Onomatopoeia Director, Cello Faculty

The American cellist, Steuart Pincombe, quickly made a name for himself as an exquisite interpreter of early and contemporary music who was keen to experiment. Steuart is regularly featured as a soloist and chamber musician in in leading venues across North America and Europe including Amsterdam Concertgebouw, Muziekgebouw aan ’t IJ, Concertgebouw Brugge, RADIALSYSTEM V Berlin, Bozar Brussels, Tivoli Vredenburg, Carnegie Hall, The Kennedy Center, and the Kauffman Center, but he is equally at home playing in your local cafe or brewery. His playing has garnered wide acclaim from the public and critics alike: The Philadelphia Inquirer calls him “a gorgeous player with perfect intonation, imaginative phrasing”, The Strad Magazine refers to him as a “superb soloist”, virtuoso cellist Giovanni Sollima calls Steuart “a complete artist, true virtuoso and poet, totally at ease with all languages and musical styles”, and an audience member once said “You’da asked me a week ago if I’sa gonna be here, I’da said ‘hell no’. Well I’m here - and I love this stuff [Bach]”.

In addition to his numerous chamber engagements, he has appeared as soloist with ensembles such as Solistenensemble Kaleidoskop (DE), Holland Baroque (NL), Wallfisch Band (UK), Symphonie Atlantique (NL), Apollos Fire (US), and the Springfield (MO) Symphony (US). His concert 'Bach&Beer' was selected by the Cleveland Plain Dealer as one of the 'Top 10 Classical Events of the Year' and a concert in which he appeared as soloist with Rene Schiffer and Apollo's Fire was numbered in London's '5 Best Classical Music Moments of 2014' according to The Telegraph (UK). If you can't hear him live, Steuart makes regular appearances on radio and has been featured on BBC, CBC, NPO, and NPR and has recently begun recording for 7 Mountain Records in Amsterdam.

Onomatopoeia Guest Violin Faculty

Concertmaster, Asko|Shönberg, Professor of Violin, Royal Conservatory of The Hague

Violinist Joseph Puglia is driven by a search to find new approaches and connections with his audience. Critics have praised his “mindblowing” performances (Luister), and the “amazing, magical moments” he creates in concert, saying that “on the way home you notice that your ears have opened – even the familiar noise of the city sounds different” (De Volkskrant).
Current projects include “Voices of the Violin”, which will connect audience members and composers in exploring how the sound of a violin itself influences our musical experiences. This project will culminate in a series of new commissioned works, to be recorded and premiered in 2023. He is also studying the music of Pauline Oliveros, researching how her philosophy can be used to form deeper connections between performers and audiences.
Joseph teaches at the Royal Conservatory of The Netherlands, in The Hague, where he has resided since 2010. Born in New York, he studied at the School for Strings and Juilliard's Pre-College division with Louise Behrend, earned his Bachelor's degree from Juilliard studying with Robert Mann and Nicholas Mann, and received his Master's degree at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague, studying with Vera Beths. Important musical mentors have also included Anner Bylsma, Joel Krosnick, Barbara Hannigan, and Laurie Smukler.

Onomatopoeia Guest Viola Faculty

Viola, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra

The Italian violist Martina Forni grew up surrounded by many kinds of music. The equally diverse musical activities she would later employ, from baroque to contemporary music passing through jazz and Argentinian tango, turned her into an eclectic musician.
Martina Forni graduated magna cum laude at both the Conservatory of Verona and the Conservatorium van Amsterdam. Among her teachers and mentors were Nobuko Imai, Michael Gieler, Umberto Forni and Anner Bylsma.
In 2013 she joined the viola section of the Concertgebouw orchestra. Previously she was a member of the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra and played with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Asko|Schönberg for many years.
Martina Forni is co-founder of the prize-winning Ensemble Lumaka, she was a member of GoYa Quartet Amsterdam for five years and plays now in Il Faro Quartet. She also plays baroque viola and has been principle violist of Anima Eterna Brugge, Ensemble Zefiro and La Chambre Philharmonique.
Martina enjoys teaching viola and chamber music. In 2019 and 2020 she gave masterclasses to the South African Youth Orchestra and since 2020 is teaching music performance on original instrument at the Mahler Chamber Orchestra Summer Academy in Dobbiaco.

Onomatopoeia Guest Cello Faculty

Principal Cello, Apollo’s Fire; Professor of Historical Cello, Cleveland Institute of Music

Is there any connection between Einstein's discovery of relativity in 1905, Schoenberg's first employment of atonality in 1909 and Kandinsky's first non-figurative painting in or around 1910? Schiffer, principal cellist of Apollo's Fire, is convinced there is, and is passionate in sharing his discoveries of the essence of music and the arts as mirrors of the human experience. Historical performance is only a part of this quest, as much of what he thinks of as truth in music transcends the mere historicity of the instruments and the musical styles. Schiffer's playing, composing and lecturing is dedicated to the uncovering of these truths, and the joy music is supposed, by its nature, to provide the player and the listener.

Schiffer is the founding continuo cellist and soloist in Apollo’s Fire led by the incomparable, orange-haired Jeannette Sorrell. His various performances brought him in many a major hall in Europe and the US, including the Concertgebouw (Amsterdam and Bruges), the Opéra in Paris, the Arena in Verona, the Arsenal in Metz, Teatro Colon (Buenos Ayres), Teatro Municipal in Madrid, the Franz Liszt Hall in Budapest etc. He did solo performances at festivals in Utrecht, Versailles (yes, the Palace!) Budapest, Tallinn, and Grandchamp (yes, the Monument). Schiffer is affiliated with Music in Familiar Spaces, a program designed by Charles Steuart Wesley Pincombe to bring classical music to places where it is actually unfamiliar.