Strings for Special Events

Samuel Nordlund is the instructor of cello at Samford University and a member of the Samford Quartet. He frequently performs with the Alabama Symphony Orchestra and has been a member of the Huntsville Symphony, Kalamazoo Symphony (MI), and Illinois Philharmonic, among others. Samuel is Past-President of the Alabama Orchestra Association and has taught at the Samford Piano and Chamber Music Institute. He earned his Doctor of Musical Arts from The University of Alabama, and a Master of Music from Northwestern University with additional studies at summer festivals including the Music Academy of the West, the Meadowmount School of Music, the Kent/Blossom Music Festival, and the Brevard Music Center. Primary teachers were Hans Jørgen Jensen and Carlton McCreery.

Prior to moving to Alabama, Samuel was a member of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, and a substitute player with the Chicago and Milwaukee Symphony Orchestras. He also served as Assistant Director of Performance Activities at the Music Institute of Chicago. For several summers, he taught cello and directed the Early Music Ensemble at the Lutheran Summer Music festival. He is a previous Music Director of the Metropolitan Youth Orchestras of Central Alabama and currently serves on their Board of Directors. Samuel and his violinist wife, Caroline, enjoy playing in String Theory Birmingham. They have two gregarious children.

Jeffrey Z. Flaniken is enjoying a multifaceted vocation as teacher, soloist, recitalist, orchestral player, and chamber music performer. He began his performing career by winning a chair in the Louisville Orchestra at the age of seventeen. He has also played with the Alabama, Cincinnati, and Atlanta orchestras; the Tanglewood and Aspen Festival orchestras; the Cincinnati Ballet and Opera orchestras; the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra and many others. Locally, Mr. Flaniken has performed on the Birmingham Chamber Music Society Series, BAMA, Artburst, City Stages, The Festival of Arts, and the Gerhart Chamber Music Festival. He studied with Dorothy Delay, Hyo Kang, Masao Kawasaki and Kurt Sassmansshaus at Philadelphia College of the Performing Arts and at Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. He has also studied with Simon Fischer in London. He has enjoyed playing in the Samford String Quartet with his wife Angela, and Samuel and Caroline Nordlund for the past twelve years. The quartet has performed and given masterclasses in many states. They also performed in England, France and Carnegie Hall.

In January of 2010, Professor Flaniken in conjunction with his wife Angela, Donald Sanders, Kevin Kozak and Sarana Chou released a recording of 21st-century chamber music presenting music of Lansky, Jensen and Chou. He has also participated on recordings of the Alabama Symphony, the Atlanta Symphony, a National Geographic television show, and the John Denver Christmas Special.

From 1994-2024, Mr. Flaniken was a faculty member at Samford University.

Born in Dublin, Ireland, Niamh’s family moved to the United States when she was nine months of age. She began violin lessons at age 4 in Huntsville, AL, via the Suzuki method, and continued her studies throughout her youth in Birmingham, AL, under the instruction of Col. Charles L. Waid, Barbara Nord, and the legendary prodigy, Guila Bustabo.

Niamh attended the Sewanee Summer Music Center for many years, studying with Connie Heard and Yair Kless, and was a winner of the Sewanee Concerto Competition. A graduate of the University of Alabama with a full music scholarship, she earned a Bachelor of Science in Violin Performance and Environmental Science through the New College program, studying violin with Henry Rubin and J. Patrick Rafferty. She served as Concertmaster of the University of Alabama Orchestra for several years, and also attended the Brevard Music Center. As an orchestral musician, Niamh performed with the Alabama Symphony, Tuscaloosa Symphony, Huntsville Symphony and Asheville Symphony, among others.

Niamh has a deep love for performing various genres of music, from classical to Irish folk and rock and roll. She has had the pleasure of performing with artists such as Stevie Wonder, Rod Stewart, The Moody Blues, Tony Bennett, Trampled by Turtles, The Eagles, St. Paul and the Broken Bones, Common, John Legend, and numerous Black Jacket Symphony shows throughout the Southeast.

Niamh is the proud mother of two amazing young men and works by day in the medical field of dermatology pharmaceutical sales.