Seattle String Ensemble

The Seattle String Ensemble was founded in 1994 and is composed of current and former members of the Seattle Symphony, the Pacific Northwest Ballet Orchestra, and the Northwest Sinfonietta. Their repertoire spans the baroque, classical, romantic, and modern eras and includes jazz and pop classics, opera excerpts, and some ragtime.

Yuriy Mikhlin,
First Violin played for twenty years as Assistant Concertmaster of the Kiev State Opera and Ballet in Ukraine, and currently serves as Concertmaster of the Federal Way Philharmonic, while playing frequently with the Seattle Symphony, the Pacific Northwest Ballet, and the Seattle Opera.

Mannfried Funk,
Cellist Manfried Funk has won a number of solo competitions and has performed in the United States, Europe, Japan, South America, Middle East and former Soviet Union. Locally he won the 1976 Don Bushell Competition and was a member of the Seattle Symphony, Pacific Northwest Ballet and the Seattle Opera. More recently he has been active as a soloist, teacher and recording cellist for the movie industry. He has also held various Principal Cello positions and was on the U.S. tour of Andrew Lloyd Webber's "Music of the Night". Prior to arriving to Seattle he was Principal and Co-principal Cello of several orchestras in South America and CO-principal Cellist for the Los Angeles Philharmonic Institute. An active chamber musician, his ensemble, the Pacific Chamber Group, played for Boris Yeltsin on his visit to Seattle, for the Secretary of State at the Russian-American International Trade Convention and in the "Out to Lunch" concert series presented by the Seattle Downtown Association at One Union Square. The Pacific Chamber Group is the permanent Artists in Residence ensemble for the performing arts center, Ascension Arts, located in Magnolia. Mr. Funk will be the featured soloist with the Eastside Symphony in November 2003.

Thane Lewis,
Viola Thane Lewis is Principal Violist of the Tacoma Symphony and Assistant Principal Violist of the Northwest Sinfonietta. He has performed as Assistant Principal Viola of the Boise Philharmonic, and as an extra with the Oregon Symphony, the Anchorage Symphony, the Auburn Symphony, the Pacific Northwest Ballet Orchestra, and the 5th Avenue Theater Orchestra, most recently in their production of Leonard Bernstein’s “Candide.” In the last three years Thane has appeared as soloist with the Tacoma Symphony, the Eastside Symphony, Octava Chamber Orchestra, and the Lake Union Civic Orchestra in Seattle’s Town Hall. The Tacoma News Tribune characterized his performance as full of “. . . passion and flourish.”

"I wanted to take the opportunity to thank you and the Seattle String Ensemble, once again, for providing a lovely evening of delightful music for our Holiday party. We were extremely pleased and will definitely remember you for another occasion."
Liz Bosold, Exec. Administrator, Starbucks Coffee Company.