Irene Test

Violin

Irene Test is a violinist who lives in Hartford, Connecticut. In May, she finished up her Master in Music degree at the Hartt School and since been doing gigs, teaching and writing. During her time there, she studied with Anton Miller and made it to the final round of the Paranov Concerto Competition, and her chamber group won Best of Chamber music twice. Prior to moving to Hartford to go to The Hartt School, she was in Boston, where she earned a Bachelor of Music and a Bachelor of Arts in English from Boston University, where she studied violin with Bayla Keyes.

While studying music, she has attended a few music festivals, including The Heifetz Institute, the Bowdoin International Music Festival, and the ARIA Music Festival. At these music festivals, she played in guest artist master classes with Ani Kavafian and Gregory Fulkerson and also did solo and chamber music performances open to the public.

Outside of playing classical music, Irene has played popular music with a band in Connecticut called The Scratches. Aside from playing in music festivals and coffee houses, they recorded an album under Sling Slang Records for violin, keyboard, and voice. In addition, for live performances, Irene transcribed synthpop songs by Depeche Mode and Ultravox for violin and keyboard.

In addition to performing, Irene does freelance music journalism. Locally, some of her feature articles and music reviews have been published in the Hartford Advocate and Connecticut Metromix. On a national level, she is a freelance staff writer for music, entertainment, and fashion publications Vicious Magazine and City Luxe and does freelance copy editing for music trade publication Performer Magazine.