This week, From the Top kicks off the Gettysburg Festival with a prize-winning quartet from Chicago playing Bartók and a teenage tuba player from Georgia with a moving story about taking up his instrument.

Sodienye Finebone, tuba, age 18 from Smyrna, GA, Jack Kent Cooke Young Artist, performing III. Allegro giocoso from Concerto for Tuba by Edward Gregson

Elaine Kang, violin, age 16 from Port Matilda, PA, performing Carmen Fantasy by Pablo de Sarasate

Kathryn Westerlund, cello, age 13 from Lebanon, PA, performing II. Allegro from Sonata in D Minor, Op. 40 by Shostakovich

Hyung-Do Kim, piano, age 14 from Palisades Park, NJ performing No. 3 La Campanella from Six Grandes Études de Paganini by Franz Liszt.

Emerald Quartet (Marko Dreher, coach; Music Institute of Chicago) performing V. Allegro molto from String Quartet No. 4 by Béla Bartók. The Emerald Quartet features Clayton Penrose-Whitmore, violin, age 17 from Evanston, IL, Kenneth Jones-Madrid, violin, age 17 from Evanston, IL, Ethan Hoppe, viola, age 18 from Chicago, IL, and Alexander Hersh, cello, age 16 from Chicago, IL.