Uri Vardi
Uri Vardi has performed as a recitalist, soloist, and chamber player across the United States, Europe, South America, and his native Israel. He studied at the Rubin Academy in Tel Aviv, was an artist diploma student at Indiana University and earned his master's degree from Yale University. In 1990, following an extensive teaching and performing career in Israel, Mr. Vardi was appointed professor of cello at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He has taught and conducted master classes at numerous music schools, including the Juilliard School, Eastman School, New England Conservatory, Indiana University, Yale University, Geneva Conservatory, Paris Conservatory, and the Jerusalem Music Center. In recent years, Vardi has initiated three major projects: The St. Petersburg School-Music for Cello, Fusions and a double concerto for cello, oud and symphony orchestra. The Fusions project toured Israel and the U.S., garnered favorable reviews by major newspapers and inspired the commission of Joel Hoffman's 2007 Forty Steps, a double concerto premiered in 2008 by the Madison Symphony Orchestra, Taiseer Elias, oud, and Vardi, cello. Vardi's students have been successful as soloists, chamber players, faculty members of major music schools and members of major orchestras. Vardi puts great emphasis in the relationship between body awareness, movement and sound. He received the 1999 UW-Madison Arts Institute Faculty Development Award to pursue Feldenkrais training and received certification as a Feldenkrais Practitioner from the Feldenkrais Guild of North Performing Arts at UW-Madison. In 2012, Vardi was awarded the Art Institute Emily Mead Baldwin Award to Create a Program for Somatic Education in the Performing Arts at UW- Madison.
Hagit Vardi
Hagit Vardi is currently the Feldenkrais Practitioner at the Integrative Medicine Clinic of the University of Wisconsin Hospital and Clinics. Additionally, she is on the staff of the University of Wisconsin-Madison Dance Department and has a private practice in Madison. Hagit received a Bachelor's degree in flute performance from Indiana University, a Master's degree from Southern Connecticut State University, and certification as a Feldenkrais Practitioner from the Feldenkrais Guild of North America. She collaborates with medical staff in her work with people dealing with diverse issues, giving individual and group classes for those who suffer from pain, musculoskeletal and neurological disorders, anxiety, trauma, and cancer. In the UW Dance Department, Hagit teaches Feldenkrais for Performers with her husband, Uri, a course open to musicians, dancers and actors. Uri and Hagit have facilitated workshops and seminars in the US, Europe, and Asia. These seminars emphasize the relationship between body awareness, artistic expression and injury prevention. Hagit also works extensively with musicians who suffer from playing related injuries.
Mark R. Erickson
Dr. Mark R. Erickson, PT, MA, DSc, OSC has been practicing physical therapy since 1983 and teaching physical therapy both at UW-Madison and Carroll University since 1992. He is Board Certified in Orthopedic Physical Therapy, and was certified by the Feldenkrais Guild as a Feldenkrais Practitioner in 1994. Dr. Erickson currently holds a Clinical Associate Professor Faculty position within the Physical Therapy Program at Carroll University where he integrates the Feldenkrais Method into his practice, teaching, and research. While on faculty at UW- Madison for 12 years he taught in the physical therapy program, assisted with curriculum and instruction in the UW/Meriter Orthopedic Residency program, and developed and directed the UW Performing Arts Outreach Program. Dr. Erickson has presented on The Feldenkrais Method at the national, state, and regional levels for both performing artists and health care practitioners. He blends the science of kinesiology and injury prevention with organic learning to provide participants with an integrated perspective for improved performance and health through enhanced knowledge and body awareness.
Matt Turner
Matt Turner is regarded as one of the world's leading improvising cellists. Also a highly accomplished pianist, Turner performs everything from jazz standards and twentieth century new music to alternative rock and improvised avant-garde. Turner completed his undergraduate studies at Lawrence University and his Master of Music degree in Third Stream Studies at the New England Conservatory of Music, where he studied with Dave Holland, Geri Allen and Joe Maneri, and where he was the recipient of a Distinction in Performance Award. Turner has performed at numerous music festivals including the JVC Jazz Festival, Nancy Jazz Pulsations, Avignon Jazz Festival, Festival en Haute-Garonene, the International Cello Festival in Montreal, the New Directions Cello Festival, the Chicago Asian American Jazz Festival, and with CUBE, Present Music, and Dadadah.
