BOULDER SUZUKI STRINGS - Key Persons
Now based in Boulder, Colorado, Dr. Winter is a faculty member of Boulder Suzuki Strings, performs with the Boulder Philharmonic, and has appeared with the Colorado Music Festival. He earned a Doctorate of Musical Arts degree from the University of Colorado Boulder, where he was the teaching assistant of Fritz Gearhart and Charles Wetherbee. He also holds degrees from the University of Minnesota, University of Miami, and the Lynn Conservatory. His previous teachers include Mark Bjork, Carol Cole, and Charles Castleman. His forthcoming album Origin: Music by Women of the Americas with pianist Barbara Noyes explores the music of Jennifer Higdon, Gabriela Lena Frank, Dana Kaufman, and Leilehua Lanzilotti.
Emily Anne Bowman is an active performer and educator. Ms. Bowman is a founding member and principal viola of the Baroque Chamber Orchestra of Colorado and has performed as guest artist with Seicento Baroque Ensemble, Parish House Baroque, Baroque Out of Bounds and the Early Music Happy Hour Chamber Concert series. Ms. Bowman especially enjoys working with young musicians and keeps a regular schedule as Artistic Director of the Greater Boulder Youth Orchestra and conductor of the GBYO Philharmonic, as faculty with Boulder Suzuki Strings where she teaches violin, viola, fiddle and conducts the Senior Solo Orchestra, and as faculty at Shining Mountain Waldorf School where she teaches grades 3-12 violin, viola and orchestra.
Ms. Bowman has been recognized with the "Exemplary Teacher" award four times by the American Strings Teachers Association of Colorado. Interested in sharing her love and enthusiasm for baroque performance practice, she guest coaches youth symphonies, school orchestras and chamber groups in period performance practice and has presented and led workshops at state and national educator conferences. Ms. Bowman graduated summa cum laude with a degree in Viola Performance from the University of Colorado, receiving the Gabor Ormai Viola Award. She lives with her husband David Crowe in beautiful Boulder, Colorado where in addition to making music she delights in eating and spending time outdoors.
Flori Muller is an active violin and SECE (Suzuki Early Childhood Education) teacher. Born and raised in Houston, TX, she began her violin studies as a Suzuki student at Parker Elementary (a Suzuki in the Schools elementary school). Having taught violin for more than twenty-five years, Flori has previously maintained violin studios in Tennessee, Minnesota, Colorado, and Texas, and directed and taught Suzuki Violin at a Suzuki in the Schools program in two elementary schools in Spring Branch, Texas. While in Spring Branch, she also directed the week long summer festival, Fiddler's Fair, that is held there each summer.
Flori currently teaches violin on the faculty of Boulder Suzuki Strings and co-owns Prelude Music, LLC, where she partner teaches weekly SECE classes. In addition, she served as the Assistant SECE Coordinator for the 2018 SAA Conference and as the SECE Coordinator for the 2020 Conference.
She has led clinics and sectionals for schools, officiated at competitions, been published in the American Suzuki Journal, featured in various SAA video sessions for their online seminar Parents and Partners Online, presented sessions at the SAA conference, has been a guest clinician (violin, SECE teacher, and presented parent talks) for many Suzuki workshops across the US as well as at Peaks to Plains Suzuki Institute. She has also served as Vice President, President, and Past President on the board of HASSA (Houston Area Suzuki Strings Association), now STXSA.
She holds a Bachelor of Music degree in Violin Performance (magna cum laude) from the Blair School of Music at Vanderbilt University, a double Master of Music degree in Violin Performance and Suzuki Violin Pedagogy from the University of Minnesota Twin Cities, and earned candidacy for the Doctorate of Musical Arts degree from the University of Colorado Boulder in Violin Performance and Violin Pedagogy. Her collegiate violin teachers include Henry Rubin, Connie Heard, Sally O'Reilly, and Jennifer John. She has SAA registered training in Suzuki Violin books 1-10 and Stages 1-5 SECE training. She is honored to have studied pedagogy with Connie Heard, Sally O'Reilly, Mark Bjork, William Starr, Dorothy Jones, Sharon Jones, and Danette Schuh.
Among the many memories she cherishes growing up a Suzuki violinist herself, there is one she will never forget- in the summer of 1989 she was invited to travel with a group of Suzuki students and teachers to participate in the 9th Suzuki Method International Conference and Summer School in Matsumoto, Japan. Traveling to Japan, meeting Dr. Suzuki and taking group classes with him as well as with other international faculty, alongside Suzuki students from around the world, continues to inspire her and her teaching.
Flori lives in beautiful Broomfield, CO with her husband and two children. In addition to teaching, her passions include photography and baking.
Helena Schumann began learning violin at age six with Amy Gesmer-Packman in Boulder Suzuki Strings. Before college, she took Every Child Can and Suzuki Book 1 training with William Starr. Helena graduated with highest honors from the University of Colorado Boulder with a Bachelor of Music in Violin Performance. She received her Master of Music in Violin Performance with an emphasis in Suzuki Pedagogy from the Hartt School of Music in West Hartford, Connecticut, where she studied with Teri Einfeldt. Her collegiate teachers include Harumi Rhodes, Margaret Gutierrez, Claude Sim, and Katie Lansdale.
In her time at the University of Colorado, Helena performed with every orchestra they offered. At the Hartt School, she was concertmaster of the Hartt Opera orchestra for their production of Copland's The Tender Land, as well as principal second violin for Vivaldi's Autumn with Sirena Huang. Helena has also performed with the Boulder Messiah Singalong orchestra for four years.
When she is not practicing, performing, or teaching, Helena enjoys making origami.
Karen Pring has had a life-long passion for playing the violin. She began taking lessons at the age of nine and has enjoyed playing in orchestras, small groups and as a solo performer ever since. She loves working with students and maintains a growing violin studio in Superior.
She was actively involved in music throughout her college years continuing her studies with Marcia Henry Liebenow and Walter Olivares and performing as a member of the Missoula Symphony, Glacier Symphony Orchestra and the University of Montana Orchestra. She is currently Assistant Concertmaster of the Jefferson Symphony Orchestra and has performed with the group for the past 34 years. She also often plays for church services as a soloist and in a worship band. In her free time, she enjoys playing in local bluegrass jams. Over the years, she has played in special performances including events with Amy Grant, Art Garfunkel, Smokey Robinson and Doc Severinsen.
She has completed a Suzuki Violin Pedagogy Certificate graduate program at the University of Denver's Lamont School of Music which included comprehensive training in Suzuki Books 1-8. She also completed SAA registered training in Suzuki Violin Books 9 and 10 studying with Kathleen Spring in an international study abroad trip to Vienna, Austria. She has done additional pedagogical training with Beth Cantrell, Charles Krigbaum, Edward Krietman, Kimberly Meier-Sims, Ann Montzka-Smelser, Stephen Sims, William Starr and Crystal Plohman Wiegman including the courses Suzuki Principals in Action, Musicality from the Beginning and Supplementary Repertoire for Books 6-8 as well as others. She has also enjoyed violin studies with Margaret Gutierrez.
Karen feels privileged to have had both of her daughters start violin lessons at an early age through the BSS program and continue through their high school years. Both girls have developed a love of the violin that has carried into their college years. Karen has traveled with the Boulder Suzuki Strings Tour Group to Costa Rica in 2014, 2016 and 2018. By being her daughters' "at-home" teacher, she has gained a great deal of insight into the many benefits and occasional challenges involved in having a child learn the violin.
Karen also enjoys photography, hiking, biking and tap dancing.