ASTRAEUS Collective – Past Concerts

ASTRAEUS' mission is to bring exciting chamber works of the past and present to new audiences in the New York Metropolitan area. Founded in 2018 in San Francisco, the group was founded by violinists Mia Nardi-Huffman and Samuel Nelson, violist Daphne Gooch, and cellist Jorge Maresch, who met as students at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. As of 2023, the group has expanded to include a roster of talented chamber musicians, and moved locations to Brooklyn, NY!

ASTRAEUS has performed in a multitude of conventional and unconventional spaces, which have included everything from decommissioned cotton mills, Stanford University, and Herbst Theater, to orchid greenhouses, cocktail bars and more. ASTRAEUS has performed at SF Music Day at the War Memorial Veterans Building and held a Commissioning Initiative, in which they sponsored the commission of a new string quartet. For the 2019-2020 season, ASTRAEUS sought to specifically sponsor the commission of a work by an LGBTQ+ composer, and worked with Initiative winner Derek Tywoniuk on the premiere of his string quartet ‘never (always) not’.

ASTRAEUS had a partnership with CSU East Bay's Music Department from 2020-2022, where they worked closely with student composers to develop new quartets, culminating in an end-of-year performance. In 2022, ASTRAEUS was proud to work together with staff and students at Stanford University for a performance of several works by the composer Bongani Ndodana-Breen, in dedication to Amy Biehl. They have also offered donation-based concerts at Pacifica’s Shelldance Orchid Gardens benefitting local and national charities, and intimate house concerts as part of the ASTRAEUS Salon Series.