Nicholas Pavkovic is a composer and pianist who divides his time between San Francisco and Los Angeles. He has composed extensively for film and is a Sundance Composers Lab Fellow. His notable concert works include the chamber opera Sredni Vashtar, the Concertino for Piano and Percussion, and the Rhapsody for Viola and Piano, which was written for SF Symphony members Jonathan Vinocour and Robin Sutherland. After earning a degree in Mathematics from the University of Chicago, Pavkovic completed a Master of Music in Composition at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, where he later taught. Mr. Pavkovic is currently the Executive Director of the Ross McKee Foundation, which supports piano performance and education in the San Francisco Bay Area.

As a solo recitalist and founding member of the Maybeck Trio, California pianist Jerry Kuderna embraces traditional repertoire and new music with boundless virtuosity and fierce commitment. Well-known as a lecture-recitalist at the Berkeley Arts Festival, he has taught at the University of Louisville, Princeton, and locally at Diablo Valley College. His affinity for modernist music has led him to write about and premiere works by Milton Babbitt, and his list of first performances includes works by Richard Swift, Alden Jenks, Robert Helps, Ann Callaway, Judith Shatin, and Herb Bielawa. Kuderna has appeared in the Los Angeles SCREAM Festival, on a series presented by Earplay and Cal Performances, and as a soloist with the Berkeley Symphony, with whom he gave the West Coast premiere of the Elliot Carter Piano Concerto