Hailed for his “trademark brilliance, penetrating sound and rich character” (The New York Times), clarinetist Anthony McGill is one of classical music’s most recognizable and brilliantly multifaceted figures. In addition to his dynamic international solo and chamber music career, McGill is principal clarinet of the New York Philharmonic—the first African-American principal player in the organization's history.

McGill’s album American Stories, with the Pacifica Quartet, won the 2021 GRAMMY for Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance. In 2020, he was awarded the Avery Fisher Prize, one of classical music’s most significant awards given in recognition of soloists who represent the highest level of musical excellence. He is Musical America’s 2024 Instrumentalist of the Year. McGill was honored to take part in the 2009 inauguration of President Barack Obama, premiering a piece written for the occasion by John Williams and performing alongside violinist Itzhak Perlman, cellist Yo-Yo Ma, and pianist Gabriela Montero.

McGill appears regularly as a soloist with top orchestras around North America, including the New York Philharmonic, Metropolitan Opera, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, San Diego Symphony, and Kansas City Symphony. In 2023, he  soloed in the US Premiere of Esa-Pekka Salonen's “Kínēma” for solo clarinet and orchestra with the New York Philharmonic. He performed “You Have the Right to Remain Silent” by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Anthony Davis with the Detroit and Boston Symphony Orchestras. He also served as the Orlando Philharmonic's Artist-in-Residence, and during this series of performances he premiered a new clarinet arrangement of the Bologne (Chevalier de Saint-Georges) Violin Concerto in A major, Op. 5, No. 2.

In June 2022, he performed as part of The Re-Collective Orchestra, the first-ever all-Black orchestra to play the Hollywood Bowl, in a CNN broadcast commemorating the first year Juneteenth was recognized as a federal holiday.

As a chamber musician, McGill is a favorite collaborator of the Brentano, Daedalus, Guarneri, JACK, Miró, Pacifica, Shanghai, Takács, and Tokyo Quartets, as well as Emanuel Ax, Inon Barnatan, Gloria Chien, Yefim Bronfman, Gil Shaham, Midori, Mitsuko Uchida, and Lang Lang.

In 2022-23, he reunited with the GRAMMY Award-winning Pacifica Quartet on a seven-city tour in support of their new album "American Stories" (Cedille Records). Each work on the album is by a living composer, and shares unique perspectives shaped by the American experience–being unhoused on Los Angeles’ Skid Row (Ben Shirley), the murder of four young girls in the 1963 Birmingham church bombing (Richard Danielpour), the early young life of Muhammed Ali (Valerie Coleman), and the encounter of indigenous Americans (James Lee III).

Anthony joined soprano Susanna Phillips and pianist Myra Huang in concerts in Cleveland and New York in 2023. He collaborated with comedian (and fellow clarinetist!) Kimberly Clark (“Tiffany Haddish Presents: They Ready - Season 2” on Netflix;) for a unique storytelling comedy project in development debuting at Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara in June 2023.

He has toured with Musicians from Marlboro and regularly performs for the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society. His festival appearances include Marlboro, Mainly Mozart, Ravinia, Skaneateles, Tanglewood, and the Music@Menlo, Santa Fe, and Seattle Chamber Music Festivals.

A graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music, McGill previously served as the principal clarinet of the Metropolitan Opera and associate principal clarinet of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra.

McGill is an ardent advocate for helping music education reach underserved communities and for addressing issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion in classical music. He serves on the faculty of The Juilliard School and the Curtis Institute of Music, where he holds the William R. and Hyunah Yu Brody Distinguished Chair. He is the Artistic Director for Juilliard’s Music Advancement Program, a weekend program dedicated to students who demonstrate a commitment to artistic excellence, which actively seeks young musicians from backgrounds underrepresented in classical music.

In 2020, in concert with a $30,000 charitable gift from the Avery Fisher Artist Program designated to a charity of McGill’s choice, McGill and Weston Sprott, Dean of the Preparatory Division of The Juilliard School, established the Weston Sprott and Anthony McGill MAP Summer Scholarship Fund so MAP students can take part in summer programs and festivals. In 2021 The Juilliard School announced a permanent endowment grant of $50 million for its Music Advancement Program (MAP) from Crankstart, which will fund full-tuition scholarships for all MAP students and program expansion.

In the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd on May 25, 2020, McGill launched a powerful musical protest video urging people to #TakeTwoKnees in demonstration against the death of George Floyd and historic racial injustice. His video went viral, and hundreds of artists and citizens amplified the message and responded to the protest with their own videos using the hashtag #TakeTwoKnees.

McGill has been covered in The New York Times and The New Yorker and has appeared on National Public Radio, Performance Today, and Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. He has served as the Artist-in-Residence for WQXR.

McGill recorded the Nielsen Clarinet Concerto with Alan Gilbert and the New York Philharmonic. His previous album with the Pacifica Quartet was Mozart and Brahms Clarinet Quintets. He and his brother, Demarre McGill, joined the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestras & Allen Tinkham, to record Winged Creatures, an album of works for flute, clarinet, and orchestra. Demarre and Anthony also recorded Portraits with pianist Michael McHale. In 2021, Anthony and pianist Gloria Chien released Here with You, an album of favorite works by Brahms, Weber, and Montgomery, longtime friends and frequent recital collaborators. McGill’s self-titled debut recording, also recorded with Chien, features early 20th century works by Gershwin, Rachmaninoff, Debussy, and Poulenc.

McGill serves on the board of directors for Cedille Records and the Harmony Program, and on the advisory councils for the InterSchool Orchestras of New York and Time In Children's Arts Initiative. He is a Backun Artist and performs exclusively on Backun Clarinets.

Carter Brey was appointed Principal Cello, The Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Chair, of the New York Philharmonic in 1996. He made his official subscription debut with the Orchestra in May 1997 performing Tchaikovsky’s Rococo Variations under the direction of then Music Director Kurt Masur. He has since appeared as soloist almost every season and was featured during The Bach Variations: A Philharmonic Festival, when he gave two performances of the cycle of all six of Bach’s cello suites. Most recently, he was the soloist in performances of Haydn’s Cello Concerto in C major at David Geffen Hall in February 2020 and at the Bravo! Vail Music Festival in July 2021, with Music Director Jaap van Zweden conducting on both occasions.

He rose to international attention in 1981 as a prizewinner in the Rostropovich International Cello Competition. The winner of the Gregor Piatigorsky Memorial Prize, Avery Fisher Career Grant, Young Concert Artists’ Michaels Award, and other honors, he also was the first musician to win the Arts Council of America’s Performing Arts Prize.

Brey has appeared as soloist with virtually all the major orchestras in the United States and performed under the batons of prominent conductors including Claudio Abbado, Semyon Bychkov, Sergiu Comissiona, and Christoph von Dohnányi. He is a member of the New York Philharmonic String Quartet, established in the 2016–17 season, and has made regular appearances with the Tokyo and Emerson string quartets, The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, and at festivals such as Spoleto (both in the United States and Italy) and the Santa Fe and La Jolla Chamber Music festivals. He and pianist Christopher O’Riley recorded Le Grand Tango: Music of Latin America, a disc of compositions from South America and Mexico released on Helicon Records.

Carter Brey was educated at the Peabody Institute, where he studied with Laurence Lesser and Stephen Kates, and at Yale University, where he studied with Aldo Parisot and was a Wardwell Fellow and a Houpt Scholar. His violoncello is a rare J.B. Guadagnini made in Milan in 1754. An avid racing and cruising sailor since childhood, he holds a Yachtmaster Offshore rating from the Royal Yachting Association.

Pianist Anne-Marie McDermott is a consummate artist who balances a versatile career as a soloist and collaborator. She performs over 100 concerts a year in a combination of solo recitals, concerti and chamber music. Her repertoire choices are eclectic, spanning from Bach and Haydn to Prokofiev and Scriabin to Kernis, Hartke, Tower and Wuorinen.

With over 50 concerti in her repertoire, Ms. McDermott has performed with many leading orchestra including the New York Philharmonic, Minnesota Orchestra, Dallas Symphony, Columbus Symphony, Seattle Symphony, National Symphony, Houston Symphony, Colorado Symphony, Pittsburgh Symphony, St. Louis Symphony, Atlanta Symphony, Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, Moscow Virtuosi,  Hong Kong Philharmonic, San Diego Symphony, New Jersey Symphony and Baltimore Symphony among others. Ms, McDermott has toured with the Australian Chamber Orchestra and the Moscow Virtuosi.

In the recent seasons, Ms. McDermott performed with the Philadelphia Orchestra, Buffalo Philharmonic, North Carolina Symphony, Charlotte Symphony, Huntsville Symphony, Alabama Symphony, San Diego Symphony, the Oregon Mozart Players, and  the New Century Chamber Orchestra.

Recital engagements have included the 92nd Street Y, Alice Tully Hall, Town Hall,  The Schubert Club, Kennedy Center, as well as universities across the country. Anne-Marie McDermott has curated and performed in a number of intense projects including: the Complete Prokofiev Piano Sonatas and Chamber Music, a Three Concert Series of Shostakovich Chamber Music, as well as a recital series of Haydn and Beethoven Piano Sonatas. Most recently, she commissioned works of Charles Wuorinen and Clarice Assad  which were premiered in May 2009 at Town Hall, in conjunction with Bach’s Goldberg Variations.

As a soloist, Ms. McDermott has recorded the complete Prokofiev Piano Sonatas, Bach English Suites and Partitas (which was named Gramophone Magazine’s Editor’s Choice), and most recently, Gershwin Complete Works for Piano and Orchestra with the Dallas Symphony and Justin Brown.

In addition to her many achievements, Anne-Marie McDermott has been named the Artistic Director of the famed Bravo! Vail Music Festival in Colorado, which hosts the New York Philharmonic, the Philadelphia Orchestra and the Dallas Symphony  in addition to presenting over 40 chamber music concerts throughout the summer.  She is also Artistic Director of Santa Fe Pro Musica, The Ocean Reef Chamber Music Festival, McKnight Chamber Music Festival, and The Avila Chamber Music Celebration in Curacao.

As a chamber music performer, Anne-Marie McDermott was named an artist member of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center in 1995 and performs and tours extensively with CMS each season. She continues a long standing collaboration with the highly acclaimed violinist, Nadja Salerno Sonnenberg.  As a duo, they have released a CD titled “Live” on the NSS label and plan to release the Complete Brahms Violin and Piano Sonatas in the future. Ms. McDermott is also a member of the renowned piano quartet, Opus One, with colleagues Ida Kavafian, Steven Tenenbom and Peter Wiley.

She continues to perform each season with her sisters, Maureen McDermott and Kerry McDermott in the McDermott Trio. Ms, McDermott  has also released an all Schumann  CD with violist, Paul Neubauer, as well as the Complete Chamber Music of Debussy with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.

Ms. McDermott studied at the Manhattan School of Music with Dalmo Carra, Constance Keene and John Browning. She was a winner of the Young Concert Artists auditions and was awarded an Avery Fisher Career Grant.

Ms. McDermott regularly performs at Festivals across the United States including, Spoleto, Mainly Mozart, Sante Fe, La Jolla Summerfest, Mostly Mozart, Newport, Caramoor, Bravo, Chamber Music Northwest, Aspen, Music from Angelfire, and the Festival Casals in Puerto Rico, among others.