Gallia Kastner

Gallia Kastner is a Los Angeles based violinist who graduated from the Colburn School of Music under Robert Lipsett in Los Angeles, California. She commenced her private violin study at five and a half with Betty Haag-Kuhnke and at age 9, she studied with Almita and Roland Vamos at the Music Institute of Chicago. She is currently on the violin faculty at the Colburn Community School.

Kastner has won numerous local, national, and international competitions, both as a soloist and chamber musician. She is the winner of the Cooper International Violin Competition, the Blount Slawson National Concerto Competition in Montgomery, Alabama, the Triennial Johansen International Competition in Washington DC, and the American Youth Symphony Concerto Competition, which included a solo performance with the orchestra in the Fall of 2019. Gallia was the concertmaster of the American Youth Symphony for seven years from 2016 to 2023. In addition, Gallia was awarded the Jack Kent Cooke Young Artist Scholarship and the Jerome and Elaine Nerenberg Foundation Scholarship from The Musicians Club of Women in Chicago.

An avid chamber musician, Gallia is a current member of the Zelter String Quartet. The Zelter String Quartet was recently awarded First Prize in the 2023 Plowman Chamber Music Competition, the Gold Prize in the 2021 Chesapeake International Chamber Music Competition and was invited to the 2021 Aspen Music Festival String Quartet Intensive Seminar, working with the Pacifica, Escher, and American String Quartets. She has also worked with the Rogue Lemon Collective, a quartet founded by cellist, Zack Reaves, who arranges popular songs for small string ensembles. She can be heard on Apple Music, Spotify, and Youtube through the Rogue Lemon Collective. She was a part of the Alameda String Quartet, who was featured in the Reno Chamber Music Festival performing works by Dvorak, Ravel, and Schulhoff, as well as performing in Siena, Italy for the Chigiana Chamber Music Festival with Clive Greensmith. Gallia appears with Alameda on the album Shapeshifter, a collection of works written by composers of the Recovered Voices Project with James Conlon. Kastner was a member of the Lumiére String Quartet that won first place at the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition and she was also the violinist of Trio Solaris, which collaborated with the Trey McIntyre Project at Jacob’s Pillow. Gallia’s broadcast performances include appearances on WFMT 98.7/Introductions, WTTW Channel 11, WGN Channel 9, and a Today Show appearance with Rachel Barton Pine.

Some of Gallia’s performances with orchestras include The Chicago Symphony Orchestra, The Cleveland Symphony Orchestra, The Colburn Orchestra, The San Francisco Philharmonic, Orchestra Santa Monica, The American Youth Symphony, The Aspen Conducting Academy Orchestra, The Gettysburg Chamber Orchestra in Pennsylvania, The Montgomery Symphony, and many others. Other stage appearances include concerts in The Hollywood Bowl, Disney Concert Hall, The Microsoft Theater, Chicago’s Millenium Park, Ravinia’s Bennett Gordon Hall and outdoor Pavilion, Lincoln Center, Kloster Schontal and Schwabish Hall Kultursiftung in Germany. She has participated in master classes with Augustin Hadelich, Rachel Barton Pine, Vadim Gluzman, James Ehnes, Joseph Silverstein, Ida Kavafian, Ani Kavafian, Ben Beilman, Ilya Kaler, Milan Vitek, Ivry Gitlis, the Cavani Quartet, the Pacifica Quartet, the Calder Quartet, the Calidore Quartet, the Dover Quartet, and the Ying Quartet. She has shared the stage with artists such as Lynn Harrell, Gil Shaham, Jean-Yves Thibauldet, Eric Whitacre, Robert Chen, Clive Greensmith, Martin Beaver, Scott St. John, and many others.

Kastner regularly performs new music. She has premiered several works, including Kevin Harnett’s Immiscible Figures with the Zelter String Quartet, A Thousand Cranes by Alex Mansour, and premiered the live performance of Isolation Variations, written by Michael Abels.

Gallia often works as a studio musician. She can be heard in the soundtracks of movies such as The Haunted Mansion, Black Adam, Dungeons and Dragons, Peter Pan and Wendy, Father of the Bride, and many others. She can be seen on screen on shows like “Jimmy Kimmel Live!”, “The Game Awards” and“The Fosters”.