Clark County’s Shimasaki sisters to perform for Ridgewood

Violinists Kanako and Mariko Shimasaki, both Clark County natives, and pianist Luke Gillespie will perform a concert at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, March 11, at the John Legend Theater, 700 S. Limestone St. in Springfield.

The jazz and classical trio has played in concert series around Japan and appeared at the Millennium Stage at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in August this year.

Proceeds from the concert will benefit Ridgewood School.

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As a soloist, Kanako Shimasaki has been featured on Classical WDPR 88.1, Weill Hall at Carnegie Hall in New York City, and the Millennium Stage Concert Series in Washington D.C. In 2013, she was named the National Violin Winner of the Yamaha Young Performing Artists Competition.

A Yamaha Young Performing Artist, Mariko Shimasaki began playing the violin at 5 years old. She is an undergraduate at the Juilliard School, studying with Masao Kawasaki. For seven years, she was a pre-collegiate of the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, where she studied with Won-Bin Yim.

Gillespie is professor of music at Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music. An active performer and teacher of jazz and classical piano, he has toured China, Europe, Indonesia, Japan and the United States and won numerous awards.

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