Faustina appeared on Show 359 in Kennet Square, PA in 2018.

Faustina Housner, 17, (violin) is a high school senior from Cherry Hill, New Jersey and is a recipient of From the Top’s Jack Kent Cooke Young Artist Award. Currently, she is under the tutelage of Ellen dePasquale and J Freivogel. Her other teachers of significance include Dara Morales, Emlyn Ngai, and Jasper Wood. Faustina has received recognition by several competitions, such as the 2017 winner of the Bryn Athyn Young Artist Competition, a 2018 Honorable Mention Winner by the National YoungArts Foundation. Last Spring, Faustina was selected to participate in the National YoungArts Week in New York in April. Faustina was also invited to Carnegie Hall’s National Youth Orchestra of USA on their 2018 tour to Asia where she served as an associate concertmaster under the baton of Michael Tilson-Thomas. As a member of Temple Music Prep’s Center of Gifted Young Musicians, Faustina serves as concertmistress of the Youth Chamber Orchestra. In addition, she is a substitute violinist for Symphony in C in Haddonfield. NJ. Faustina has performed in masterclasses by Stefan Jackiw, Kim Kashkashian, Juliette Kang, Benjamin Bowman, Lara St. John, Sidney Curtiss, Jasper Wood, Peter Slowik, the Jasper Quartet, Escher Quartet, Parker Quartet, Fry Street Quartet, and Arianna Quartet.

Ria appeared on Show 359 in Kennet Square, PA in 2018 and Show 383 in Boston on February 8, 2020.

Ria Modak (guitar), 19, is a classical guitarist and composer-improviser based in New York and Boston. Ria studies Social Studies at Harvard College and Classical Guitar Performance at the New England Conservatory, where they study with Eliot Fisk and Jerome Mouffe. Ria has been recognized by the National YoungArts Foundation, the Long Island Classical Guitar Society, the New York Guitar Seminar, and Lincoln Center’s Chamber Music Society for her playing. They appeared on NPR‘s From the Top on Show 359 in Kennet Square, PA, in 2018. Ria has performed at guitar and new music festivals across the country, including Dwellings Art Festival, the Indiana Guitar Festival, Ragas Live, and NEC’s own Boston GuitarFest. In addition to classical guitar, Ria is trained in flamenco guitar and Hindustani music, and their compositions are inflected with these musical traditions and lineages.