Viorel Bejenaru

Viola

At this moment …

We would find Viorel at a Starbucks about a mile away from his house. "I don't have a car, which I'm glad about," he explains. "I'm doing pretty well without one; besides, I like to walk."

On the CD player …

"My ears don't want to listen to anything but classical," says Viorel. Currently he's listening to Nathan Millstein and Henryk Szeryng's recordings of Bach, as well as Bach's Brandenburg Concertos. When he's not enjoying music, Viorel tunes in NPR.

In the kitchen …

Although he claims to have little talent in the kitchen, Viorel harbors a not-so-secret desire to become a sushi chef. "I was about to join a sushi school before the Oregon Symphony hired me. If I hadn't gotten this job, I was going to continue my viola career and be a sushi chef on the side. I still might do it if I go back to Reno this summer; why not?"

On the music stand …

The Bartók and Stammitz viola concertos. "The first time I heard the Bartók it didn't make any sense to me, but a year later it started to grow on me," Viorel explains. "There's some music you need to grow up to understand." Viorel strives to find meaning in whatever he plays, whether it's scales or repertoire. "It's always challenging and you'll never be perfect."

And on the nightstand …

Viorel is currently brushing up on his German but also speaks Russian, Rumanian and English. When he's not studying languages he'll relax with historical fiction and recently finished Steven R. Lawhead's The Black Rood, the second volume in the Celtic Crusade trilogy.

Before you left …

Viorel would show you his seven piranha fish babies. "It's too hard to keep track of which is which; they all look the same to me," he admits. "Fish fascinate me both because they're beautiful and they have very interesting behavior."