The Schroeder Umansky Duo is a New York based ensemble formed in 2014. Amy Schroeder, a founding member and violinist in the multi - Grammy Award winning Attacca Quartet and Felix Umansky, cellist of the Grammy Award winning Harlem Quartet came together to form this long-anticipated duo shortly before being married. With a love for the standards the Duo created its first album by arranging some of it’s favorite tunes, which make regular appearances on concerts alongside more typically played violin/cello duo repertoire. The Duo is also fiercely dedicated to new music including original compositions by living composers such as Caroline Shaw and Michael Ippolito and also by its members. Active collaborators, the Duo has performed with members of the Apple Hill String Quartet, clarinetist Wonkak Kim, and pianists Yalin Chi, Grace Eunhye Choi, and Irina Nuzova. In recent years the duo also formed the group knows as Trio Raconteur with phenomenal collaborator and Army Band pianist, Yalin Chi. The duo is extremely devoted to education and both members teach privately and give master classes and workshops at schools while on tour around the world. Umansky is also currently on the cello and chamber music faculty at Montclair State University.
The duo play on instruments loaned to them by the Five Partners Foundation. Schroeder plays on a violin made by Fernando Gagliano, and Umansky plays on a a cello by Jean-Baptiste Vuillaume.
Outside of music the duo enjoys spending time with their two year old daughter, gardening, and going bowling.
Individual Bios
New York based violinist and pedagogue Amy Schroeder is a founding member of the multi- GRAMMY award winning Attacca Quartet and has been hailed by the Washington Post as ‘an impressive artist whose playing combines imagination and virtuosity.’ She has soloed with orchestras including the Buffalo Philharmonic, the Amherst Symphony, the Clarence Symphony, the Hilton Head Symphony, and the Greater Buffalo Youth Orchestra. With the Attacca Quartet, Ms. Schroeder has soloed with the Spanish National Orchestra with composer John Adams conducting, the Nagoya Philharmonic Orchestra in Japan, the Orquesta Filarmónica de Bogotá in Colombia, and the Cabrillo Festival Orchestra with Marin Alsop conducting. Since its inception the Attacca Quartet has won an array of awards including the grand prize in the Osaka International String Quartet Competition, the National Federation of Music Clubs Centennial Chamber Music Award, the Arthur Foote Award from the Harvard Musical Association, and the Lotos Prize in the Arts from the Stecher and Horowitz Foundation. With the Attacca Quartet Ms. Schroeder can be heard on several critically acclaimed recordings produced Sony Classical: Of All Joys, and Real Life as well as a few albums by Azica Records: “Fellow Traveler” the complete works of John Adams, Haydn: “Seven Last Words,” “Songlines,” works of Michael Ippolito, and most recently on Nonesuch/New Amsterdam Records the GRAMMY award winning albums, Shaw/Attacca Quartet 'Orange' and Caroline Shaw: Evergreen. In 2016 the Quartet completed a six year project in which they performed all 68 of Haydn’s String Quartets.
In 2002 Schroederwas the recipient of the Henrietta and Albert J. Ziegle Jr. Scholarship, which provided the tuition for her studies at Juilliard where she was a student of Sally Thomas and the Juilliard String Quartet. Growing up in Buffalo, New York Ms. Schroeder began her violin studies with Karen Campbell and Thomas Halpin. She currently plays on two different violins, a Fernando Gagliano made in 1771 on loan to her from the Five Partners Foundation, and a violin made by Nathan Slobodkin in 2012. In New York Ms. Schroeder teaches violin and piano to students of all ages, and outside of music she enjoys spending time with her daughter and husband, composing, bowling, and scuba diving.
Praised for his “sublime” playing by Cleveland Classical, cellist Felix Umansky is a frequently sought-after recitalist and pedagogue. His versatile career has taken him all over Europe as well as North and South America where he has performed in some of the most prestigious concert halls including Carnegie Hall, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Lincoln Center, and the Kennedy Center.
One of Mr. Umansky’s missions as a performer is to bring a wide range of music to as many people as possible. He has been seen and heard playing everything from Bach to works written in the 21st Century in venues ranging from jazz clubs to 8th century abbeys to 1500-seat concert halls. An avid supporter of contemporary music, Mr. Umansky has performed and premiered works by numerous living composers such as William Bolcom, John Corigliano, Kelly-Marie Murphy, Vivian Fung, Chen Yi, Osvaldo Golijov, Gabriela Lena Frank, and Chick Corea, among many others.
Currently a visiting artist-in-residence at the Royal College of Music in London, Mr. Umansky has also previously held similar appointments at Yale University and the Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts, and he has given masterclasses at universities and conservatories around the world. He has also performed and taught at many of the premier summer festivals in the USA. Mr. Umansky holds Bachelors and Masters degrees from the Cleveland Institute of Music and an Artist Diploma from Yale University.
Mr. Umansky is the newest member of the Harlem Quartet, having joined the ensemble in 2015. Prior to this, he spent six seasons as a founding member of the award-winning Linden String Quartet. He also currently performs in the Schroeder-Umansky Duo with his wife, violinist Amy Schroeder. In their spare time, they enjoy traveling the world and going on snorkeling and diving adventures.
