Kenichiro Matsuda

Violist and native of Japan, Kenichiro Matsuda came to the United States after three and a half years with the New Japan Philharmonic under Seiji Ozawa. He attended Kunitachi Music College in Tokyo and Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, IL., where he received his BM and MM in viola performance.

Ken was a member of the Grant Park Symphony, Grand Rapids Symphony, and Buffalo Philharmonic (Acting Assistant Principal Violist) before joining the Columbus Symphony Orchestra in 1987. He has also played with the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra and Chicago Symphony Orchestra as a regular substitute violist and has participated in touring and recording.

Besides teaching privately, he has taught viola at universities and colleges in Michigan and Ohio. Most recently, Ken taught at the University Cincinnati College Conservatory of Music (CCM) as an adjunct viola professor (2020 – 2022). He is currently an adjunct instructor at Capital University in Bexley, Ohio. Ken was on faculty at the Cshey Summer School of Music (Langhorn, PA) and MasterWorks Festival (Spartanburg, SC).

He is the violist of the Cygnus Quartet and enjoys playing chamber music with his colleagues. He toured Japan (1988) with the Columbus String Quartet as well as Estonia (1999) with the Songs Artis Quartet. As part of a Christian mission trip, he has been visiting Karuizawa, Japan regularly with a string ensemble since 2005. In 2018, Ken was invited to play with the Hiroshima Symphony Orchestra under Junichi Hirokami to perform Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony in Hiroshima, Japan.

He was formerly a part of the Nissen Duo (Viola and Piano) along with his late wife, Tanya.

For the past 27 years, he has been the conductor of “Hanamizuki no Kai”, the Japanese Women’s Chorus in Columbus, Ohio.

His teachers include Nobuko Imai, Jerry Horner, Bernard Zaslav, and Shumel Ashkenazi of the Vermeer Quartet.

Ken plays a viola made in 2020 by Tetsuo Matsuda (no relation) of Barrington, IL. 

Karl Pedersen

Gay Su Pinnell Chair

Karl Pedersen joined the Columbus Symphony as Principal Viola at the start of the 2011-12 season. In the summer, Karl performs at the Chautauqua Institution in New York as a member of the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra. Previously, he was rotating Principal Violist of the New World Symphony in Miami, FL for three years and was Principal Viola of the Breckenridge Music Festival for two years. He has recorded and performed with the Kansas City Symphony and performed with the Virginia Symphony Orchestra, Richmond Symphony, Cedar Rapids Symphony, and Quad Cities Symphony Orchestra. He has served as Concertmaster with the Oskaloosa and Ottumwa Symphony Orchestras.  

Born in Kansas City, MO, Karl received his Bachelor of Music at the University of Iowa under Christine Rutledge. He completed his Master of Music at the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University as a student of Victoria Chiang and former Philadelphia Orchestra violist, Stephen Wyrczynski.

In 2016, Karl performed a Showcase Performance Recital at the American Viola Society Festival at Oberlin College. He has performed the Bartok Viola Concerto with the Columbus Symphony Youth Orchestra and Mozart’s Sinfonia Concertante with the New Albany Symphony Orchestra. He previously enjoyed the role of Sancho Panza in a performance of Strauss’ Don Quixote with the Columbus Symphony.  

An avid chamber musician, Karl is a former member of the Meridian String Quartet, which held residencies from 2008-2011 at the Strings Music Festival in Steamboat Springs, CO. Outside the United States, he has performed in France, Spain, and the Dominican Republic, and he has appeared on stage preceding speeches by Colin Powell and Oprah. 

In 2005 and 2006, Karl was awarded the Peabody Career Development Grant. His chamber music performances can be heard on Performance Today on public radio. He is currently on faculty at Ohio Wesleyan University, and he has been a Greater Columbus Arts Council (GCAC) Columbus Makes Art featured artist since 2015.  

John Pellegrino

In addition to performing in the Columbus Symphony Orchestra (CSO), John Mark Pellegrino performs regularly in the Grand Teton Music Festival and serves as Principal Bass of the Peninsula Music Festival and ProMusica Chamber Orchestra. Calls from the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, The Cleveland Orchestra, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, Nashville Symphony, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, and Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra have allowed him to play, tour, and record with those ensembles. Other orchestral appearances have included concerts with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, North Carolina Symphony, Alabama Symphony Orchestra, Lake Placid Sinfonietta, New York Virtuosi, and Philharmonia Virtuosi of New York. Before moving to Ohio in 1989, John was a section member of the New Orleans Symphony Orchestra. 

Mr. Pellegrino earned degrees from the Manhattan School of Music and The Juilliard School, and he has served on the faculties of Ohio Wesleyan University, Eastern Music Festival (NC), Warwick Music Festival (RI), Kinhaven Music School (VT), and Chamber Music Connection in Worthington, OH. Currently, he is on the faculty at Capital University in Bexley, OH. In 2008, John was the recipient of the Ohio Private/Studio Teacher of the Year award given by the Ohio String Teachers’ Association. His students have won competitions held by the International Society of Bassists, Columbus Symphony Orchestra, Aspen Music Festival, Ohio String Teachers’ Association, Interlochen Arts Camp, and The Philadelphia Orchestra. 

Since 2007, John has been the Artistic Director of www.musiconthehillri.org. Additional chamber music performance appearances have included concerts at the Roycroft, Sarasota, Aspen, Waterloo, and Grand Teton music festivals as well as at Ohio State University’s Contemporary Music Festival, Sunday at Central recital series in Columbus, and the OWU•//•NOW Festival of Contemporary Music in Delaware, OH. John was born and raised in Warwick, RI and owes much to his family of music educators/performers, private teachers, public school music program in Warwick, and the Rhode Island Philharmonic Youth Orchestra program under the direction of Nedo Pandolfi.

Jessica Pasternak

Violist Jessica Pasternak Ingersoll joined the Columbus Symphony in June 2023. She grew up in Akron, Ohio, and started the viola at the age of 10. She later studied at the Cleveland Institute of Music in their Young Artists Program where she was a student of LembiVeskimets. She continued her studies with Robert Vernon and received a Bachelors and Professional Studies degrees as well as the Robert Vernon prize from the Cleveland Institute of Music. After graduating she was a fellow of the New World Symphony. 

Jessica has performed with The Cleveland Orchestra as a regular substitute and has joined them on multiple tours to Miami, Indiana, Iowa, and Chicago. She has also performed as a substitute with the Pittsburgh Symphony. In 2022, Jessica won the 2nd prize at the American Viola Society Excerpt Competition.  

As a chamber musician, Jessica has been praised by the South Florida Classical Review for her “dark-hued resonance” and “rich viola.” She has had the opportunity to perform with renowned artists including Atar Arad, Martin Chalifour, Timothy Eddy, Ralph Kirshbaum, TamásVarga, and Tabae Zimmerman.

Jena Huebner

Double bassist Jena Huebner, the daughter of a music educator mother and a physics professor father, was born in Southern California but grew up in Jacksonville, FL. She did her undergraduate studies with the renowned pedagogue Lawrence Hurst at Indiana University, where she also pursued her interests in ballet and early music. Jena’s graduate degree was done at the Peabody Institute with Harold Robinson, Principal Bassist of The Philadelphia Orchestra. While in Baltimore, MD, she had the privilege of playing in the Baltimore Chamber Orchestra, Peabody Early Music Ensemble, National Repertory Orchestra, and National Symphony Orchestra, among others. 

Jena served as Assistant Principal Bassist for the Knoxville Chamber and Symphony Orchestras in Tennessee for three years. After relocating to Louisville, KY, she performed regularly with the Louisville Orchestra, Lexington Philharmonic, and Louisville Mandolin Orchestra, while also making appearances with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and in her hometown with the Jacksonville Symphony. In 2000, Jena became a member of the Columbus Symphony Orchestra double bass section. Here in Columbus, she also has had the opportunity to perform with ProMusica Chamber Orchestra and the New Albany Symphony Orchestra and has been a featured soloist with the Otterbein University Symphony Orchestra.

When not engaged in musical pursuits, Jena enjoys vegetarian cooking, sewing, fitness, seeking beautiful natural settings, the wide variety of activities involved in parenting her two sons, and her pets. She also has developed a passion for home renovation, which has led her to pursue getting a real estate license.

Ann Schnapp

Ann Schnapp has been a member of the Columbus Symphony Orchestra since 1975. A native of Dayton, OH, Ann received a Bachelor of Music in Viola and a Master of Arts with emphasis in performance from The Ohio State University, studying with Robert Culver and Martin Kelly. She has been teaching violin and viola throughout Central Ohio for more than forty years, coaching students in area schools, and judging at regional music competitions. In addition, she is a faculty member at Chamber Music Connection. Ann plays with the Lakeside Symphony Orchestra every summer and has played with the ProMusica Chamber Orchestra. In 2006, she toured with Chamber Music Connection in Europe. Ann and her husband live in Westerville, OH.

Alice Risov

Originally from Detroit, MI, Violist Alice Risov began her musical education on the piano and violin but fell in love with the beautiful sound of the viola during her high school years. In the past, she has served as Section Viola in the Flint Symphony Orchestra and as Assistant and Acting Principal Viola of the Battle Creek Symphony Orchestra. She joined the viola section of the Columbus Symphony Orchestra in 2021.

Alice has been a part of multiple festivals and programs, including the Montecito International Music Festival, New York String Orchestra Seminar, and National Orchestral Institute + Festival under the baton of renowned conductor Marin Alsop. She also has performed on multiple prestigious stages, including Orchestra Hall in Detroit and Carnegie Hall.

Alice graduated in 2020 with both a Bachelor of Science in Neuroscience and a Bachelor of Music in Viola Performance from the University of Michigan. Despite heavily considering going into research, she eventually decided to continue pursuing her musical talents as a career. Alice completed one year of her master’s degree at the Cleveland Institute of Music before winning her position with the Columbus Symphony. Her primary teachers were Yitzhak Schotten and Lynne Ramsey.

Away from the viola, Alice can be found curled up with a good book and a mug of her favorite jasmine tea.