BELINDA MCFARLANE
Violin
Youth Education Programme Advisor; Director – London Symphony Orchestra; 2nd Violin – London Symphony Orchestra; Fiorini piano trio

Australian Hometown: Adelaide
Education: Elder Conservatorium

BIOGRAPHY
Belinda studied at the Elder Conservatorium, Adelaide university. Joining AYO in 1984, she became Leader in 1988 for the orchestra’s Grand Bicentennial European Tour, culminating in a Prom concert at the Royal Albert Hall, London. She liked it so much she stayed!
As a member of the London Symphony Orchestra and Fiorini piano trio Belinda performs regularly throughout the world. She is a dedicated member of the LSO’s Discovery team teaching and workshop leading with playing and non-playing musicians of all ages and ability in London and abroad. Most notably as a lead instigator on the Take A Bow project in London and Paris, preparing string players of all abilities to perform alongside the LSO at the Barbican and Salle Pleyel, and the LSO’s On Track programme which included training an orchestra of East London school children to perform Elgar’s ‘Nimrod’ at the Opening Ceremony of the 2012 London Olympics.
In 2013 she appeared in a Channel 4 documentary as an LSO mentor for the ‘Addicts’ Orchestra’. A Director of the LSO, she also sits on the orchestra’s Education Liaison Committee. With Fiorini she has led chamber music masterclasses and music workshops in schools and communities in the UK, France, Australia and Zimbabwe and is a teacher of string chamber music at the Junior Guildhall of Music and Drama. Belinda enjoys returning to Australia to work for the AYO and to perform as a member of the Australian World Orchestra – for which she is also their Youth Education Programme Advisor.
Belinda graduated from Elder Conservatorium, Adelaide University with a First Class Honours degree, and plays a on a Giuseppe Fiorini violin.

SHARON GRIGORYAN
Cello

Supported by Ezekiel Solomon AM

Associate Principal Cello – Adelaide Symphony Orchestra; Former – Melbourne Symphony Orchestra; Australian String Quartet

Australian Hometown: Melbourne
Education:University of Melbourne; Australian National Academy of Music

BIOGRAPHY
Based in Adelaide, Sharon Grigoryan was the cellist with the Australian String Quartet from 2013-2020. As part of that group, she has collaborated with artists such as the Goldner and Tinalley Quartets, Pieter Wispelwei, Sara Macliver, Slava Grigoryan, Pepe Romero, Wolfgang Muthspiel, Katie Noonan, Konstantin Shamray, Caroline Almonte, and the Melbourne, Sydney, Tasmanian and West Australian Symphony Orchestras.

Born in Melbourne, Sharon studied at the University of Melbourne and the Australian National Academy of Music (ANAM) under David Berlin, Philip Green, and Howard Penny. From 2008-2012 Sharon held a position with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, and in 2011 Sharon was a recipient of the MSO Friends’ Travel Scholarship which took her to Berlin to study with Professor Wolfgang Emanuel Schmidt and Nicolas Alsteadt. Whilst there she performed with the Mahler Chamber Orchestra and Spira Mirabilis Chamber Orchestra.

An avid chamber musician, Sharon performed in the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra’s Chamber Players series many times, and in 2009 she formed the Hopkins String Quartet. In the same year, she was accepted into the Australian Chamber Orchestra’s Emerging Artists program and has toured extensively with the ACO both nationally and abroad since then. Sharon was also made a Core Player of the Melbourne Chamber Orchestra in 2012.

Sharon has performed as a guest with the Australia Ensemble and Australian World Orchestra and has been invited to be guest principal cellist with the Melbourne, Adelaide, and Tasmanian Symphony Orchestras. Sharon was the Artistic Director of the “Barossa, Baroque and Beyond” music festival from 2013-2021. In 2019 Sharon curated a chamber music series, “Live at the Quartet Bar” as part of the Adelaide Festival Centre and made her debut as a radio presenter on ABC Classic.

Apart from teaching the cello privately, Sharon has tutored ensembles such as the Melbourne Youth Orchestra, the Australian Youth Orchestra, is on staff at the University of Adelaide, and been a guest chamber music tutor at ANAM and the University of Melbourne.

Sharon formed the cello/guitar duo with husband Slava Grigoryan in 2014, and this has been a particularly joyful musical and personal collaboration for her. She is currently on contract as acting Associate Principal Cello of the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra. 

HUW JONES
Oboe

Section Principal – Queensland Symphony Orchestra

Australian Hometown: Brisbane
Education:Sydney Conservatorium of Music; Royal College of Music, London

BIOGRAPHY
Huw Jones has been Principal Oboe of the Queensland Symphony Orchestra since 2013. He has appeared as an oboist with every major symphony orchestra in Australia and New Zealand, as well as Guest Principal Oboe with the Australia Chamber Orchestra, Irish Chamber Orchestra, and the Opera Australia Orchestra.

Huw graduated from the Sydney Conservatorium of Music with First-Class Honours, and later continued studies in London at the Royal College of Music. During this time in London Huw toured extensively across Europe and the U.S. with the Philharmonia Orchestra, Australia Chamber Orchestra and the Irish Chamber Orchestra. As well as playing in QSO, Huw regularly appears as a chamber musician with the Australia Ensemble and Ensemble Q. Huw is a faculty member of the University of Queensland School of Music, and the Queensland Conservatorium Griffith University. Huw loves teaching, conducting, performing and living in Brisbane alongside his one wife, two children and three chickens.

JUSTIN BEERE
Clarinet

Associate Principal Clarinet – Orchestra Victoria; Artistic Director – Melbourne Chamber Players; Director – Continuo Commissioning Circle; Music Educator; Former Clarinet – Rubiks Collective

Australian Hometown(s): Melbourne
Education:Australian National Academy of Music; Queensland Conservatorium of Music; University of Tasmania Conservatorium of Music

BIOGRAPHY
Justin is the Associate Principal Clarinet of Orchestra Victoria and the founding Artistic Director of the Melbourne Chamber Players. Justin has enjoyed a varied career, guesting regularly with leading Symphony Orchestras and chamber music festivals across Australia, New Zealand and Canada. Justin has appeared on numerous live broadcasts for ABC and 3mbs radio, Radio New Zealand, Opera Europa, and ABC Classics.

As a chamber musician, Justin has worked with leading chamber ensembles, Orava Quartet, Flinders Quartet, Arcadia Winds, Hindemith Wind Quintet, and the Melbourne Ensemble. He has also performed in the Port Fairy Music Festival, Peninsula Summer Music Festival, Bendigo Festival, Melbourne Festival, Music by the Springs, the Banff Summer Music Festival (Canada) and the Mackay Chamber Music Festival.

Passionate about new Australian music, Justin has commissioned many new works by Australian composers and has performed with award-winning new music ensembles Syzygy, Arcko Symphonic Project, Opus House and was a founding member of the Rubiks Collective. Memorable premieres include works by Deborah Cheetham, Nigel Sabin, Paul Dean, Brett Dean, Sam Smith, and Matthew Laing. Justin is also the director of the Continuo Commissioning Circle, a Victoria-based initiative to support the creation of new chamber music by local composers.

As an Alumnus and Fellow of the Australian National Academy of Music (ANAM), his teachers have included David Thomas, Paul Dean, Stephen Kenyon, and Floyd Williams. He has also performed in masterclasses with clarinetists Andrew Marriner, Michael Collins, Paul Meyer and Dimitri Ashkenazy, Thorsten Johanns, James Campbell, and Frank Celata to name a few. On full scholarship, Justin undertook study in the Professional Performance Program at ANAM, a Master of Music Research degree at the Queensland Conservatorium and several post-graduate degrees on an orchestral woodwind scholarship at the University of Tasmania Conservatorium of Music. He was also the winner of the Nelle Ashdown Memorial Award in 2011 and Robert and Elizabeth Albert Scholarship in 2019.

Justin is active as a music educator with extensive experience teaching in schools across Queensland and Victoria. He is has acted as associate lecturer at the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music and has also conducted masterclasses for the Queensland Conservatorium of Music. He looks forward to joining the Melbourne Conservatorium Young Artists Academy staff in 2022.

CASEY RIPPON
Horn

Bayerische Staatsoper; Lecturer Horn – University of Augsburg

Australian Hometown: Newcastle
Education: Newcastle Conservatorium of Music

BIOGRAPHY
Casey Rippon was born in 1983 in Newcastle, Australia. She studied with Geoff O’Reilly and Ben Jacks as part of her Bachelor of Music degree at Newcastle Conservatorium, also taking private lessons with Gail Williams in Chicago.

In Australia, Casey has played with Sydney Symphony, Australian Chamber Orchestra and is currently a member of the Australian World Orchestra. Casey moved to Germany in 2008 to Study in Stuttgart with Christian Lampert and Erich Penzel. In the same year, she played in Mannheim Nationaltheater in the Academy, before winning a job as Low Horn in the Frankfurt Opera in 2009.

Casey has been a member of The Bayerische Staatsoper since September 2011.