A three-time first prize winner at the Singapore National Violin Competition, Ike has performed across Asia, Australia, Europe and North America as a soloist, chamber musician and orchestral player.

Ike grew up in Singapore as one of four children. He began violin lessons at the age of four with Sylvia Khoo and won his first national competition at the age of ten. He later studied with Qian Zhou, Head of Strings at the Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music before moving to Philadelphia to attend the Curtis Institute of Music, where he completed a Bachelor of Music under the tutelage of Joseph Silverstein and Pamela Frank.

Prior to joining the ACO, Ike was Associate Concertmaster of the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra and played as Principal Second Violin of the Curtis Symphony Orchestra and Associate Concertmaster of Symphony in C. He has been a member of the Verbier and Pacific Music Festival Orchestras and has performed at the Amelia Island Chamber Music Festival, Kirishima International Music Festival, Singapore Arts Festival, Singapore Chamber Music Festival, Heifetz International Music Institute, and Curtis on Tour in Europe.

He studied chamber music with members of the Guarneri, Orion and Vermeer Quartets, and has collaborated with musicians including Roberto Diaz, James Dunham, Pamela Frank, Karen Gomyo, Susan Graham, Clive Greensmith, Gary Hoffman, and Anthony McGill.

Ike is proud to play on the first instrument he can truly call his own, made for him in 2021 by Brooklyn-based luthier Sam Zygmuntowicz

Lerida has carved out a rich career as a chamber musician, orchestral player and educator. In 2003, Lerida co-founded the Tinalley String Quartet, with whom she toured extensively over the next two decades, performing throughout Europe, America, Canada and Australia in the world’s finest concert halls and festivals.  Winners of the 9th Banff International String Quartet Competition, the quartet’s career highlights included performances in the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, Bremen Die Glocke, Hamburg Laeiszhalle, Berlin Konzerthaus and Frankfurt AlteOper.  The Quartet released numerous critically acclaimed recordings with ABC Classics and DECCA Australia and collaborated with Australia’s finest artists including Konstantin Shamray, Liwei Qin, Brett Dean, Daniel de Borah, Piers Lane, John Bell, Lior and Umberto Clerici. 

Lerida is currently Assistant Concertmaster with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra.  She has performed as guest Principal with the Tasmanian, Adelaide and Melbourne Symphony Orchestras and has toured with the Australian Chamber Orchestra and Australian World Orchestra. Lerida commenced her tertiary studies aged 15 at The University of Melbourne and was awarded a Doctor of Musical Arts in 2003.   Lerida has also studied at the International Menuhin Academy; International Holland Music Sessions; Banff Centre for the Arts, Canada; International Musicians Seminar Prussia Cove, UK; Yale Summer School of Music and Stanford University.   Keen to give back to the arts community, in 2024 Lerida became Artistic Director of Hunters Hill Music.

Originally from a rural town in the Yarra Valley, Lerida is privileged to play on a 1793 Joseph and Antonius Gagliano violin, a gift from her father.Description text goes here

Violist Stefanie Farrands is principal viola of the Australian Chamber Orchestra. Prior to her

appointment with the ACO, she was principal viola of the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra.

Stefanie has performed extensively throughout Europe, America, Asia and Australia with

orchestras including the Berlin Philharmonic, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe

and Camerata Salzburg. She has performed as guest Principal Viola with the Strasbourg

Philharmonic, Amsterdam Sinfonietta, Australian World Orchestra, Melbourne Symphony

Orchestra and Sydney Symphony Orchestra.

Stef is a passionate chamber musician and a strong advocate for her instrument. She has won

numerous awards including the Asia Pacific Chamber Music Competition and has been the

recipient of the Freedman Classic Fellowship, which helped support her lifelong passion of

commissioning new music for the viola.

She has appeared as soloist with major orchestras across Australia, including the

ACO, and in 2022 recorded and premiered Holly Harrison’s Hotwire with the TSO.

Stefanie studied at the Australian National Academy of Music, where she was a

member of the award-winning Hamer Quartet, before continuing her studies

with Tabea Zimmermann at the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler in Berlin.

Stef has been a member of the String Faculty at the Hobart Conservatorium

of Music and the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, and has given masterclasses through the

Melbourne Conservatorium of Music, Sydney Conservatorium of Music, Australian National

Academy of Music, ACO’s Emerging Artist Program and AYO’s Young Symphonists Program.

Justin Williams holds the position of Assistant Principal Viola with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra

and is the founding violist of the Tinalley String Quartet (TSQ). Justin has performed as Principal Viola with Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, Sydney Symphony Orchestra, Australian World Orchestra, Queensland Symphony Orchestra, Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra (AOBO), Melbourne Chamber Orchestra and Australia ProArte.

As a member of Tinalley String Quartet, Justin shared in the experience of winning the 2005 Australian Chamber Music Competition and the 9th Banff International String Quartet Competition. With TSQ he has toured extensively throughout Australia, Europe and North America and has released several recordings with Move Records, Decca Australia and ABC Classic.

As a composer, Justin released his ‘Movement for String Quartet’ in 2020, which has since been

performed throughout Australia and in Italy by the Australian String Quartet. In 2022, Justin was the recipient of a Sydney International Piano Competition Composing the Future juror’s prize for his ‘Three Intermezzi’ for solo piano, premiered by Daniel de Borah. In 2023, his set of songs ‘Three Pieces for String Quartet and Voice: Love – Despair – Hope’, was premiered at the Blackheath Chamber Music Festival, and his

First Symphony, jointly commissioned by QSO and SSO, was premiered by QSO under the direction of Maestro Umberto Clerici as part of the Brisbane Festival.

 Eliza Sdraulig is a Sydney-based cellist originally from Melbourne, Australia. Eliza regularly performs as a guest musician with the Australian Chamber Orchestra, Sydney Symphony Orchestra, Opera Australia Orchestra and Melbourne Symphony Orchestra. She has studied at The University of Melbourne, New England Conservatory (Boston, USA) and the Australian National Academy of Music (ANAM). Eliza was an Emerging Artist with the Australian Chamber Orchestra in 2018 and a Fellow with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra in 2019.

An avid solo, chamber and orchestral musician, Eliza has appeared as a concerto soloist with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra and The University of Melbourne Symphony Orchestra. She is a founding member of the Chroma Quartet and has performed at various festivals such as the Mimir Chamber Music Festival (USA), Australian Festival of Chamber Music and Huntington Festival.