Our Musicians

Currently based in North Yarmouth, Maine, Matt Consul holds a Bachelor’s degree in Viola Performance and a Master’s in Contemporary Improvisation on mandolin and violin from Boston’s New England Conservatory of Music.  He is the 3rd chair violist of the Portland Symphony Orchestra, serves as a substitute musician with the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Boston Pops, and has previously performed with the Washington Heights Chamber Orchestra, the Cayuga Chamber Orchestra, Shattered Glass ensemble, and as acting principal viola of the New Orchestra of Washington.  Matt was formerly the principal violist of Boston’s highly-acclaimed (but, sadly, now defunct) chamber orchestra Discovery Ensemble.  A lifelong lover of chamber music, Matt has been an artist at the Birdfoot International Chamber Music Festival in New Orleans, the SOTA festival in Hyderabad, India, and has attended such festivals as The Taos School of Music and Kneisel Hall. He has also appeared as guest violist with the Portland String Quartet and coaches chamber music at the Pineland Suzuki School in Manchester, Maine. Matt was a co-founder / director of For The Love Of Music, an educational initiative that provided free interactive performances and workshops for children in uptown Manhattan, and currently presents educational workshops for kids in Portland public elementary schools through the Portland Symphony’s Explorers program. Active in a variety of musical circles outside the classical world, Matt is a member of jazz composer / bandleader Miho Hazama’s Grammy-nominated ensemble m_unit and was formerly a member of the alt folk outfit the Laura Grill Band. He has appeared multiple times as a member of the on-stage band (mandolin / violin / vocals) for the 2022 Relentless Award-winning musical How the White Girl Got Her Spots and Other 90s Trivia written by Shayok Misha Chowdhury and Laura Grill Jaye.  He has performed, toured, and recorded with artists as diverse as jazz vocalist Kurt Elling, rock groups The Dear Hunter and Bent Knee, and ska band Streetlight Manifesto. In addition to performing, Matt maintains a small private studio teaching viola and violin.

Nate Lesser began playing the violin when he was four years old.  While growing up in central Maine, his primary teachers included Irene Rissi, Alicia Doudna, and Gilda Joffe, and he spent many summers participating in local programs through Kneisel Hall, Bay Chamber Concerts, and the Summer Festival of the Arts.  He holds Violin Performance degrees from the Oberlin Conservatory and the Yale School of Music, where he studied with David Bowlin and Ani Kavafian.  Nate has had the privilege of teaching at many of the Maine programs and institutions that shaped him, including Kneisel Hall (as a Young Artist mentor), John Bapst Memorial High School, and Arthur Russell Strings (now Arthur Russell Week–the Ellsworth Community Music Institute’s summer program).  He is a member of the Bangor Symphony Orchestra’s violin section and a proud collaborator with Shelter Music Maine.  Outside of music, Nate holds a Master’s Degree in Information Systems from the University of Maine and works in data analytics and engineering consulting.  He and his family reside in southern Maine.

Violinist Katherine Liccardo, a native New Yorker, began her violin and piano studies at age 3. Katherine’s passion for music started at home, growing up in a household of music teachers and performers. At the age of 18, she made her Carnegie Hall Stern Auditorium solo debut as the winner of the Metropolitan Youth Orchestra Concerto Competition. An active pedagogue and trained Suzuki teacher, Katherine has a full studio of in person and online students spanning from Maine to Australia. She has been on the faculty of the Center for Preparatory Studies in Music at Queens College for 13 years. During the summers, Katherine has served on the faculty of Kneisel Hall’s Program for Maine Students and Berkshire Summer Music in Massachusetts. Katherine currently serves on the board of the Maine Suzuki Association.

As a performer, Katherine has performed at major venues such as Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center and The Kennedy Center, but is currently committed to serving local communities in Maine. In addition to her involvement with Shelter Music Maine, Katherine is the associate director of Vigorous Tenderness, an immersive outdoor concert series that amplifies marginalized voices in classical music and democratizes new/experimental music. VT concerts happen on each equinox and solstice throughout the year and serve as a beautiful way to mark the passage of time for the community. Each concert resembles an art museum experience, with chamber music in harmony with the landscape.

During her time living in New York City, Katherine was a member of Shattered Glass Ensemble, a self-governed conductorless string orchestra. The ensemble released an album in 2017 featuring pieces by living composers Caroline Shaw, Tarik O'Regan, and a commission by Pascal Le Boeuf. In her four seasons in SG, Katherine was a featured soloist in Vivaldi concerti, Stravinsky’s Apollon Musegète, Delights and Dances by Michael Abels, and Chaabi by Tarik O’Regan.

As second violinist and founding member of the former Blue Hill String Quartet, Katherine has made appearances at Alice Tully Hall in the Wednesdays at One concert series, community spaces in Brooklyn through Groupmuse, and recitals throughout the New York region. In April 2015, the BHSQ was awarded first prize in the J.C. Arriaga Chamber Music Competition, competing against ensembles from all over the country. In the summer of 2015, the BHSQ held a fellowship at the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, working closely with members of the Emerson, Brentano, Artis and Alexander string quartets.

Katherine has recently discovered a love for Celtic fiddling and has been studying with Jeremy Kittel for the past two years. When she’s not playing and teaching, you will probably find her drinking tea with a cat on her lap.

Native to Tokyo Japan, Ryu Mitsuhashi studied in the pre-college division of The Juilliard School after moving to NY at the age of 9. She is a cross genre player, concertmaster of the Augusta Symphony Orchestra, a member of Bangor Symphony Orchestra, a fiddler for the folk fusion band Tough End String Band as well as for the classical-meets-folk duo Ryu&Tom. Ryu also plays in pit orchestras for musicals all over the east coast and has traveled to perform and tour with international orchestras and concert tour groups.

Marisa Solomon, Founder of Shelter Music Maine, received cello performance degrees from the Oberlin College and San Francisco Conservatories. She is the Director of the Kneisel Hall Program for Maine Students, adjunct faculty at the University of Maine, serves on the Chamber Music Society board at the Collins Center for the Arts, and is a member of the Bangor Symphony Orchestra.  Marisa is a 2023 recipient of the Director’s Award from the Collins Center for the Arts.