Lara was the guest host on Show 370 in Atlanta, Georgia in April of 2019.

Lara Downes is among the foremost American pianists of her generation, an iconoclast dedicated to expanding the resonance and relevance of American music for diverse audiences. A trailblazer on and off-stage, she follows a musical roadmap that seeks inspiration from the legacies of history, family, and collective memory. Downes’ playing has been called “ravishing” by Fanfare Magazine, “luscious, moody and dreamy”  by The New York Times, and “addicting – Downes plays with an open, honest heart” by The Huffington Post.

Born in San Francisco and raised in Europe, Downes’ interest in connecting music to a broad and inclusive breadth of human experience mines her mixed Jamaican and Russian background and peripatetic upbringing to find inspiration in unexpected places. She enjoys collaborating with myriad artists, including cellist Yo-Yo Ma, baritone Thomas Hampson, singer Rhiannon Giddens, jazz vocalist Theo Bleckmann, beatboxer Kevin “K.O.” Olusola, writer Adam Gopnik, and former U.S. Poet Laureate Rita Dove. Her collaborations with leading composers span genres and generations to bring significant new contributions to the American repertoire.

A laureate of the 2016 Sphinx Medal of Excellence award, Downes is recognized as a leader in expanding the reach of the arts as a performer, an entrepreneur, and a cultural visionary. She is an Artist-in-Residence at the Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts – UC Davis, where she mentors young musicians as director of the National Young Artists Program. She serves on the advisory board of The Time In Children’s Arts Initiative and is the founding director of the My Promise Project.

Also a writer, Downes’ essays and memoirs have been published in The Rumpus, Listen Magazine, Huffington Post, and Reader’s Digest. She is a favorite of national radio audiences and featured on NPR’s First Listen, WNYC’s New Sounds, MPR’s Marketplace, and SiriusXM’s Symphony Hall. As a pianist, Downes has performed on stages ranging from Carnegie Hall, John F. Kennedy Center, Lincoln Center, the U.S. Supreme Court, Queen Elizabeth Hall, and the Vienna Konzerthaus, to downtown venues including National Sawdust, Le Poisson Rouge, and Yoshi’s SF., among others.

Upcoming engagements take her coast to coast from Alaska to New Hampshire, with debuts this summer at Ravinia Festival and Glimmerglass. New projects include appearances as a featured artist on Thomas Hampson’s 50 State tour Song Of America: Beyond Liberty, the launch of a duo cabaret show with vocalist Theo Bleckmann, and the world premiere of a new piano concerto by Maxime Goulet.  Additionally, she is pioneering Holes In The Sky, a recording and concert program of multi-genre piano, vocal, and chamber music by women composers and poets, which celebrate stories of women’s lives and dreams. The project is inspired by this quote by Georgia O’Keefe: “I want real things – live people to take hold of – to see – and talk to – music that makes holes in the sky – I want to love as hard as I can,” and will feature collaborations with prominent female artists across genres and traditions.

Lara Downes is a Yamaha Artist.

Lara Downes is an artist represented by CADENZA ARTISTS LLC, 12021 Wilshire Blvd #710, Los Angeles, CA 90025. www.CadenzaArtists.com.

Sarah performed on Show 370 in Atlanta Georgia in April of 2019.

Sarah Kave (cello), 14, lives in Tarzana, California and is a freshman at North Hollywood Highly Gifted Magnet High School. She studies cello at Colburn Music Academy with Clive Greensmith. She won the Discovery Prize sponsored by the Young Musician’s Foundation (YMF), and has soloed with the Debut Orchestra at the Wallis Annenberg Performing Arts Center in Los Angeles. She is a senior intern for the Classics Alive Artists Ambassador Program, in which she organizes events where young artists can perform for the community. She also enjoys songwriting, singing, participating in Model United Nations, track, and contributing to her school newspaper.

Takumi performed on Show 370 in Atlanta, Georgia in April of 2019.

Takumi Taguchi (violin), 17, is from Shoreline, Washington and is now pursuing his Bachelor’s of Music at the Curtis Institute of Music, with teachers Aaron Rosand and Midori. His proudest musical accomplishment was performing with Music of Remembrance in Seattle, a program that remembers the Holocaust through music. Takumi enjoys collecting records, studying world history, and economics.

Javier Morales-Martinez performed on Show 331 in Honolulu, HI, on December 2, 2016. Javier also participated in the “This Land/Our Land” project, released in July of 2017. He performed on Show 370 in Atlanta, Georgia on April 7, 2019.

UPDATED Bio

Javier Morales Martinez (clarinet), 18, is a 2018 graduate of the Los Angeles County High School for the Arts and attends the University of Southern California, where he studies with Yehuda Gilad. He is a recipient of From the Top’s Jack Kent Cooke Young Artist Award and performed on the NPR radio program in 2016. He also appeared in From the Top’s video “This Land/Our Land”, celebrating musicians of different cultures. He was a recipient of a Herbert Zipper Scholarship at the Colburn Community School of Performing Arts, where he was a student from 2013-2018 and studied with Michael Yoshimi, Kathy Sawada, and was principal clarinet of the Colburn Youth Orchestra directed by Maxim Eshkenazy. In 2018, Javier made his Sony Classical recording debut in a collaboration with pianist Lara Downes for the album “For Lenny”. In summer 2018, Javier participated in the National Youth Orchestra of the United States in its Asian tour. In 2017, Javier was the first prize winner of the Mondavi Young Artists Competition, won 2nd prizes at the Backun International Clarinet Competition and the International Clarinet Association High School solo competition, and received an honorable mention award from the Music Center Spotlight Awards. Previous to that, he has won prizes in the Michele Zukovsky Competition and has been a YoungArts winner.

Show 331 Bio

Javier Morales-Martinez, 15, is originally from Mexico, and currently attends Los Angeles County High School for the Arts (LACHSA) in Los Angeles, California. He studies clarinet at the Colburn Community School of Performing Arts with Michael Yoshimi and is a member of the Colburn Wind Ensemble and Colburn Honors Woodwind Quintet. He has also performed with LACHSA Symphony and with Interlochen’s World Youth Symphony. Javier can also play the saxophone, and enjoys his academic pursuits.