about us

The Bayberry String Quartet is emerging onto the concert scene with recent appearances at Carnegie Hall and the Chautauqua Institute. Other recent concerts include performances at the Lincoln Center Chamber Music Society’s CMS Kids, Ridotto Series, White Lake Chamber Music Festival, Chamber Music @ AEIVA, and Fairlane Music Guild, among others. Only in their sixth season, they have enjoyed residencies at the Chicago Suzuki Institute, STEP Birmingham Chamber Music Workshop, Peaks to Plains Institute in Colorado, and PhoenixPhest in Michigan. They have an innovative virtual presence through online collaboration and videos, including work with arranger Rami Vamos and drummer Pete Siers to perform “Frankenstein” by the Edgar Winter Group. BSQ also created a virtual chamber music approach in a program called PhoenixPhest Virtual where they coached student and professional groups across North America in a dozen online workshops. Through their individual and collaborative work, the four musicians have impacted the lives of thousands of musicians.

In June of 2024, BSQ released an album of early Mozart quartets titled “Only Mozarts in the Building.”

Violinist NURIT PACHT was a top prize winner in international competitions including the Irving Klein International Music Competition in California and the Tibor Varga International Violin Competition in Switzerland. As a soloist she was featured in major world events such as the European conference for the inauguration of the Euro in Brussels and under the auspices of the European Commission and United Nations she toured the former Yugoslavia, during the cease-fire in 1996. In 2015, she performed for Pope Francis on his visit to New York and gave a State Department funded recital tour of Ukraine. She has collaborated with stage director Robert Wilson, choreographers such as Bill T. Jones and has worked closely with many of today’s celebrated composers. She has toured as soloist with orchestras around the world including the Houston Symphony, the Pacific Symphony, the Rhode Island Philharmonic and the Israel Chamber Orchestra. The Israeli Composer Noam Sheriff dedicated the violin concerto “Dibrot” to her and she performed it in several prestigious venues of Israel. As a baroque violinist, she has a master’s degree from Juilliard’s Historical Performance program. Ms. Pacht has recorded for Nimbus Records and Toccata Classics.

Violinist STEFFANI KITAYAMA splits her time performing, teaching, and dancing with a small ballet company in Michigan. She holds performance degrees from the University of Cincinnati College Conservatory Music and Northwestern University where she studied with Won Bin Yim and Blair Milton. While residing in District of Columbia the past few years, she performed with the Grammy nominated Inscape Chamber Orchestra, the New Orchestra of Washington and various chamber music collaborations throughout the States. A passionate chamber musician, she has studied with some of the great quartet players, notably Mathias Tacke of the Vermeer Quartet and has performed in collaboration with YoYo Ma, Simon Fischer, Peter Salaff, and members of the Cavani Quartet, Lincoln Trio and Artemis Quartet. As a teacher, she has taught in a variety of settings from public school outreach to group classes and private lessons. She currently maintains a private studio with her husband, Gabe Bolkosky in Ann Arbor, Michigan and teaches at institutes across the States and abroad.

Violist GABE BOLKOSKY has performed and taught across the United States and abroad. Primarily a violinist, he performs a diverse repertory of classical and contemporary works with different collaborative artists from many genres of music making. Gabe released seven CDs that show his breadth as a musician focused in the areas of contemporary music, jazz and tango as well as traditional classical music. Over the last two decades, Gabe spent six years as Guest Artist at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor teaching 18violin and chamber music and as the Executive Director of The Phoenix Ensemble, a nonprofit organization dedicated to being a musical resource for artists and educational institutions. Gabe also directs PhoenixPhest! and PhoenixPhest! Grande, two amateur chamber music festivals held each May and August intent on creating an environment open to all levels and ages of musicians. Recently, he founded the organization, Musicians Take a Stand, encouraging musicians to hold concerts for humanitarian causes and raise money through social media platforms.

Cellist LAURA USISKIN has performed throughout North America and Europe in such venues as the Kennedy Center, Alice Tully Hall, Palazzo Chigi Saracini (Italy), Weill Hall, and Barge Music. With a penchant for music both old and new, she worked as a Baroque cellist and has also premiered dozens of works as well as commissioned works in her name. In 2011, Usiskin founded the Montgomery Music Project, an El Sistema strings program for students in Montgomery, Alabama. The program has given intensive string instruction to hundreds of low-income children across three counties. Usiskin has held orchestral positions with the New Haven Symphony, Jacksonville Symphony, and Orchestra Iowa. In addition to the Bayberry String Quartet, Usiskin is a core member of the Atlanta-based new music group ensemble vim. She has served on the faculty at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, through which she founded the series “Chamber Music @ AEIVA,” as well as Birmingham-Southern College. Usiskin graduated cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts in Neuroscience and Behavior from Columbia University, Master of Music from The Juilliard School, and Doctor of Musical Arts from the Yale School of Music, where she was awarded the Aldo Parisot Prize. She currently lives in Atlanta.