Catherine Hubert Foster
Catherine Hubert Foster, a founding member of the Belle Arte String Quartet, was Assistant Principal Second Violinist with the Richmond Symphony for many years until retirement in 2019. She also performed with the North Carolina Symphony, Charleston Symphony Orchestra, and the Virginia Philharmonic. She has been active in summer music festivals including the Spoleto Festival in Charleston S.C. and Italy, the Eastern Music Festival in Greensboro, North Carolina, and the Bear Valley Music Festival in California.
Graduating magna cum laude from Duke University, Catherine received majors in Music Performance and French Literature. She studied the violin with Giorgio Ciompi, first violinist with the Ciompi Quartet and a former member of the NBC Symphony Orchestra. During her years at Duke, she spent the summers studying and performing chamber music at Kneisel Hall Chamber Music School in Blue Hill, Maine.
BASQ
Meet the Members (scroll over photo for bio)
Catherine Hubert Foster
Catherine Hubert Foster, a founding member of the Belle Arte String Quartet, was Assistant Principal Second Violinist with the Richmond Symphony for many years. She also performed with the North Carolina Symphony, Charleston Symphony Orchestra, and the Virginia Philharmonic. She has been active in summer music festivals including the Spoleto Festival in Charleston S.C. and Italy, the Eastern Music Festival in Greensboro, North Carolina, and the Bear Valley Music Festival in California.
Catherine earned majors in Music Performance and French Literature from Duke University. She studied the violin with Giorgio Ciompi, first violinist with the Ciompi Quartet and a former member of the NBC Symphony Orchestra. During her years at Duke, she spent the summers studying and performing chamber music at Kneisel Hall Chamber Music School in Blue Hill, Maine.
Brian Evans
Brian Evans began his musical studies on the violin at the age of thirteen and on the viola as a junior in high school. He received his Bachelor’s Degree in Viola Performance from Bob Jones University in 2001 and went on to complete a Master’s Degree in Viola Performance from BJU in 2003. Brian has performed with the Winston Salem (NC) Symphony, Greensboro (NC) Symphony, and the Richmond Symphony. Currently, he directs the strings program at St. Catherine’s and St. Christopher’s Schools in Richmond, VA, and chairs the music department at St. Catherine’s. As a free-lance artist, Brian has performed with bands at Carnegie Hall, The Kennedy Center, Bridgestone Arena (Nashville), and The Kimmel Center (Philadelphia). He plays regularly with Good Shot Judy, a Virginia-based classic vocal jazz band. Brian lives in Richmond with his wife, Alyssa, and their four children.
Ryan Lanan
Cellist Ryan Lannan has been the third chair cello with the Richmond Symphony since 1999. He has a Bachelor of Music in Cello Performance from Indiana University and a Master of Music in Cello Performance from Northwestern University. He was a prizewinner at the 1998 Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition with the Arbor Trio, a soloist with PAI Festival Orchestra in Tchaikovsky’s Rococo Variations in 2001, and served as faculty with the Performing Arts Institute at Wyoming Seminary (PA) and the Eastern Music Festival.
Helen Coulson
Helen Coulson received her Bachelor of Music degree with Distinction in violin performance from Converse College and her Masters degree in Performance and Literature from the Eastman School of Music. She began her music career as a member of the Richmond Symphony, playing with the orchestra for twenty- nine years. She has performed with the Roxbury Chamber Players for ten years in Delaware County,
New York and is currently a member of the Belle Arte String Quartet. Ms. Coulson also has maintained a private studio for over thirty years. She served for twenty-five years as Director of Instrumental Music at Collegiate School. While Ms. Coulson was at Collegiate, the Instrumental Music program grew from ten students to two hundred and fifty students in a K-12 Instrumental Music program. Her orchestras consistently received Excellent and Superior ratings at instrumental festivals and adjudications, including performing at the VMEA Conference in 2011. Ms. Coulson is a member of the Virginia Music Educators Association, Virginia Band and Orchestra Directors Association, National Association for Music Education, and Mortar Board National Honor Society.