Faculty Recital: Joel Ayau, Piano and Jeremy Crosmer, Cello | Cello + Piano, Classical + Jazz

Artist(s)

Joel Ayau

Senior Vocal Coach Joel Ayau enjoys a broad musical career spanning a wide range of genres, venues, and musical styles. A graduate of the Cafritz Young Artist Program of the Washington National Opera, Ayau has assisted on eleven productions at WNO, including Samson et Dalila, Aida, and Eugene Onegin. He has also worked on the music staffs of North Carolina Opera, Portland Opera, Opera Omaha, Wolf Trap Opera, and Aspen Opera Theatre and VocalARTS. During his three seasons on the music staff of the Castleton Festival, he prepared the chorus for Roméo et Juliette under Rafael Payarre, and Lorin Maazel's productions of Don Giovanni and Madama Butterfly.

From 2018-2020, Ayau assisted in the preparation of operas, musicals, and oratorio for the National Symphony Orchestra. Ayau’s concert appearances include recitals at Stern Auditorium in Carnegie Hall, the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow, and National Concert Hall in Taipei, in collaboration with vocalists Andrea Bocelli, Frederica von Stade, David Portillo, Kathryn Lewek, and Zach Borichevsky, and instrumentalists Charles Neidich, Ian Bousfield, David Halen, and the Attacca Quartet. During his time in Northern Virginia, Ayau enjoyed frequent collaboration with Renée Fleming; their concert appearances together include a performance (along with Hao Jiang Tian and Béla Fleck) at the Kennedy Center as part of the Coal + Ice: Musical Homage to the Earth exhibition, and virtual gala concerts for the Metropolitan Opera and the Lang Lang International Music Foundation. ​​Ayau’s performances of the Ben Folds Concerto for Piano and Orchestra, accompanying the Nashville Ballet at the Kennedy Center Opera House, were praised as "a worthy spectacle" by DC Theatre Scene. He went on to perform this concerto as a guest artist at the Chautauqua Institution in the summer of 2018.

A coach of Russian, French, German, and Italian vocal repertoire, Ayau also speaks Mandarin Chinese. Formerly on the faculties of Shenandoah Conservatory and George Washington University, his recent concerts and guest artist residencies include The University of Michigan, Gordon College, Louisiana State University, Virginia Tech, and several universities and conservatories in Taiwan and China. From 2011–2014, he served as pianist for the United States Army Chorus, performing for foreign dignitaries and audiences around the country. He holds the Doctorate in Musical Arts from the University of Michigan in Collaborative Piano, having studied under renowned pedagogue Martin Katz, and holds a Masters in Collaborative Piano from The Juilliard School.

Jeremy Crosmer

Cellist and composer Jeremy Crosmer is a remarkable young artist. He completed multiple graduate degrees from the University of Michigan in cello, composition and theory pedagogy, and received his D.M.A. in 2012 at age 24. From 2012 to 2017 he served as the Assistant Principal cellist in the Grand Rapids Symphony, and joined the Detroit Symphony Orchestra in May of 2017.

Crosmer is a recipient of the League of American Orchestras’ 2021 Ford Musician Award for Excellence in Community Service for his work piloting the DSO’s partnership with Gesher Human Services. He was also honored with the Gesher Impact Award in 2025. Additionally, he is the sole composer and arranger for the Grand Rapids Symphony’s Music for Health Initiative, which pairs symphonic musicians with music therapists to bring classical music to hospitals. In March of 2017 the Helen DeVos Children’s Hospital launched a music TV channel that runs continuously using four hours of meditative music composed by Crosmer.

Crosmer has written numerous orchestral works for the Grand Rapids Symphony, Arkansas Symphony, Ozark Music Festival, and the Jackson Symphony Orchestra. His overture Ozark Traveler and his viola concerto Masks: a Heroine’s Tale have been performed around the country. In May of 2022 he performed his work Threnody for cello and string orchestra with maestro Jader Bignamini and the DSO. He has played Dvořák, Haydn, Boccherini, Elgar and Saint-Saëns cello concertos numerous times with orchestras across Michigan, and in April of 2023 he performed and recorded the American premiere of Fernande Decruck’s 1932 Cello Concerto with maestro Matthew Aubin and the Jackson Symphony Orchestra. The recording is available from Claves Records.

Crosmer is a founding member of the modern music ensemble Latitude 49. He is also a current member of the band ESME—a duo that brings crossovers and mashups of pop and classical music to schools throughout Michigan. ESME released its first CD in December of 2016. Crosmer was also a part of the World Map project with the Four Corners Ensemble, recording Shuying Li’s cello concerto Matilda’s Dream in 2020. Crosmer was awarded the prestigious Theodore Presser Graduate Music Award in 2011 to publish, record and perform his Crosmer-Popper duets. The recording with Julie Albers and the sheet music are both available online.

In 2021, Crosmer created a database of free, digital editions of music by Classical Black Composers arranged or transcribed for string quartet, with over 33 pieces available on his website. He also has arrangement collections of Disney, Motown, Taylor Swift, 1940s, and other pop music available for flexible instrumentation that orchestras use in their community engagement programs across the country. Crosmer has taught music theory, pre-calculus, and cello at universities across Michigan.