Originally from South Korea, Violinist YuEun Gemma Kim started playing piano at age 5 and violin at 7, although she enjoyed singing Korean and American pop songs from the 80’s with her father the most. She also used to play organ every Wednesday at 6am at the church services.

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She moved to the US about 7 years ago to study at University of Southern California under the tutelage of violinist Midori Goto. She is not a big fan of competitions, however, she has been participating in quite a few of them and has won first place in USC’s Solo Bach Competition and the Strings Concerto Competition, and was a semi-finalist at the Qingdao International Violin Competition (China) and the Michael Hill International Violin Competition (New Zealand). The most memorable competition was the Boulder International Competition: Art of Duo where  she won second prize in 2018.

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YuEun started exploring more of the early music repertoire, and this season, she is invited to play with various Baroque ensembles including Musica Angelica Baroque Orchestra, American Bach Soloists, Boulder Bach Festival and Blue Hill Bach in Maine. She was one of the recipients of the 2021 American Bach Soloists’ Jeffrey Thomas Award.

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YuEun is a core member of Delirium Musicum, a self-conducted chamber orchestra based in Los Angeles. During the pandemic, Delirium Musicum created MusiKaravan that took YuEun and Artistic Director Etienne Gara to the road in a vintage Volkswagen bus to perform socially-distanced concerts for farm workers, winemakers, random passerby, and even the occasional ostrich. The video episodes of this musical journey can be found on Youtube.

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Her Chopin’s Nocturne video on YouTube has over 10 million views. The funniest moment in her performing career was when she noticed Itzhak Perlman was in the audience; she couldn’t turn the pages and she ended up playing the whole Haydn string quartet by heart.

German-born guitarist Ines Thomé is a multifaceted musician and educator. She has completed a Bachelor and Master’s degree in Germany, and in 2018 earned her Doctor of Musical Arts degree at University of Southern California, Los Angeles.

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Ines is a passionate chamber musician who performs diverse repertoires with a variety of instrumental ensembles. Her ensembles Yu&I Duo with violinist YuEun Kim, and Gifts From Over Sea with soprano Katina Mitchell, have toured extensively in California. Gifts From Over Sea recently toured Italy and Germany where they performed in medieval castles and churches, which included a collaboration with UNESCO and Museo Civico Castelbuono. On multiple occasions she was invited to join the Colburn Orchestra, performing under the batons of John Adams and Matthias Pintscher, and the USC.

Symphony Orchestra with performances in Walt Disney Concert Hall, conducted by Carl St. Clair. Even as a young student Ines won first prizes as a solo and chamber musician in national competitions - later in her career she received awards from numerous international competitions in Germany, Italy, and the United States, including First Prizes at the Beverley Hills National Auditions, the International Guitar Competition in Walnut Creek, California and the American Guitar Society’s Bickford Competition in 2015.

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Ines’ academic interests include historical performance practice; in addition to classical guitar Ines enjoys playing lute, theorbo, and baroque guitar. In 2017 she performed original continuo realization in Handel’s Alcina for the USC Opera, and has performed on period instruments with the American Contemporary Ballet company in Los Angeles and at the Berkeley Early Music Festival. Her passion for early music was honored with a special prize for the best interpretation of a work by Johann Sebastian Bach at the International Guitar Competition in Erwitte, Germany.

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This year’s projects include concerts with violinist YuEun Kim throughout the U.S., international engagements with German violinist Puschan Mousavi Malvani, a CD of the yet unrecorded chamber works for guitar by Ian Krouse, and didactic recordings for the online platform EliteGuitarist.com. Ines currently lives in Columbus, GA with her husband Michael and son Vincent.