FSU College of Music presents the Faculty Recital of Shannon Thomas, violin and Stijn DeCock, piano on March 25th at 7:30pm in Longmire Recital Hall.  The program will include three of Johannes Brahms' violin sonatas (Sonata No. 1 in G Major, Op. 78; Sonata No. 2 in A Major, Op. 100; and Sonata No. 3 in D Minor, Op. 108).

Violinist Shannon Thomas has garnered a reputation for exciting, thoughtful performances as a chamber musician, soloist, and in recital throughout North and South America, Europe, and Asia. Recent performing engagements have taken her to the Kennedy Center, Spoleto Festival USA, Bolivia’s Centro Sinfonico in La Paz, and the Banff Centre where she has collaborated with distinguished artists such as St. Lawrence String Quartet, David Halen, Richard King, Wendy Chen, and Anita Pontremoli.

An active performer, Shannon has appeared at Innsbrook Summer Music Festival, Sarasota Music Festival, Kneisel Hall, Aspen Music Festival, with the Bryant Park Chamber Players in NYC and IRIS Orchestra under the direction of Michael Stern. Shannon has recorded for Blue Griffin, and her CD celebrating the music of Lera Auerbach, Ellen Zwilich, and Jennifer Higdon was released last fall.

She serves as Assistant Professor of Violin at FSU and has taught at Kinhaven Music School, Stony Brook University, University of Southern Mississippi, the Cleveland Institute of Music, Interlochen Arts Camp and Innsbrook Institute Summer Music Academy, where she served as Education Director. This summer, Shannon will be teaching and performing at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Luby Violin Symposium, Brancaleoni International Music Festival, and Hilton Head Chamber Music Institute.

Shannon earned a DMA at the Cleveland Institute of Music, where she was Paul Kantor’s assistant; she also holds degrees from Yale University and Vanderbilt University. She studied chamber music with Peter Salaff, Christopher von Baeyer, Laurie Smukler and members of the Juilliard, Blair, Tokyo, and Cavani String Quartets. Her principal teachers have included Paul Kantor, Cornelia Heard, Robert Lipsett, and Ani Kavafian. For more information, please visit shannonthomasviolin.com.

Stijn De Cock, Assistant Professor of Piano, maintains an active musical career as a soloist, chamber musician, and teaching artist in the United States and abroad. His playing has been described as “alternating between the stormy and sublime, while getting to the heart of the music” and was praised for its ability to create “a most compelling musical narrative” (Amalfi Festival concert review). In recent years, Dr. De Cock’s concert seasons have included concerts on four continents, from the North America to Europe, Asia, and Africa. As the founding director or the Brancaleoni International Music Festival, Dr. De Cock has created a large-scale international summer festival in Italy that offers a unique, intensive, and integrated artistic learning environment to aspiring young pianists, singers, and string players from around the world. Dr. De Cock has taught and held faculty positions at the State University of New York Fredonia, University of Wisconsin Stevens Point, the University of Michigan, Schoolcraft College, and Albion College. He holds an undergraduate degree from the Royal Conservatory of Music in Brussels, and a Master’s and Doctorate of Musical Arts from the University of Michigan.