of a University Award in Teaching in 2005.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Kirsten Weingartner Weiss

Violinist/Violist Kirsten Weingartner Weiss began studying the violin at the age of four. After fourteen years of study with the legendary Suzuki teacher, John Kendall, Kirsten continued her studies first at Illinois Wesleyan University and then at De Paul University.

Kirsten came to the Ozarks in 1993 to play for entertainer Wayne Newton and the next year landed the job of violinist, violist and featured soloist with the Lawrence Welk Show, a position she held for ten years, performing 300 shows per season. In addition, she has performed as a member of the Illinois Symphony and Chamber Orchestra, the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, the Omaha Symphony and the Cedar Rapids Symphony and String Quartet. Kirsten has also served as adjunct instructor of violin at College of the Ozarks and Drury University.

Currently, she serves as Assistant Principal Second Violin of the Springfield Symphony, Concertmaster of the Chamber Orchestra of the Ozarks, and is a violist with the Ft. Smith Symphony and the St. Mark's Square String Quartet.

 

John Atteberry

John Atteberry is currently the music teacher at Thomas Jefferson Independent Day School in Joplin, Missouri, where he is responsible for Early Childhood Music, Middle School Instrumental and Vocal Music, Upper School Instrumental and Vocal Music, Music Theory and Drama. He is also principal bassoon of the Springfield Symphony Orchestra, and a regular performer in the Fort Smith Arkansas Symphony and the Southern Symphony.

In the past, he was bassoonist with the Jupiter Symphony of New York, Concerto Soloists of Philadelphia, Princeton Chamber Orchestra, Princeton Pro Musica, and the Riverside Symphonia, among others. He also played in the opera orchestras for the Spoleto Festival in Charleston, South Carolina, the Festival of the Two Worlds, in Spoleto, Italy, and the AIMS Festival in Graz, Austria. He has degrees in Bassoon performance from the University of Missouri – Columbia, and Rutgers University.l

John is also a published composer, with works for Choir and Handbell ensemble available through GIA Music. He lives in Joplin with his wife Gina (a violinist in the Springfield Symphony). They have 3 sons: Christian, Kelsey, and Kip.