Young Strings Registration Form

KCD's Young Strings program is an instrumental strings program that extends KCD's strings offerings to students in grades 1-4. The program is conducted during the regular school hours and occasionally as an after school activity. The program is the next step toward our goal of building an exceptional orchestra program for all students in grades 1-12.

The program will be directed by Mr. James Racine, who has played violin with both the University of Kentucky Symphony and the Lexington Philharmonic Orchestra. More information about Mr. Racine can be found below.

About the director
James Racine was born in 1980 in Port-au-Prince, Haiti into a family of musicians. His father is a flutist, conductor and composer. His mother is an educator and professional violist. James began playing the violin at the age of four, instructed by his mother. He later studied with Yvrose Philippe-Auguste and Romel Joseph. He added the piano and the flute a few years later.

For three consecutive summers he was awarded a scholarship to attend the Sewanee Summer Music Center, in Tennessee. By the age of fifteen, he was a violinist in the Holy Trinity Philharmonic Orchestra, in Port-au-Prince. At seventeen, he was the assistant concertmaster of the Holy Trinity Philharmonic Orchestra and the first violinist of the Holy Trinity String Quartet. He led the quartet in 1998 to perform at the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition in South Bend, Indiana. He later moved to the United States and studied the violin with Keith Cook for a year.

In 1999, James started to attend the University of Kentucky where he was awarded a full Undergraduate Scholarship. He was also the recipient of the William C. Parker Grant during his entire undergraduate career. He studied the violin and the viola respectively with Professors Daniel Mason and Dorotea Hoffman. He played in the University of Kentucky Symphony Orchestra and the Lexington Philharmonic Orchestra. During that time, James fell in love with teaching and participated in the String Project, a program delivered by the American String Teachers Association (ASTA) to offer a musical education to the youth in Lexington. He was then hired to teach along with Professor Hoffman at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music.

At the conservatory, James taught a strings class for the college’s preparatory program. At the
university, he was the founding member and violist of the Animato Quartet. He performed along with violinists Hristo Popov, Ella Chang and cellist Yoonie Choi. The Animato Quartet performed at many events around Kentucky and the founding members were awarded full fellowships to participate in the Garth Newel Chamber Music Festival in Hot Springs, Virginia.

James received in 2004 a Bachelor of Arts in Music Education and a Bachelor of Arts in Music Performance with a concentration on violin from the University of Kentucky. He then moved to Louisville to take the Orchestra Director position at Myers Middle School. James now resides in Louisville and is both Musical Director and Orchestra Director at the Kentucky Country Day School college preparatory program where he also holds a full violin/viola studio after school. He is also the Residing Violin Instructor at Steilberg Strings Instruments and teaches both violin and viola at the Western Louisville Talent Education Center along with Keith Cook. James has also played with the Louisville Orchestra. Undoubtedly a sought-after performer, he has performed Gospel as a solo violinist at many big churches such as St Stephen's Church, Canaan Christian Church, South East Christian Church, Mercy Seat Baptist Church and more.

In his spare time, James loves to compose at the keyboard and play jazz on his violin. He is a Solo Violinist of the New Age group F.E.D. and Friends, which has performed in the United States and Haiti during the summers. As a small group, they were gold medaled in the Instrumental Music category at the 2006 edition of the World Championships of Performing Arts (WCOPA) held in California. James is also the founder of popular group Racine Kompa. He regularly honors performance commitments at private events and currently works on his album on which he will showcase the best of his talent including his masterworks on his innovative “Blazing Violin.”