Dawn Harms’ diverse career ranges from being a chamber musician, violin soloist, and concertmaster, to being a music director and conductor. She is a first violinist in the San Francisco Opera Orchestra, Associate Concertmaster for the New Century Chamber Orchestra, and Co-Concertmaster with the Oakland Symphony. She also records regularly at Skywalker Studios for movies and video games. She teaches at Stanford University and is the conductor of the pre-college string orchestra at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.

Dawn is in her seventh season as Music Director and conductor of the Bay Area Rainbow Symphony. She was chosen as a Fellow at the exclusive American Academy of Conducting at the Aspen Music Festival, where she worked with some of the top conductors of the world. She has conducted the San Francisco Opera orchestra twice in concert. Her guest conducting engagements include appearances with the Palo Alto Chamber Orchestra, the Livermore Amador Symphony, the Fremont Symphony, the Paradise Symphony, and the Grass Valley Summer Music Festival Orchestra.

A strong advocate for music education, Dawn has designed her own family show and has performed it throughout the United States, New Zealand, and Japan. Dawn’s family show performances include the Kohl Mansion Family Series, the Lincoln Symphony in Nebraska, the Oakland Symphony, Berkeley Symphony, Merced Symphony, and the Napa Youth Symphony. She is invited every summer to perform with the Bear Valley Music Festival Orchestra.

Dawn has played chamber music regularly at Music in the Vineyards in Napa Valley, the Filoli Gardens concert series, Music at Kohl Mansion and Chamber Music San Francisco. She has also performed chamber music with Lynn Harrell, Jake Heggie, Frederica von Stade, and Nadja Solerno Sonnenberg.

Kayo Miki is a violinist who was born in Nanaimo, British Columbia and began her violin studies at age nine.  As a high school student, she earned her diploma from the Interlochen Arts Academy and then completed her Bachelor and Master degrees in Violin Performance and Literature from the Eastman School of Music.  She has participated in the Salzburg Music Festival, Holtzhauser Musiktage Festspiele, Schleswig Holstein Festspiele, Heidelberger Schlossfestspiele, Sapporo Pacific Music Festival, Banff Festival of the Arts, Martha’s Vineyard Chamber Music Society Festival, and the Stern Grove Festival.

Since living in the Bay Area, she’s performed with the New Century Chamber Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony’s AIM program, San Francisco Chamber Orchestra, Skywalker Symphony Orchestra, San Francisco Ballet Orchestra, and has been Grammy-nominated twice as a member of Quartet San Francisco for Latigo (2006) and Whirled Chamber Music (2007). During her time with QSF, she was a Guest Artist-in-Residence at Mills College during the 2004-2005 Academic year and a Grand Tango Instrumental Musical Prize winner in NYC.

Kayo was formerly managed by Joanne Rile Artists Management during her time in QSF and performed concerts throughout Europe, Japan, South America, Canada, and the USA. She has appeared in concert with Stevie Wonder, Barbra Streisand, Joni Mitchell, The Who, Lauryn Hill & The Fugees, Andrea Bocelli, Diana Krall, and recorded for SONY, Sundance Music Festival, National Geographic, motion pictures, and video games.

She has performed in many Broadway shows, including Hamilton, and is currently a performing artist via San Francisco’s Candlelight Concerts.

She enjoys coaching music students through Music at Kohl Mansion, Palo Alto Chamber Orchestra, and has a private violin studio as well.  Her primary violin teachers include Denes Zsigmondy, William Preucil, Charles Castleman, and Camilla Wicks.

An active Bay Area violist, Elizabeth Prior is the principal violist with the Santa Rosa Symphony and a member of the New Century Chamber Orchestra. Elizabeth is also the Associate Principal Violist with the Marin Symphony, a season substitute with the San Francisco Ballet, and a season-contracted violist with the San Francisco Opera. She performs regularly with the San Francisco Symphony and the Pittsburgh Symphony. Other orchestral credits include the Freiburg Philharmonic (Associate principal) and the Cape Town Symphony. She has recently worked with the Las Vegas Philharmonic and the Reno Philharmonic. She used to play regularly with Südwestfunk (Southwest Radio, Germany), Stuttgart Radio, Basel Symphony, and the Mannheim Opera Orchestras.

A native of South Africa, she was a prizewinner in the International String Competition in Pretoria and gave her debut at Carnegie Hall with the Russian Chamber Orchestra. She toured regularly as a soloist with the Chamber Ensemble of Cologne in France and was recently featured with the Santa Rosa Symphony. Other solo and chamber music engagements include the founder of the Broderick Ensemble, Amelia Island Chamber Music Festival, Sun Valley Summer Symphony, Midsummer Mozart, and “Chamber Music San Francisco.” She is a member of the Farallon Quintet. She performs regularly on solo recitals in the San Francisco Bay Area and has performed internationally for more than a decade with Maestro Donald Runnicles on the piano.

She recently launched her new album, “Viola Romance,” with pianist Miles Graber, which can be found on Spotify and Apple Music.

Thalia Moore joined the San Francisco Opera Orchestra as Associate Principal Cello in 1982. A Washington D.C. native, she began her cello studies with Robert Hofmekler, and after only 5 years of study, appeared as a soloist with the National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center Concert Hall. She attended the Juilliard School of Music as a scholarship student of Lynn Harrell, and received her bachelor’s and master’s Degrees in 1979 and 1980. While at Juilliard, she was the recipient of the Walter and Elsie Naumberg Scholarship and won First prize in the National Arts and Letters String Competition.

In addition to her position in the San Francisco Opera Orchestra, Ms. Moore joined the cello section of the San Francisco Ballet Orchestra in 1989. She has appeared as a soloist at Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center, Carnegie Recital Hall, the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater, the Herbst Theater in San Francisco, and the San Francisco Legion of Honor, among others. She has also performed as a guest artist at the Olympic Music Festival in Seattle, the Grand Teton Music Festival, and the Music in the Vineyards Chamber Music Festival. In 1991, Ms. Moore appeared in the last episode of the TV series, Midnight Caller, and in 1993, she was featured as a soloist with the San Francisco Chamber Symphony under the direction of Roger Norrington. In 1996, she performed one of the first Bay Area performances of the composer’s version of Tchaikovsky’s Rococo Variations with the San Francisco Chamber Orchestra. In 1998, she was named a Cowles Visiting Artist at Grinnell College (Iowa) and, in both 1999 and 2001, won election to the Board of Governors of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences.

As a member of the new music groups Earplay and the Empyrean Ensemble, she has recorded works by Mario Davidovsky, Maria Niederberger, Ross Bauer, Cindy Cox, William Kraft, Jorge Liderman, Kurt Rohde, and David Rakowski. She has presented numerous premieres of works, including the 2005 world premiere of Laws of Motion, a concerto by Richard Festinger, written especially for her.

Praised for her “especially fine contributions” and “standout solo work,” Eleanor Kirk was appointed Principal Harpist of the San Francisco Opera Orchestra in 2025. Before joining the SFOO, she held principal positions in the Illinois Symphony Orchestra and Illinois Philharmonic, and was a member of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago. Ellie has appeared as a guest with leading ensembles including the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Minnesota Orchestra, Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, and St. Louis Symphony Orchestra. She is a member of the Chicago Harp Quartet, a leading group in the world of small harp ensembles, and enjoys foraging, fermenting, and spending time with her spouse, Kevin, and cats, Figaro and Oleanna. Ellie comes from a family of opera musicians; her parents and uncle all perform with the Lyric Opera in Chicago and the Santa Fe Opera in the summer. She is delighted to be a new San Franciscan and carry on the Kirk pit musician tradition.