Anika performs on Show 416.

Anika Veda (flute), 17, hails from Palatine, Illinois, and is a senior at William Fremd High School. She studies flute with Jennifer Gunn. Anika is passionate about furthering diversity in the arts. She is a fellow of the Chicago Musical Pathways Initiative, an organization committed to helping young musicians from underrepresented backgrounds pursue careers in classical music. Anika is a member of the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra and plays in the Jubilee Wind Quintet. As a soloist, Anika has performed at acclaimed venues such as Carnegie Weill Recital Hall and Chicago Symphony Center. In 2020, she performed the Ibert Flute Concerto with the Oistrakh Symphony of Chicago as a winner of the DePaul Concerto Competition. She was also the winner of the 2020 CYSO Philharmonic Orchestra Concerto Competition and has received awards in the Crain-Maling CSO Young Artists Competition, the Society of American Musicians Competition, the American Protégé Music Talent Competition, the ENKOR International Music Competition, the Great Composers Concert Series, and the Granquist Competition. A camp scholarship awardee at the CSO Young Artist Competition, Anika attended Interlochen Arts Camp in Summer 2019 and Curtis Summerfest in 2020. Anika attended the Orford International Music Festival on scholarship in 2021. Anika has also played in the ILMEA District 7 Orchestra and the Honor Band at the ILMEA All-State Festival. Anika is a co-founder of Sharing The Stand, a non-profit that links musical mentors and young musicians across the globe. She has been studying Carnatic vocal music of the Indian classical tradition for 12 years, and is proficient in the Indian bamboo flute. Outside of music, Anika enjoys crochet, cooking and baking, and she loves trying different types of coffee and tea.

Alex Laing’s work represents a modern take on orchestral practice. Principal clarinet of The Phoenix Symphony, he is active as a performing and teaching artist, passionate and curious about design and learning, and actively exploring the push and pull between a legacy art form and its unfixed future.

In addition to his work with The Phoenix Symphony, recent seasons have found him contributing his sound in a range of other projects including: as a soloist with the Sphinx Virtuosi at Carnegie Hall, with Lawrence Brownlee (in both the world premiere and visual recording of Tyshawn Sorey’s Cycle of My Being), with the Re-Collective Orchestra (in the 2019 soundtrack recording of Disney’s The Lion King) and as a member of Gateways Festival Orchestra.

Alex is frequently sought for his thought leadership and has been an invited speaker to the annual conferences of both the Association of British Orchestras and the League of American Orchestras where, in 2019 he was a keynote speaker. Shaped around his belief that ‘music isn’t just sound; it is sounds, and words, and people’, his practice has been honored, most recently with a 2018 Sphinx Medal of Excellence and in 2017 named one of Musical America’s Professionals of the Year.

As a teacher he has been a frequent collaborator with the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s YOLA (Youth Orchestra Los Angeles) program, and a faculty member for both the National Youth Orchestra of the United States of America (NYO-USA) and the League of American Orchestras’ ‘Essentials of Orchestra Management Seminar’. He’s currently lead faculty for the YOLA National Institute and serves on the board of directors for Gateways Music Festival and Arizona School for the Arts.

A graduate of Northwestern University, Alex received his master’s degree in Orchestral Performance from the Manhattan School of Music, an artist’s diploma from the Sweelinck Conservatorium Amsterdam and a certificate in nonprofit management from Arizona State University’s Lodestar Center for Philanthropy and Nonprofit Innovation.

Peter was named Host of From the Top in January 2020.

Peter Dugan’s position is sponsored by Susan and Gerald Slavet.

Peter first appeared on From the Top Show 158, recorded in April 2007, at age 18.

Prizing versatility as the key to the future of classical music, pianist Peter Dugan is equally at home in classical, jazz, and pop idioms.

He is heard nationwide as the  host of NPR’s beloved program From the Top.  He has appeared as a soloist, recitalist, and chamber musician across North America and abroad. 

In 2020, Mr Dugan performed with Joshua Bell on a PBS Broadcast “At Home with Music” and appeared on  the album of the same name on Sony Classical. He was also featured on PBS Great Performances with mezzo-soprano Kara Dugan for the series “Now Hear This”.

A sought-after multi-genre artist, Mr. Dugan has performed in duos and trios with artists ranging from Itzhak Perlman and Renee Fleming to Jesse Colin Young and Glenn Close. Mr Dugan’s debut performances with Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony were described by the Los Angeles Times as “stunning” and by the SF Chronicle as “fearlessly athletic.” The Wall Street Journal described Mr. Dugan’s collaboration with violinist Charles Yang as a “classical-meets-rockstar duo.” Mr. Dugan has been presented in chamber music recitals by Carnegie Hall, Chamber Music Society of Palm Beach, Music at Menlo, Moab Music Festival, and recently in recital with Joshua Bell at the Minnesota Beethoven Festival.  He was the 2019 featured recitalist for the California Association of Professional Music Teachers, and has soloed with the San Francisco Symphony, Houston Symphony, Kansas City Symphony, New World Symphony, and Mid-Texas Symphony.

His album with baritone John Brancy –  A Silent Night: A WWI Memorial in Song – pays homage to composers who lived through, fought in, and died in the Great War. Brancy and Dugan toured this program across North America in commemoration of the centennial of WWI, including performances at The Kennedy Center, Alice Tully Hall, Stanford University, the United States Naval Academy, and the Smithsonian Institute.  Together Brancy and Dugan won first prize at the 2018 Montreal International Music Competition and second prize at the 2017 Wigmore Hall International Song Competition. He can also be heard as the piano soloist on a recording of Ives’ Fourth Symphony from Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony, a recording which the New York Times named one of the top classical albums of 2019. 

Mr. Dugan advocates the importance of music in the community and at all levels of society.  As a founding creator of Operation Superpower, a superhero opera for children, he has traveled to dozens of schools in the greater New York area, performing for students and encouraging them to use their talents – their superpowers – for good.

Mr. Dugan holds Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from The Juilliard School, where he studied under Matti Raekallio. He was a recipient of the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation’s Young Scholar, College Scholar, and Graduate Scholar awards.

He resides in New York City with his wife, mezzo-soprano Kara Dugan, and serves on the piano faculty at the Juilliard School Evening Division. Mr. Dugan is a Yamaha Artist.