Meet the teachers

Ravenswood Location

  • Azusa Tashiro, a distinguished musician and educator, has dedicated over 10 years of her life to nurturing the musical talents of students of all ages and levels. Hailing from Chiba, Japan, her musical journey began when she started solfège training at the age of three and violin studies at four. Her passion for music led her to continue studying at Toho Gakuen School of Music, earning a Bachelor of Music degree. She then completed a Master of Music degree from DePaul University School of Music, where she studied with Ilya Kaler.

    Azusa’s Suzuki teacher training mentor was Ed Kreitman. To date, many of of her students have been accepted into prestigious orchestras such as the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra and Midwest Young Artists.

    When teaching, she focuses on developing students' abilities to analyze and solve problems independently. She believes that by nurturing independent learners and fostering a growth mindset, students thrive not only in their musical journey but also in the multifaceted challenges they may encounter throughout life.

    As an accomplished violinist, Azusa is currently serving as the Concertmaster of the Illinois Philharmonic Orchestra. Additionally, she holds principal positions in both the South Bend Symphony Orchestra and the Rockford Symphony Orchestra. She has appeared as a soloist with the Illinois Philharmonic Orchestra, Lakeshore Symphony Orchestra, College of DuPage Chamber Orchestra, and Northwestern University Orchestra. Her performance has been heard numerous times on WGN Radio, WGN-TV, and WFMT.

    When Azusa finds free time, she indulges in her other passions: cooking, eating and playing with her cat, Gabriel von Eisenstein.

    Learn more about Azusa here.

Irving Park Location


  • Willie McLellan has performed and taught violin and viola in Chicago for the last decade. He is an experienced orchestral musician, having played with the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, Elgin Symphony Orchestra, and Sinfonietta. Willie also greatly enjoys playing chamber music. He was a member of Chicago Symphony’s MusiCorps outreach program that educated and performed for audiences in schools and park spaces. In 2019 he co-founded the Kolmar Music Collective, a mixed ensemble that performs works of diverse and underrepresented composers. In the summer of 2021 he was a featured performer in a string quartet at the American Suzuki Institute in Stevens Point.

    Willie has a performance degree from UW-Madison in violin. He studied viola performance at DePaul University and Northern Illinois University, where he was a teaching assistant to Tony Devroye. Willie began his Suzuki Method teacher training with Ed Kreitman and continued with Rolando Freitag.

    As a teacher, Willie enjoys working with students of all levels. He believes learning to play with physical ease is fundamental to the lifelong enjoyment of an instrument. At weekly lessons he aims to give his students personalized instructions to improve their technique, listening and reading fluency, and musicality.

    When he is not busy on the music scene Willie enjoys cooking new vegetarian recipes, biking the streets of Chicago, and playing competitive foosball.