Iris Artist Fellowship

The Iris Artist Fellowship is a program for rising professional musicians with a passion for engaging music as a tool for social impact while growing in their own artistry.

Applications for 2024-2025 now open!

Iris Artist Fellowship Partner

Designed to address the under-representation of Black, African American and Latinx artists in classical music, the fellowship is directed toward musicians from those populations.

Iris Artist Fellows perform throughout the Iris Collective season and benefit from the opportunity to build their professional network within a community of skilled instrumentalists with nationwide connections. Between concert events, Fellows focus on chamber music, education, youth development, community-building projects, and collaborations.

The program is designed to provide experiential opportunities in several aspects of a professional music career: including performance, teaching artistry, and community involvement. Iris Artist Fellows bring positive change to schools and other organizations in underserved communities by participating in community engagement programs that focus on social and emotional learning through music, mentorship, inspiration, and social equity.

Meet Our Current Iris Artist Fellows

Pedro Maia

Pedro Maia has an extensive experience performing as a soloist and chamber musician. He has played in some of the most prestigious venues throughout Asia, South America, and North America including Weill Hall at Carnegie, Sala São Paulo, and Seoul National Theater. At the age of fifteen, Pedro debuted with the ArtBrasilia Symphony Orchestra, and he often performed both as concertmaster and soloist with many orchestras at the Brasilia School of Music and University of Brasilia.

Recently Pedro made his Mexico debut soloing the four seasons by Piazzolla with the Orquesta Filarmonica Tlaxcalan. Pedro is a founding member of Cosmos New Music ensemble, which had their Carnegie Hall debut at Weill Hall in 2018. He is also a member of Trio Nobile and Eppes String Quartet. He has won several chamber music competitions, such as MMTA and Great Composers Competition, and he is often invited to judge youth string competitions in Florida.

As an orchestral musician Pedro is a member of the Tallahassee Symphony Orchestra and the Mobile Symphony Orchestra and holds the principal second violin position with the Albany Symphony. Pedro has performed with some of the leading conductors in the world including Paul Tortelier, Ira Levin, Kurt Mazur, and Emil Tabakov. His orchestral and chamber music engagements has brought collaborations with artists such as Shlomo Mintzs, Itzhak Perlman, Roberto Diaz, Alex Klein, Yo-Yo Ma, Albrecht Mayer, Giles Apap, Igudesman and Joo, and Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg.

An active pedagogue as well, Pedro has years of experience teaching students from the most diverse backgrounds. He has a private studio in Tallahassee, FL and has been on the faculty of festivals in Brazil, Chile, Colombia, USA, and Mexico. As a graduate teaching assistant at Florida State University, he teaches chamber music as well as technique classes for undergraduates. For the Tallahassee Youth Orchestra, he coaches middle and high school students.

Besides these musical activities, Pedro is a Global Leaders Program’s alumnus, which helped him enhance his leadership, teaching artistry, marketing, and management skills. Pedro holds a bachelor’s degree in violin performance from the University of Southern Mississippi and a master’s degree in violin performance from Florida State University. Currently, he is a graduate teaching assistant pursuing a doctoral degree in violin performance at Florida State University. His principal teachers have included Erich Lehninger, Katia Andrade, Nadia Nedialkova, Stephen Redfield, and Shannon Thomas.

Otávio Kavakama

Otávio Manzano Kavakama is a Brazilian cellist currently based in Memphis, Tennessee. He holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Southern Mississippi and a master’s degree from Bowling Green State University, where he studied with Alexander Russakovsky and Brian Snow, respectively. He is currently a doctoral candidate at Bowling Green State University in the Contemporary Music program; for his final document he is commissioning three pieces for cello and Brazilian viola (viola caipira) focusing his research on cross-cultural collaborations.

A new music advocate, Otávio has premiered dozens of pieces, from solo to large ensemble works, and has worked with prominent composers, such as Nico Muhly, Stepheen Hartke, and Don Crockett. His work with up-and-coming composers has led to fruitful experimental works, including a piece for cello and live electronics in which the electronic sounds were being processed in Brazil by the composer (Luzilei Aliel) and the piece was being performed in the U.S., with the sound travelling back and forth between the two countries.

Besides premiering other people’s works, Otávio also writes music, which are mostly acoustic representations of noise music. As a chamber musician, he has performed alongside well-established performers such as Steven Banks, Nicholas Phan, Phillip Moll, and Ursula Oppens. Otávio is currently a fellow of the Aspen Contemporary Ensemble at the Aspen Music Festival and School, and the Iris Collective in Memphis. Recent highlights include a world premiere of Oksoko by Du Yun, and the U.S. premiere of Karel Goeyvaerts’ Pour que les fruits mûrissent cet été, for renaissance instruments, in which he played the viola da gamba and vielle. When not playing the cello, he can be seen riding his bicycle around, reading a book, swimming, playing Bossa Nova on the guitar, or trying to troubleshoot an issue in his Linux laptop.