On Sunday, January 19, violinist Kelly Hall-Tompkins will perform a recital to benefit the Ben Carlson-Berne (BCB) Scholarship Fund in support of classical music education for Cincinnati’s youth. Her performance, 3 p.m. next Sunday in the Mayerson Theater at the School for Creative & Performing Arts, is open to the public.

She performed as the “Fiddler” violin soloist in the Grammy/Tony nominated Broadway revival of “Fiddler on the Roof.” Featured as soloist in more than 400 Broadway performances, plus a Grammy-nominated cast album alongside a bonus track by Itzhak Perlman, Hall-Tompkins has been the featured subject on NBC’s Today Show with Harry Smith, and many other news outlets.

Among her awards, she received a Naumburg International Violin Competition Honorarium Prize, a Concert Artists Guild Career Grant, and the Sphinx Medal of Excellence. She is featured in the Smithsonian Museum of African-American History.

She’s also the founder of Music Kitchen-Food for the Soul, a program which has brought more than 100 chamber music performances to New York City, Los Angeles and even Paris, France, homeless shelters.

She also has a Cincinnati connection — in 2018, she was appointed as the Cincinnati Symphony‘s inaugural Classical Roots program Artist-in-Residence. To read her impressive biography, click here.

Since 2004, the BCB Fund has helped provide instruments and lessons with premier, private instructors to underserved and economically disadvantaged Cincinnati Public School (CPS) students with an interest in classical music. To date, the fund has provided 350 lesson years to 131 youth.

Here’s a story I wrote for the Courier in 2018 about how one former student benefited from the BCB Scholarship.

Details:

An evening of great music featuring guest violinist Kelly Hall-Tomkins
Sunday, January 19, 2025 at 3 PM
Mayerson Theater, School for Creative and Performing Arts
108 West Central Parkway, Cincinnati, OH 45202
Tickets: bcbscholarship.org

Ben’s story:

Ben was a serious student of piano. He loved classical music and grew into a young man full of vitality and spontaneity, with a deep sensitivity for beauty. In high school Ben took it as his mission to help ensure that his love of classical music could be shared with underserved youth. He volunteered his time and talents to help connect youth to classical music, to teach music lessons and to locate instruments for students who could not afford them. Ben’s short life ended in 2002 at age 19 in a hiking accident. Ben’s vision has inspired others who also want to spread the love of classical music, making the scholarship a growing success and a living legacy to the inspiration of one youth.