WARMEST WAVE, sound Meditation Album We wanted to create a refuge from our busy lives through the voices of our instruments. Only from within our own stillness could we explore and discover how to build these harmonies across landscapes and cultures.
Ezgi Karakus, Cello Amado Espinoza, Native Flutes
Ezgi Karakus is a highly accomplished Turkish cellist whose musical journey began at the age of eleven. Her talents were duly recognized as she won the concerto competition three times during her conservatory education. After moving to the United States, her exceptional skills were awarded first prize in the Belle and Lynum Jackson Balshaw Music Competition. She completed her Doctor of Musical Arts in Cello Performance at the prestigious UMKC Conservatory of Music & Dance.
Ezgi has performed internationally with renowned orchestras like the Topeka Symphony, Tulsa Symphony, and Kansas City Symphony. She was also featured as a soloist at the esteemed Springfield Symphony, Topeka Symphony and Yo-Yo Ma’s Master Class at the Kauffman Center of the Performing Arts.
On May 25th, 2023, She made her debut at the prestigious Carnegie Hall, gracing its illustrious stage with her ensemble, Ensemble Iberica, for the sold-out Amazonas concert series. Furthermore, she is currently a cellist of Symphony of Northwest Arkansas, co-director of Soundwave Academy and an accomplished cellist of Ensemble Iberica.
Amado Espinoza is a unique performing artist, composer, and instrument maker from Cochabamba, Bolivia, that respects his folk traditions of the Andes Mountains while creating compositions that are sincere to his musical-wanderlust personality. Amado most recently received the 2022 Spirit of Folk award from Folk Alliance International. He is a 2019 grant recipient of the Lighton International Artist Exchange Program, a 2017 Charlotte Street Foundation Generative Performing Arts Fellow. Amado works as a solo performer and with his groups the Amado Espinoza Quartet, Colectivo Yanquitl, and Ayllu. He is a featured artist with Ensemble Iberica (Kansas City, MO), Oil rock band (Cochabamba, Bolivia) and guides musical meditations.
He composes for film, theatre, and dance. Notable projects include The Tempest (2021), with Heart of America Shakespeare Festival, El Amor que Mueve el Sol y Las Demas Estrellas (2020) for Kansas City Public Theatre, The Storytelling Project (2018) with UMKC’s MFA Theatre Acting and Directing Program, and We are the Landscape (2016), an independent theatrical offering to the Pachamama (Mother Earth) in Kansas City, Mo.
In October, 2019, Amado was invited by the Berklee School of Music in Boston, MA, to give a masterclass on Andean Music, with emphasis on pre-Colombian instruments. He co-founded Resonation Music and Arts, LLC with theatre-artist Karen Lisondra to use educational programming to inspire curiosity and respect for world cultures through music, dance, and storytelling.
Amado is a graduate of Milan Conservatory in Cochabamba, Bolivia.
Doors @ 3:30pm Music @ 4pm (an hour & a half before kick-off)
Greenwood Social Hall is on the second floor of an historic building, and does not have an ADA accessible entrance. We apologize for this inconvenience.