Featured in the March 2018 edition of New on NAXOS for her recording of Michael Daugherty’s Trail of Tears with the Albany Symphony Orchestra, flutist Amy Porter has been praised by critics for her exceptional musical talent and passion for scholarship. This captivating performer was described by Carl Cunningham in the Houston Post as having “succeeded in avoiding all the overdone playing styles of the most famous flutists today.” In American Record Guide, flutist Christopher Chaffee wrote, “If you have not heard her playing, you should.” Ms. Porter “played with graceful poise,” noted Allan Kozinn in The New York Times. And Geraldine Freedman, writing in the Albany Gazette, commented, “Amy Porter showed that she’s not only very versatile but that she can do everything well. She chose a program that tested every aspect of her playing from a Baroque sensibility to using the instrument as a vehicle of sound effects, and she met each challenge with passion, skill and much musicality.”


Ms. Porter has been a featured soloist with the American Composers Orchestra at Carnegie Hall’s Zankel Hall, and with the Atlanta, Houston, Omaha, Delaware, Albany, Flint, Billings, Battle Creek, Arkansas, and Elgin symphony orchestras. She has twice appeared in recital at the National Concert Hall in Taipei, as well as at Skidmore College’s Arthur Zankel Music Center. Her collaborators have included such distinguished conductors as Nicholas McGegan, Ransom Wilson, David Alan Miller, Yoel Levi, Thomas Wilkins, José-Luis Gomez, Enrique Diemecke, David Amado, Anne Harrigan, and Arie Lipsky. She has given premieres of works by Michael Daugherty, Ellen Taaffe Zwilich, Joel Puckett, Christopher Caliendo, Katherine Hoover, and Frank Ticheli, among others.


Winner of the 3rd Kobe International Flute Competition and the Paris/Ville d’Avray International Flute Competition, Ms. Porter has served on international juries around the world, including the 6th Kobe International Flute Competition. She has been heard in recital on National Public Radio; highlighted on PBS’s Live From Lincoln Center; and featured on the covers and as a writer for the magazines Flute Talk in the USA and The Flute in Japan.


In 2006 Ms. Porter became the first performing artist to be awarded the University of Michigan’s Henry Russel Award for distinguished scholarship and conspicuous ability as a teacher. Her popular study guide on the German composer Sigfrid Karg-Elert elicited the following comment from Spanish Flute Society: “Strength, beauty, a captivating and seductive force, sensitivity, perfection and a sense of humor characterize the impressive American flautist Amy Porter.”


She has won praise both as a recording artist and as a chamber musician. Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim, in her New York Times review of the CD In Translation: Selections from J.S. Bach’s Cello Suites on the Equilibrium label, applauded Ms. Porter for her “gleaming, lyrical reading” of those works. As a member of Trio Virado with violist Juan-Miguel Hernandez and guitarist João Luiz, she recorded Mangabeira, a CD featuring works by Piazzolla, Brouwer, Hand, Assad and Luiz, about which Ken Keaton wrote in American Record Guide: “First let me say that these are fine musicians, and they present a set of performances that are unfailingly strong, expressive, and imaginative.”


Formerly a member of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Ms. Porter was recently appointed Principal Flute of North Carolina’s Brevard Music Center, where she will perform as soloist, chamber musician, and orchestral player.


Highlights of Ms. Porter’s 2019-20 season include a tour of Missouri with Trio Virado and appearances at the Brevard Music Center as Principal Flute, The University of Kansas, and MidSouth Flute Festival. She will also perform Daugherty's "Trail of Tears" with the Indianapolis Chamber Orchestra. Recent study guide releases include her latest “THE GAUBERT CYCLE: The Complete Works for Flute and Piano by Philippe Gaubert” with guests Tim Carey and Penelope Fischer. The printed edition, Philippe Gaubert Treasures for Flute and Piano, is published by Carl Fischer.


Born in Wilmington, Delaware, Ms. Porter graduated from The Juilliard School and pursued further studies at the Mozarteum Academy in Salzburg. She plays a 14K white gold flute with rose gold engraved keys made for her by the Wm. S. Haynes Co.



Nancy Ambrose King, oboe, is the first-prize winner of the Third New York International Competition for Solo Oboists, held in 1995. She has appeared as soloist throughout the United States and abroad, including performances with the St. Petersburg, Russia, Philharmonic, Prague Chamber Orchestra, Janacek Philharmonic, Tokyo Chamber Orchestra, Puerto Rico Symphony, Orchestra of the Swan in Birmingham, England, Festival Internacionale de Musica in Buenos Aires, New York String Orchestra, Amarillo Symphony, Cayuga Chamber Orchestra, and Sinfonia da Camera. She has performed as recitalist in Weill Recital Hall and as soloist at Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall. She has recorded eleven CDs of works for the oboe on Boston Records, Cala Records, Equilibrium, Naxos and Centaur Records. Recent releases include “IllumiNation” featuring concertos by Scott McAllister, Michael Daugherty, and Alyssa Morris; the “Halle” Trio Sonatas of G.F. Handel; “Global Reflections” recorded with the Prague Chamber Orchestra and featuring the works of Strauss, Skalkottas, Sierra, and Foss, as well as the premiere of Jennifer Higdon’s Oboe Concerto with the University of Michigan Symphony Band. She also recorded a Youtube video channel, “Trois Trios/Deux Duos” with colleagues Jeffrey Lyman, bassoon and Martin Katz, piano, and can be heard performing on the Athena, Arabesque, and CBS Masterworks labels. She was a finalist in the Fernand Gillet Oboe Competition held in Graz, Austria, and has been heard as soloist on WQXR radio in New York City and NPR’s “Performance Today”. She is on the faculty of the Sarasota Music Festival, has appeared as a recitalist throughout the world and was a member of the jury for the esteemed 2009 Barbirolli and the 2016 Muri, Switzerland Oboe Competitions. Ms. King has written a highly successful e-book for Apple I-Tunes titled “Making Oboe Reeds from Start to Finish with Nancy Ambrose King”.

Her playing has earned high praise from a variety of critics, including the American Record Guide: “Marvelously evocative, full of character, sultry and seductive, with a soft-spoken, utterly supple tone, and as musically descriptive as any I have heard…a fine exhibition of thoroughly musical oboe playing”; "She plays not only with delicacy, but also with an intense, almost rapturous sound that is second to none in expressivity and gradation. Delightful!". "...a lovely player with a tone that surpasses that of most other American oboe soloists. It defines delicacy, yet is strangely assertive, like a soft-spoken woman who nonetheless speaks up strongly when her mind is made up.", Fanfare: “Nancy Ambrose King is clearly a skilled musician of great promise, with a sterling technique”, and The Double Reed: “…thoughtful, expressive, and perfectly controlled performance of consummate accuracy. It’s not that she makes it sound easy-she makes it sound perfect”, "Ms. King's fluid technique, combined with clean and accurate articulations, makes the most complex passages flow and sounds effortless. Combine these aspects with a beautiful tone and a sensitive touch in the lyrical passages, all oboists have a new level to which to strive."

Currently Professor of Oboe and Chair of the Winds & Percussion Department at the University of Michigan, she was previously Associate Professor and University Scholar at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign and served as the first female President of the International Double Reed Society. She is on the faculty of the Sarasota Music Festival. She has also served on the music faculties of Indiana University, Ithaca College, University of Northern Colorado, and Duquesne University Schools of Music, as well as the Idyllwild Music Festival, Bowdoin Music Festival, Marrowstone Music Festival, Strings in the Mountains of Steamboat Springs, and the Hot Springs Music Festival.

Professor King received her Doctor of Musical Arts, Master of Music, and Performer’s Certificate from the Eastman School of Music, studying with Richard Killmer. A graduate of the University of Michigan with a Bachelor of Music degree where she studied with Arno Mariotti and Harry Sargous, Ms. King was the recipient of the school’s prestigious Stanley Medal and was honored with the 2010 Hall of Fame Award and the 2018 Harold Haugh Teaching Award by the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre and Dance.

Acclaimed as "a pianist of poetry, elegance, and power" (American Record Guide), "a pianist of exceptional, cherishable finesse" (Los Angeles Times), and "one of those rare pianists who combine structural intelligence with a hundred color gradations" (Village Voice), Phillip Bush has established a performing career over the past three decades that is noted for its remarkable versatility and eclecticism, with a repertoire extending from the 16th century to the 21st. Since the launch of his career upon winning the American Pianists Association Fellowship Award and subsequent New York recital debut at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1984, Mr. Bush has appeared as recitalist throughout North America as well as in Europe, Asia and the Caribbean. His Carnegie Hall concerto debut with Oliver Knussen and the London Sinfonietta was hailed by the New York Times for its "impressive last-minute heroics," as he substituted for an ailing Peter Serkin on short notice in concerti by Stravinsky and Alexander Goehr. Mr. Bush has also appeared as soloist with the Osaka Century Orchestra, Cincinnati Symphony, Houston Symphony and a number of other orchestras, in repertoire ranging from the Beethoven concerti to the American premiere of Michael Nyman’s Concerto for Harpsichord.

Phillip Bush is widely acknowledged as one of the most experienced American chamber music pianists of his generation: the Kansas City Star referred to him as "the ideal chamber musician." He has performed and recorded with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, appeared innumerable times on Brooklyn's Bargemusic series, and has performed at the Grand Canyon Music Festival, Newport Music Festival, Bridgehampton Chamber Music Festival, Cape Cod Chamber Music Festival, Strings in the Mountains (Colorado), Sitka Music Festival (Alaska), St. Bart's Music Festival, Music at Blair Atholl (Scotland), Cape May Music Festival, and at many other festivals. He has collaborated in recital and chamber music with concertmasters and principal players of many of the world's great orchestras, including Berlin, Chicago, Los Angeles, Metropolitan Opera, Philadelphia, New York, Cleveland, and Houston. Mr. Bush has also made guest appearances with the Kronos, Miami, Parker, Jupiter, Lutoslawski, and Carpe Diem string quartets, and has performed with members of the Emerson, Guarneri, Tokyo, Orion and St. Lawrence quartets.

Over a ten-year period, Mr. Bush performed over 250 concerts in Japan with the piano quartet "Typhoon", including several sold-out performances at Osaka Symphony Hall and Tokyo's Bunkamura Orchard Hall. He recorded five CD's wth the group for Epic/Sony, all of which reached the top of the Japanese classical charts. From 2007 to 2015, he served as Artistic Director of the Bennington Chamber Music Conference in Vermont, the largest (over 300 participants and 50 faculty) and oldest (founded 1946) institute for amateur chamber musicians to study with professional concert artists.

A devoted advocate for contemporary music, Phillip Bush performed worldwide for 20 years with both the Philip Glass Ensemble and Steve Reich and Musicians, in venues ranging from the Sydney Opera House to the Acropolis in Athens. He has also worked first-hand directly with many of the most significant American composers of our time, from John Adams to Charles Wuorinen. The New York Times has said "Mr. Bush may be one of the few pianists who can play both Elliott Carter’s music and Philip Glass' with equal persuasiveness." Mr. Bush's efforts on behalf of contemporary music have earned him grants and awards from the Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust, the Aaron Copland Fund, ASCAP, Chamber Music America and the National Endowment for the Arts. His discography as soloist and chamber musician has now reached over 45 recordings on labels such as Sony, Virgin Classics, Koch International, ASV, New World Records, Denon, Cedille, and many others.

Mr. Bush is a graduate of the Peabody Conservatory, where he studied with Leon Fleisher. From 2000 to 2004, Mr. Bush taught piano and chamber music at the University of Michigan, and he has also served as Visiting Faculty at the University of North Carolina. Since 2012 Phillip Bush has been a member of the piano and chamber music faculty at the University of South Carolina School of Music.