Meet Our Team
Chris Sanchez, Founder & Director
A native of the Washington D.C. region, violinist Chris Sanchez began his musical studies at age seven, completing all ten Suzuki volumes within five years and continuing his childhood studies with David Salness at the University of Maryland and at the Meadowmount School in New York. He has earned performance degrees from the University of Maryland, College Park (BM) and the University of Georgia (MM). His major teachers have included Ronda Cole, Sally Thomas, David Salness, Dr. Levon Ambartsumian, Charles Castleman, and Arnold Steinhardt and John Dalley of the Guarneri String Quartet. He performs on the 1903 Ex-Mischakoff Stefano Scarampella violin and bow made by Nicolas Maline circa 1850.
Driven by his fascination with how a teacher’s artful words alone can transform one’s technical and creative efficacy, Chris developed a passion for musical education at an early age. He believes that every child has a unique and important journey in life and his teaching philosophy centers on helping each child discover possibility beyond their peripheries. His students have won various competitions, attained youth orchestra concertmaster positions, and have been accepted to numerous acclaimed collegiate music schools. Chris co-founded and co-directs Capitol Sound Strings in Washington, DC with his teaching partner, Susan Fuller, and teaches with Ronda Cole at the Northern Virginia Suzuki Music School. He lives in Bethesda, MD with his wife and two children, ages 5 and 3.
Susan Fuller, Founder & Director
2024 Festival Faculty
Elizabeth Cunha, violin, theory games, & fiddling
Elizabeth Cunha is the Performing Arts Department Chair at Stone Ridge School where she teaches Middle and High School String Ensembles. In addition, Elizabeth is director and founder of Silver Strings Suzuki Studio. Elizabeth received her Bachelor’s from The Catholic University of America where she studied violin performance, musical theater and music education with Jody Gatwood, Piotr Gajewski, Jane Pesci-Townsend and Dr. Robert Garofalo. Elizabeth received a MM in Music Education and Suzuki Pedagogy from The University of Maryland under the tutelage of Ronda Cole. In 2009, Elizabeth was awarded teacher-training certification in Music Mind Games and has led workshops across the U.S., and internationally. She has served on the board of directors for the Suzuki Association for the Greater Washington Area (SAGWA) and is currently President for the American String Teachers Association MD/DC chapter (ASTA MD/DC). Elizabeth is co-music director for Washington Preludio Strings international performance ensemble, and values opportunities to design, rehearse and travel while sharing culturally diverse musical experiences with students and families.
As a performer, Elizabeth has a wide range of theater credits as an actor/vocalist/violinist including: National Tour of Cabaret, Shakespeare Theater, Signature Theater, Ogunquit Playhouse, Toby’s and West End Dinner Theater. Elizabeth’s teaching style is a fusion of extensive training in Suzuki, Orff Schulwerk, Dalcroze Eurythmics with Dr. Jeremy Dittus, Creative Strings Academy, World Music Drumming and opportunities for composing, arranging, choreographing, and exploring new styles of music with students, colleagues and friends.
In her teaching, Elizabeth aims to provide unique, creative, and happy musicing experiences that ebb and flow in nature to meet the needs and goals of the musicians in the room or zoom. Elizabeth’s most treasured musical moments continue to be a result of her own experiences as a Suzuki mom with her two children.
Joel Fuller, violin
Joel Fuller is a member of the first violin section and currently acting associate principal second violin of the National Symphony Orchestra (NSO) of Washington, D.C. He was appointed by Christoph Eschenbach in 2009 after serving four years as assistant principal second violin of the Kennedy Center Opera House Orchestra.
Fuller holds degrees from the University of Wisconsin at Madison and the University of Michigan where his principal teachers were Vartan Manoogian and Paul Kantor. As a student, Fuller won both schools' concerto competitions and was the Grand Prize winner of the ASTA competition in Michigan.
A lover of chamber music, Joel Fuller is a founding member of the Last Stand Quartet with members of the NSO and a member of the IBIS Chamber Music Society. Recent solo engagements include concerto performances with the Londontowne Symphony, the Central Wisconsin Symphony Orchestra, and the Eclipse Chamber Orchestra. Fuller plays on a violin made in Cremona, Italy by Omobono Stradivari in 1724 named the ex-Powell.
Dr. Jasmin Lee, accompanist
Dr. Jasmin Lee is a native of Northern Virginia, starting piano at the age of five. She is an alumni of Dr. Marjorie Lee’s studio, joining at age seven. She sustains a vibrant career as a collaborative and solo pianist. She currently serves as the Pianist and Organist at Cedar Lane Unitarian Universalist Church. In addition to maintaining a private piano studio, Dr. Lee currently is the staff accompanist and teacher at the Suitland Center for the Visual and Performing Arts, as well as the Glorystar Children’s Chorus. Dr. Lee was recognized as a Prizewinner in the International Young Artist Piano Competition and a National Finalist at the MTNA Young Artists Piano Competition. She holds both Doctor of Musical Arts and Masters of Music degrees from the University of Maryland, College Park, and a Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.
Frank Auer, violin
Frank Auer began taking Suzuki violin lessons in Franklin, Tennessee when he was five years old. Since then, the Suzuki philosophy has played an important role in his life and career.
He completed both his Bachelors degree at the University of Evansville and his Masters degree at the University of Maryland in Violin Performance with an emphasis on Suzuki Pedagogy. Mr. Auer has performed with the Owensboro Symphony in Kentucky, and has been a member of the Evansville Philharmonic Orchestra.
He has registered training with the Suzuki Association of the Americas for violin books one through ten. He has received training from Ms. Ronda Cole, Dr. Carol Dallinger, Mr. Terry Durbin, and Ms. Christie Felsing.
Mr. Auer has taught extensively in Suzuki programs such as the University of Evansville Suzuki Program, the College Park Suzuki Violin Program, Music Kids Suzuki Violin, and Levine School of Music. He currently teaches in Franklin, Tennessee and is the Director of Thistledown Strings.
James Lee, cello
James Lee was born in the San Francisco bay area, where he made his debut with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra at the age of 15. He received his bachelor’s degree from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and his master’s degree from The Juilliard School. That same year, he became a member of the National Symphony Orchestra. At Juilliard, Mr. Lee served as principal of both the Juilliard Orchestra and the Juilliard Chamber Orchestra. As winner of the prestigious Juilliard Cello Competition, he was a featured soloist at Alice Tully Hall. Lee’s teachers have included Margaret Rowell, Bonnie Hampton, Leonard Rose, and Joel Krosnick. Lee appeared as a soloist with the National Symphony Orchestra in the 1988 world premiere of Andreas Makris’s Concertante under the baton of Mstislav Rostropovich. In 2011, Lee performed the Crouching Tiger Concerto with the National Symphony Orchestra at Wolf Trap with composer Tan Dun. He was also featured with two other colleagues from the cello section in Penderecki’s Concerto Grosso for Three Cellos and Orchestra in 2015 with Christoph Eschenbach conducting. A devoted chamber musician, Mr. Lee is the artistic director and founder of the National Chamber Players, the resident chamber ensemble at Episcopal High School since 2004. Mr. Lee’s cello is made by Claude Guillot, Bordeaux, 1842.
Sarah Berry, cello & orchestra
Sarah Berry holds the position of Professional in Residence at Western Kentucky University, where she teaches cello. Mrs. Berry taught strings for six years in the Bowling Green and Warren County Schools as part of WKU's partnership with the school systems to start local string programs, programs which have since grown to include over 500 string students. She co-founded and directed WKU's summer camp for strings, String Explosion, for eleven years. Mrs. Berry has been a Guest Conductor at the WKU String Invitational, Nashville Honors Orchestra, Williamson County Honors Orchestra, the Tennessee Valley Music Festival, and the Levine School of Music in Washington, D.C. Mrs. Berry performs with the Nashville Opera Orchestra and Orchestra Kentucky. Mrs. Berry received her Master of Music in Cello Performance from Rice University and her Bachelor of Music degree from Vanderbilt University with majors in Cello Performance and German. Her principal teachers include Felix Wang, Norman Fischer and Grace Mihi Bahng. Mrs. Berry is a registered Suzuki Teacher, having completed training with Melissa Kraut, Avi Friedlander, Laura Shaw and Alice Vierra. Mrs. Berry lives in Bowling Green, KY with her husband, two children and a Boston Terrier named Wrigley.
Daniel Foster, viola & chamber music
Violist Daniel Foster's varied career encompasses orchestral, chamber, and solo playing, as well as teaching. After capturing the First Prize in both the William Primrose and Washington International Competitions, Mr. Foster became a member of the National Symphony viola section in 1993 and was appointed Principal by Music Director Leonard Slatkin in 1995. Mr. Foster has appeared frequently as soloist with the National Symphony since his appointment.
Mr. Foster is a member of the critically acclaimed Dryden Quartet, along with his cousins Nicolas and Yumi Kendall and National Symphony Concertmaster Nurit Bar-Josef, and is also a founding member of the Kennedy Center Chamber Players.
Mr. Foster is on the faculty at the University of Maryland and has given master classes at Oberlin and Peabody Conservatories, the University of Michigan, and the Cleveland Institute of Music. He has been a faculty member for the National Orchestral Institute and is a member of the International Principals faculty at the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo, Japan.
David Salness, violin & chamber music
Violinist David Salness has attained international recognition as a performing artist and teacher. He has appeared in more than 25 countries and in 48 out of the 50 United States in such renowned venues as Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Orchestra Hall in Chicago, Salle Pleyel and London’s Wigmore Hall. His performances are broadcast on National Public Radio, Radio France, Bavarian Radio and the British and Canadian Broadcast Corporations. His recordings are found on the RCA, Telarc and Centaur labels, amongst others.
A dedicated chamber musician, Salness was for twelve years a member of the Audubon Quartet and won the Deuxieme Grand Prix as a member of Nisaika in the 1984 Evian International String Quartet Competition. Formerly a performer with the historic Theater Chamber Players and currently founding artistic co-director of the Left Bank Concert Society, Salness is a member of the critically acclaimed Left Bank Quartet. He appears frequently in the greater Washington, D.C., area performing at the Kennedy Center, the Corcoran, National Gallery, the Phillips Collection, the Smithsonian and Hirschorn Museums, Strathmore Hall, Dumbarton Oaks, The Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center and the Library of Congress.
Salness has collaborated with members of the Guarneri, Juilliard, Orford, Moscow and Cleveland Quartets amongst others. Pianists with whom he has collaborated include Yefim Bronfman, Lydia Artimyw, Christopher O’Reilley, Jean Yves Thibaudet, Ruth Laredo, Vladimir Sokoloff, Jorge Bolet and Semour Lipkin. Salness is fortunate to have performed most of Brahms chamber music with Leon Fleisher, known as an expert in this repertoire.
An alumnus of the Interlochen Arts Academy, earning the Dendrinos Scholarship Chair and the Curtis Institute (having also attended the Cleveland Institute of Music), Salness studied with David Cerone, Jascha Brodsky, Ivan Galamian, Joseph Gingold and Karen Tuttle. Salness’s understanding of the historical practice of chamber music has been informed by his work with members of the Kolisch, Griller, Hungarian and Budapest Quartets. He has actively pursued his study of the music and performance traditions of Schoenberg, Webern, Berg, Bartók, Kodály, Ravel, Ysaýe and Barber under the direction of Eugene Lehner, Felix Galimir, Lorand Fenyves, Brodsky and Gingold, all of whom worked personally with some of these composers and are considered their chief exponents. At the Banff Center, Salness was privileged to work intensively with Zoltán Székely on Bartók’s Violin Concerto No. 2 (composed for and premiered by Székely) and several of the composer’s string quartets. Salness has performed Bartók’s string quartets many times over the past 30 years.
He has enjoyed a long association with New York’s Chautauqua Institute and Festival and was selected to participate in the Aspen Festival’s elite Center for Advanced Quartet Studies as a member of the Cézanne Quartet. Other notable festivals include Ravinia, Newport, Banff, La Jolla and Lincoln Center’s Mostly Mozart Festival. He has appeared with the Concerto Soloists of Philadelphia, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra and the Brandenburg Ensemble of New York.
At the age of twenty and as the youngest member in the group, Salness was appointed concertmaster of the St. Louis Opera Orchestra. Throughout his orchestral career, he has performed under some of the most respected conductors including Eugene Ormandy, Zubin Mehta, Leonard Bernstein, Rafael Fruhbeck du Burgos, Robert Shaw, Helmuth Rilling, Andre Previn, Robert Spano and Leonard Slatkin. Salness was honored to perform in Carnegie Hall under the direction of Sergiu Celebidache in his long-anticipated U.S. debut and to study with him the application of phenomenology in chamber music performance. Salness is currently concertmaster of Northern Virginia’s Fairfax Symphony Orchestra.
Salness began his teaching career as assistant to David Cerone at the Curtis Institute and also the Meadowmount School of Music in New York, where he returned to serve for five years as a member of the Meadowmount Artist Faculty. Having also been a guest faculty member at John Hopkins’ Peabody Conservatory and Distinguished Teacher of Violin at the Brevard Music Center, he is currently professor of violin at the University of Maryland. Salness has taught or coached students who have garnered top prizes from such major international compositions as Indianapolis, Evian/Bordeaux, Portsmouth, Naumburg, Menuhin, Schneider and Banff.
Salness plays a beautiful example of the work of Pietro Giovanni Mantegazza built c.1785 in Milan. Born into a musical family, Salness began his study of the violin at the age of six, with his father as his first teacher.
Briannah Steele, violin
Briannah Steele received her BM in Music, Business from Grove City College and her MM in Violin Performance from Penn State University. Growing up in Northern Virginia, she was a part of Ronda Cole and David Strom's violin studio, and took private lessons with David Strom. Her undergrad and grad school teachers were Maureen Conlon and Max Zorin. She has also participated in many master classes with teachers such as David Kim and Rune Sorensen of the Danish String Quartet. She is currently teaching Suzuki violin and is a co-teacher in the Capitol Sound Strings studio with Chris Sanchez.