The trio, founded in 2000 by pianist Lester Seigel and cellist Craig Hultgren, features violinist Karen Bentley Pollick in her first appearance with the Chagall. The Trio is in residence atBirmingham-SouthernCollege.

Karen Bentley Pollickhas concertized as soloist throughoutEurope,Asia, theUnited States, Canada, and Russia. Among her several recordings of original music, “Dancing Suite to Suite” was awarded second place in the Just Plain Folks 2004 Record Awards for Best Classical Soloist Album. Her numerous collaborations and performances of contemporary music include a variety of musical styles merging violin, viola and Norwegian hardingfele, and violin with electronics. In addition to orchestras across the country, she has recorded with the Dave Matthews Band and Evanescence, as well as film scores at Skywalker Ranch. She is currently the violinist in Paul Dresher’s Electro-Acoustic Band, which performed at Carnegie’s Zankel Hall as part of the In Your Ear festival, hosted by John Adams, and has appeared on the NPR program “St. PaulSunday.”

Ms. Pollick currently resides inBirmingham,Alabamawhere she is First Lady of Birmingham Southern College.

Craig Hultgren is an activist for new music, the newly creative arts, and the avant-garde. Possessing a broad range of instrumental techniques from traditional to radical, Hultgren presents his own spontaneous, free-style improvisations along with programs of new music throughout the country and abroad. His performances have been broadcast on National Public Radio’s Performance Today, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, and European radio. The Birmingham News said of him, “Hultgren…pushes the limits of his instrument brilliantly by using extended techniques in fascinating ways.” A recipient of Artist Fellowships in 1992 and 1999 from the Alabama State Council on the Arts, he has been a member since 1993 of Thamyris, a contemporary chamber music ensemble inAtlanta. He is a longtime member of the music faculty atBirmingham-SouthernCollege, where he teaches cello and string methods, and has directed the College’s New Music Ensemble.

Lester Seigel is the Joseph Hugh Thomas Professor of Music at Birmingham-Southern, where he directs the College’s famed Concert Choir, a 40-voice mixed ensemble of undergraduate students. The critically-acclaimed choir, which travels extensively in the region and nationally, will make an international tour next year. He is also director of The Hilltop Singers, the College’s select vocal jazz ensemble, teaches conducting, a new course in American Music, and conducts opera productions. He is also Choirmaster/Organist atCanterburyUnitedMethodistChurchinMountain Brook, and holds the AAGO certificate from the American Guild of Organists. His choral compositions are published by Oxford University Press. Other conducting appearances have taken him toCanada, where he led the Elmer Iseler Singers of Toronto at their summer festival inBritish Columbia, and the Gregg Smith Singers inNew Yorkat the Adirondack Festival of American Music.