Like a ‘Lark,' Violinist Sarah Ying Ma is ready to soar with the Dallas Chamber Symphony

The prize-winning violinist will perform Ralph Vaughan Williams’ "The Lark Ascending" with the orchestra Jan. 14.

When Sarah Ying Ma steps onto the stage of Moody Performance Hall to perform with the Dallas Chamber Symphony on Jan. 14, it will be the beginning of an exciting year for the prize-winning violinist.

“I just turned 22 and I’m entering the professional world faster than I thought I would, and I think this year will be really testing that for me. I want to build the stamina and repertoire to be able to have a majority performance-based career and to have the skills to be able to do that as sustainably as I can,” Ma said.

Ma began playing the violin at age seven. Her mother encouraged all of her children to play an instrument and initially, Ma tried the piano. That instrument did suit her. After pointing to the violin section in a picture of an orchestra, Ma discovered her perfect musical fit.

“It really does feel like even if I’m playing another composer’s music, I can speak my own stories into it and what I want to say into the music, especially on the violin. I think over time, I’ve developed my own approach to technique and sound. It’s really representative of my personality and my identity in a unique way from anything else I’ve been interested in,” Ma said.

Ma is a 2024 Performance Today Young Artist in Residence with host Fred Childs and she has performed as a soloist with several orchestras, including the Island Symphony Orchestra, North Shore Symphony Orchestra, New York Concerti Sinfonietta, Manhattan School of Music’s Symphony Orchestra, Ensemble 212, Accademia D’Archi Arrigoni (Italy), Indiana University’s Informatics Philharmonic, Bravura Philharmonic Orchestra, and New York Chamber Players Orchestra.

She transferred from The Juilliard School to Oberlin Conservatory, earning a B.M. in Violin Performance. At Oberlin, she became a founding member of the Poiesis Quartet.

“We actually didn’t even know each other before we decided to play together,” Ma said.

The quartet ended up being a turning point in Ma’s development as a musician.

“When the four of us started playing together, it was just like magic. It was like our brains were synched up without having to talk and the rehearsal process and the performing process, the more we did it, the more it really felt cathartic to be onstage with colleagues. It made me grow more into the violin, not just as a violinist, but as a human being and an artist,” Ma said.

The Poiesis Quartet is the Grand Prize, Gold Medal, and Lift Every Voice winners of the 2023 Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition, Gold Medal and BIPOC prize winners at the 2023 St Paul String Quartet Competition’s Senior Division, and finalists in the 2024 Concert Artists Guild competition. 

In addition to being in residence at the University of Cincinnati’s Graduate Quartet Program, the quartet has been featured on recordings of new music by composers Rick Stout and Clint Needham, singer Nancy Maultsby, and multiple Grammy-winning producer Elaine Martone, as well as with producer Stefan Hersch at Guarneri Hall on Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson’s “Calvary” Quartet. More projects and competitions are in the works for 2025.

“It’s a big quartet year, for sure,” Ma said.

Ma is the second prize winner of the 2023 Dallas International Violin Competition. She performed with the Dallas Chamber Symphony during the final round of the competition and savored the musical conversation she has onstage with the orchestra.

“The connection that the soloist has with the conductor, I’ve always found that compelling. Having  to use all of your body language and subtle eye contact skills to forge that kind of intimate connection with some body without using a single word, without verbalizing anything, and still be able to land every single note together with sometimes 100 people around you, depending on the size of the orchestra,” Ma said.

Ma will perform Ralph Vaughan Williams’ The Lark Ascending, a piece inspired by George Meredith’s poem. The violin solo part represents the song and flight of a skylark. Vaughan Williams wrote the piece for violin and piano before the outbreak of World War I. After the war, Vaughan Williams reworked the piece for solo violin and orchestra. Since orchestral version’s first performance in 1921, it has become one of Great Britain’s favorite classical pieces.

“The harmonies feel more traditional. It’s more easily drawn to the human ear, the human aesthetic. And also because of the way it’s written in that folky sound world, it has an aspect of peace and gratitude in the music,” Ma said. “It just holds you in this magical space the entire time it goes on. The whole time you’re waiting for the next note.”

In addition to The Lark Ascending, the program includes Respighi’s Trittico botticelliano and Beethoven’s Fourth Symphony. Richard McKay, Dallas Chamber Symphony’s Artistic and Music Director, will conduct.

As beautiful as it is, the piece is a challenge.

“I love playing it, but it’s so hard!” Ma said. “Because it’s all built in fifths, the intonation is wicked hard.”

The piece is also difficult to memorize, but Ma believes the hard work will pay off.

“I’ve actually cried a lot over it,” Ma said. “But it’s really magical with the orchestra.”

Learn more: Dallas Chamber Symphony