Recent honors awarded to violist Melia Watras, head of the UW Strings program, recognize her distinguished contributions to the instrument as performer, composer, teacher, and leader. The Maurice W. Riley Award, granted annually by the American Viola Society (AVS), honors outstanding exemplars of the viola world. Watras was presented the award at the 2024 AVS Festival, held at the Colburn School in Los Angeles this past summer.
AVS also commissioned a work from Watras for viola ensemble. Her composition Fantasies in alto clef received its world premiere at the festival. Watras was the AVS Artist-in-Residence for May and June, 2024.
Watras’s work is multi-faceted and ecompasses composing and commissioning new works for viola, creating and realizing complex interdisciplinary presentations of innovative, original repertoire in both live and recorded formats. In her 2024 UW faculty recital, she debuted works from Play/ Write, her latest release of original and commissioned works.
Watras marks the release of a new CD, the almond tree duos, at the UW on March 14, 2025 (Brechemin Auditorium), and her May 5 faculty recital at Meany Hall premieres a new multi-disciplinary project, Broken Bell, a collaboration with writer Sean Harvey.