Brentano Quartet – October 9-10, 2025

Thursday, October 9-10, 2025

Brentano Quartet

Location: First Community Church – Joplin

Time: 7:00 PM

The Brentano String Quartet

Mark Steinberg, violin
Serena Canin, violin
Misha Amory, viola
Nina Lee, cello

With a career spanning over three decades, the Brentano Quartet has appeared throughout the world to popular and critical acclaim. The New York Times extols its “luxuriously warm sound [and] yearning lyricism; and the Times (London) hails their “wonderful, selfless music-making.” Known for its unique sensibility, probing interpretive style, and original programming, the Quartet has performed across five continents in the world’s most prestigious venues and festivals, thus establishing itself as one of the world’s preeminent ensembles.

Dedicated and highly sought after as educators, the Quartet has served as Artists-in-Residence at the Yale School of Music for the past decade. They also lead the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival and appear regularly at the Taos School of Music. Previously, the Quartet served for fifteen years as Ensemble-in-Residence at Princeton University.

In the 2025-26 concert season, the Quartet will tour throughout North America, including concerts in New York, Boston, Chicago, Vancouver, Detroit, San Francisco, and Denver. They will perform the complete Mozart Quintets with violist Hsin-Yun Huang in Philadelphia. Further afield, they will tour Spain in November 2025 and elsewhere in Europe in March 2026.

Formed in 1992, The Brentano Quartet has received numerous accolades, including, in 1995, the prestigious Naumburg and Cleveland Quartet Awards. They have been privileged to collaborate with such artists as sopranos Jessye Norman and Dawn Upshaw; mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato; as well as pianists Mitsuko Uchida and Jonathan Biss. The Quartet has commissioned works from some of the most important composers of our time, including Bruce Adolphe, Matthew Aucoin, Gabriela Frank, Stephen Hartke, Vijay Iyer, Steven Mackey, Charles Wuorinen, Lei Liang, James MacMillan, and Melinda Wagner.

Notable recordings include Beethoven’s Quartet, Op. 131 (Aeon) which was featured in the 2012 film “A Late Quartet,” starring Philip Seymour Hoffman and Christopher Walken, and a 2017 live album with Joyce DiDonato, “Into the Fire—Live from Wigmore Hall” (Warner) Their most recent release features the K. 428 and K. 465 (“Dissonance”) Quartets of Mozart for the Azica label.

The Quartet is named for Antonie Brentano, whom many scholars consider to be Beethoven’s “Immortal Beloved,” the intended recipient of his famous love confession.

Updated June 2025. Please discard previous or undated versions.

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Emlyn Johnson

Emlyn currently serves as Creative Director of Pro Musica. Emlyn’s background as a classically trained flutist, educator, and presenter eventually led her to Missouri, where she taught in the music department at Missouri State University and was the Executive Director for Pro Musica from 2021 – 2023. She is the co-director of the American Wild Ensemble and performs regularly around the state and beyond, and is an adjunct instructor of Flute at UMKC Conservatory in Kansas City, MO. Emlyn holds a doctorate from the Eastman School of Music and holds additional degrees from Eastman and the University of Michigan. She is responsible for creative and artistic aspects of Pro Musica and guides the selection process of concerts, reporting to the Board of Directors

Joani Zibert

Joani serves as the incoming Executive Director of Pro Musica, bringing more than 17 years of executive leadership experience across nonprofit governance, arts education innovation, K-12 and postsecondary education development, public and private funding strategy, legal compliance, and organizational growth. A nationally recognized school founder and non-profit executive, she has secured millions in public and private funding, built high-performing organizations from the ground up, and guided boards through periods of transformation, scale, and long-term sustainability at the local, state, and national levels.

Joani is the founder and former Board President of Doral Academy of Nevada, where she led the creation and expansion of an arts-integrated school system now serving over 5,000 students, transforming community frustration over the loss of arts education into an award-winning model of creative excellence.

Originally from the 4-States area, with Slovenian grandparents, she has worked nationally gaining a professional background that includes serving in varying roles including President of nonprofits, Director of Operations, Director of Law & Policy, Director of Grants, Director of Marketing, and senior executive advisor roles. Joani is known for aligning missions with measurable impact while bridging vision, governance, and execution. Her work is rooted in the belief that the arts are not an accessory to education or community life, but a catalyst for connection, economic vitality, and generational change.

As Executive Director of Pro Musica, Joani brings a bold, forward-focused approach centered on organizational excellence, financial sustainability, expanded community engagement, and the elevation of Pro Musica’s role as a cultural cornerstone. She leads with clarity, courage, and collaboration while committed to honoring Pro Musica’s legacy as we build the next chapter with strength and momentum.