Dior String Quartet

And finally introducing our cellist and Co-Founder Joanne Yesol Choi! Korean-Canadian cellist Joanne Yesol Choi, recipient of the Canada Council’s 2025 Virginia Parker Prize and named one of CBC’s 30 Under 30 Canadian Musicians, is a distinguished artist in the chamber music world. She is a founding member of the Dior Quartet, an ensemble praised for its artistic depth and cultural diversity. The quartet has won the 2023 Concert Artists Guild Victor Elmaleh Competition and performed at major venues including Carnegie Hall, Koerner Hall, Stanford’s Bing Concert Hall, Bravo! Vail, Tippet Rise Art Center, and the Banff International String Quartet Festival.The group has also competed at the Banff and Melbourne International String Quartet Competitions. Beyond performance, Joanne is deeply committed to mentorship and access. She is the Founder and Artistic Director of Solegio Arts, a nonprofit dedicated to making high-level music education more accessible. Joanne has served as a guest lecturer at Stanford University and the University of Toronto, and was on faculty at the PRIZM International Chamber Music Festival. She has coached at the Phil and Eli Taylor Academy and Oscar Peterson School, and served as an adjudicator for the 2025 Kiwanis Music Festival and the 2023 Don Banks Music Awards. She holds Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music and was a Rebanks Fellow at the RCM in 2021. Outside of music, she debuted as a children’s book author with Blob the Colorful Star, and appeared in Netflix’s Bet as a special skills actor. She currently works with Music Toronto as their social media manager and correspondent. Fun fact: Joanne used to be a Grandmaster League of Legends TFT player and used to stream on Twitch! 👾 Photo: @shaymarkowitz #cellist #cello #portrait #diorquartet #classicalmusician

Member and Co-Founder Spotlight! Noa Sarid, First Violin Noa Sarid is an Israeli violinist and chamber musician. She is the first violinist and founding member of the Dior Quartet, winner of the Concert Artist Guild, the Chesapeake (silver), and the Fischoff International Chamber Music (bronze) Competitions. The quartet is known for its innovative blend of contemporary compositions and classical pieces, and made its debut at Carnegie Hall in 2024. Alongside her group, she participated in renowned festivals such as the Banff International String Quartet Festival, Bravo Vail, and Tippet Rise Art Center and studied with members of the Pacifica, Alban Berg, St. Lawrence, Danish, Artemis, Ébène, and Belcea Quartets.  Noa’s chamber career extends to being a member of the Canadian Chamber Orchestra and collaborating with various groups, including the Gryphon Trio, Canadian Children’s Opera Company, Art of Time, Akpik Theatre, and Kronos Quartet. Noa is also a Naxos Records artist.  In addition to her performance career, Noa is a dedicated teacher, teaching violin and viola students at the Oscar Peterson School of the Royal Conservatory and the Lane School of Music in Toronto.  Noa holds degrees from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music and the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance. She recently concluded her Rebanks Fellowship (2023-2024) and three-year string quartet residency at the Glenn Gould School of the Royal Conservatory. Her violin mentors include Simin Ganatra, Roi Shiloah, Jonathan Crow, and Nava Milo. She now pursues her Doctor of Musical Arts degree at the University of Toronto.  Noa has been supported by the America-Israel Cultural Foundation, the Ronen Foundation, the Lyons Scholarship, and plays on an Austrian violin generously loaned by Eyal Hofmekler.  Fun Fact: Noa has a violin named Freddie and a border collie named Sunny. Both are equally loud and playful. Photo: @shaymarkowitz

Family photo update!! ✨ We’re so excited to welcome some new members into our string quartet family 🤍 Looking forward to all the music, rehearsals, concerts, laughs, and memories ahead together. 😊 Website update coming in June!! Photography: @shaymarkowitz #StringQuartet #ChamberMusic #TorontoMusic #ClassicalMusic #QuartetLife

Join us Saturday, May 30 at 4 PM at the Aperture Room for an afternoon with the Dior Quartet — featuring works by Shostakovich, Vrebalov, Webern, and Dvorak! First half features cellist Joanne Yesol Choi and pianist Chris Au in a program of music and storytelling. 🎟️ Tickets in bio. #MusicToronto #DiorQuartet #ChamberMusic #LiveMusicToronto #ApertureRoom

For our second introduction, we are elated to announce that the wonderful violinist David Baik is joining our quartet! You can catch him in concerts with us starting June. To learn a bit more about him: Featured on the CBC Canada’s “30 Hot Canadian Classical Musicians Under 30”, South Korean-born violinist David Baik is devoted to expressing intimate emotions through his instrument and creating a profound connection with his audience. As a soloist, David has performed with orchestras including Sinfonia Toronto, Toronto Summer Music Festival Orchestra, Durham Chamber Orchestra, North York Symphony Orchestra, Ottawa Youth Orchestra, among others. In the 2026 season, he will tour South America as asoloist with the Canadian Virtuoso Ensemble. A passionate chamber musician, David has performed with esteemed artists such as Peter Bruns, Helene Clement, Dover Quartet, Charles Richard Hamelin, Jennifer Koh, Andrew Wan, Desmond Hoebig, and Jonathan Crow. Additionally, his former string quartet has garnered acclaim, earning multiple awards, including the 2024 Schiermonnikoog Festival Audience Award and the Grand Prize at the 2023 McGill Chamber Music Competition. In 2024, the quartet toured extensively across the Netherlands. David obtained his Bachelor’s degree from the University of Toronto, where he studied with Jonathan Crow, and continued his training at the Schulich School of Music under Andrew Wan as a fellowship recipient. For the 2024/25 season, he was a member of the Rebanks Family Fellowship and International Residency Program at the Royal Conservatory of Music. He has made appearances at the Geneva International String Academy, Toronto Summer Music festival, Schiermonnikoog Festival, Netherlands String Quartet Academy, McGill International String Quartet Academy, and the Trondheim String Quartet Academy. He performs on the 1871 J.B. Vuillaume (‘Messiah’ Stradivari) violin, generously on loan from the Canada Council for the Arts. Fun fact: David likes to try the local beers wherever he travels to, so if you are about to travel abroad and want to know the best places, ask him, he’ll point you in the right direction! Photo: @shaymarkowitz

And now for some introductions! You probably spotted our new violist in recent concerts - we are so happy to officially welcome Ronen Shifron! Here is a little bit about him: Violist Ronen Shifron, a newcomer to Toronto from Berlin, is a renowned chamber musician and soloist and First Prize winner at the International Anton Rubinstein Competition in Düsseldorf. Ronen performed in festivals such as Mas Musici, Gezeitenkonzerte, and Brücken and collaborated with celebrated artists including Tatjana Masurenko, Peter Bruns, Erich Höbarth, Giovanni Gnocchi, and Chouchane Siranossian. Featured on German and Israeli radio, he has recorded works by Max Reger and has appeared as a soloist in Hindemith’s Der Schwanendreher in Leipzig under the direction of Matthias Foremny. His career includes performing with leading orchestras in Germany. As an educator, Ronen held teaching positions at the Leipzig University of Music and Theatre and at the Haute École de Musique (HEMU) in Sion, Switzerland, where he served as assistant to Tatjana Masurenko. An Israeli-born, Ronen holds a Bachelor’s degree with distinction from Tel Aviv University’s Buchmann-Mehta School of Music under the tutelage of Lilach Levanon, and a Master’s degree and postgraduate soloist diploma with highest honours from the University of Music and Theatre in Leipzig under Tatjana Masurenko.. Masterclasses include Jean Sulem, Thomas Riebl, Garth Knox, Martin Outram, Françoise Gneri, and Atar Arad. Ronen was supported by the America-Israel Cultural Foundation. FUN FACT: Ronen is fluent in 5 languages! Can you guess which ones? ______ Photo: @shaymarkowitz

Spring concerts are here 🍃 We’re so excited to share that we’ll be joined by the wonderful Astrid Nakamura @astridnakamura for these concerts. It’s been such a joy making music together, and we can’t wait to bring this program to you. 🤍 Later this week we will be introducing our new members of the quartet officially! Stay tuned! UPDATE: there is a typo with the date for Soundstreams. Our concert is on May 9! #DiorQuartet #springconcerts #todotoronto #classicalmusic #stringquartet

Hi everyone, it’s been a little while! 2025 has been a year of change for us, and we wanted to take a moment to say thank you—to everyone who’s been following along, coming to concerts, and supporting us through it all. To our dear Toby and Caleb: thank you for unforgettable years of music, friendship, and shared life on and off stage. We built together nothing less than a family, so proud of all we’ve done, seen, and experienced together. To the incredible musicians who joined us as guests this season: Yuri, Jacob, Daisy, Matthew, and Patrick - it has been a joy and privilege to collaborate! We are so excited to share new updates soon, stay tuned! - Noa and Joanne 😊

2 years ago we played Lace from Hollow Knight: Silksong as an encore at a @music.toronto.concerts COSE concert! Saw that the game came out a month ago and thought it would be so fun to share! Composers: @composerlarkin @teamcherry_official #cellist #classicalmusic #classicalmusician #musician #quartet #stringquartet #hollowknight #hollowknightsilksong #videogame #cover #stringquartet

In 2023 Dior Quartet performed an incredibly theatrical version of Dinuk Wijeratne’s ‘The Disappearance of Lisa Gherardini’ for the Tippet Rise audience. As described in the composer’s notes, “this virtuoso musical escapade for string quartet is inspired by the audacious, real-life theft of Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa from the Louvre Museum in 1911”. Watch the members of Dior as they reenact the theft while playing the piece with humor and dramatic flair! Enjoy now via the link in bio. _____ Wijeratne: The Disappearance of Lisa Gherardini Performed by Dior Quartet: Noa Sarid, violin @noasarid Tobias Elser, violin @tobyelser Joanne Yesol Choi, cello @joanne_yesol Caleb Georges, viola @calebvla Produced in house at Tippet Rise Art Center Film Director & Cinematographer: Kevin Richey Lighting Board Operator / Electrician: Peter Fedock Editor & Colorist: Kevin Richey Sound Recording: Monte Nickles and Jim Ruberto Sound Editor: Dan Getty Sound Mastering: Monte Nickles

On performing the Ravel String Quartet, cellist Joanne Yesol Choi expresses how “as musicians, it is so fulfilling to experience that because the piece has some of the most tender and vulnerable moments, it goes to something so free and beautiful, and then it goes to fire and passion.” Watch Dior Quartet’s newly released concert film of Maurice Ravel’s String Quartet in F Major performed live in the Olivier Music Barn at Tippet Rise Art Center on September 3, 2023. /films | Link in bio. _____ Ravel, Maurice: String Quartet in F Major 00:00 - Introduction by Joanne Yesol Choi 00:32 - Allegro moderato - Très doux 08:33 - Assez vif - Très rythmé 14:51 - Très lent 23:31 - Vif et agité Performed by Dior Quartet: Noa Sarid, violin Tobias Elser, violin Joanne Yesol Choi, cello Caleb Georges, viola Produced in house at Tippet Rise Art Center Film Director & Cinematographer: Kevin Richey Lighting Board Operator / Electrician: Peter Fedock Editor & Colorist: Kevin Richey Sound Recording: Monte Nickles and Jim Ruberto Sound Editor: Dan Getty Sound Mastering: Monte Nickles #TippetRise #DiorQuartet #MauriceRavel #RavelStringQuartet #ArtCenter #Montana #OivierMusicBarn

We had a fun time performing for @purolatorinc for the Purolator Health Roadshow! Happy to always give back to our community and share our music!! -#stringquartet #music #purolator #classicalmusic #toronto