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Marina Kifferstein

American violinist, composer, improviser, and educator

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 14, 2026
Entity authorityQ104971672 ↗
Source-derived summary

Marina Kifferstein (born July 19, 1989) is a violinist, composer, improviser, and educator based in New York City. She is a member of contemporary classical quintet TAK ensemble, The Rhythm Method string quartet, and electronic noise project xbucket.

Education

Born and raised in Manhattan, Kifferstein attended New York City's School for Strings and went on to major in both violin performance and English as part of Oberlin College and Conservatory's double degree program, where she studied with violinist Milan Vitek. She continued her studies at Manhattan School of Music's Contemporary Performance Program, studying with Laurie Smukler and Curtis Macomber. She is currently pursuing a doctorate of Musical Arts at the Graduate Center, CUNY.

Career

In 2013 Kifferstein co-founded TAK ensemble, a contemporary quintet based in New York City, where she also co-founded The Rhythm Method, an experimental string quartet, in 2014. She is a frequent guest with ensembles such as the International Contemporary Ensemble, Talea Ensemble, Wet Ink Ensemble, Da Capo Chamber Players, and the Ensemble of Lucerne Festival Alumni.

As a writer, Kifferstein has contributed to I Care If You Listen, Wet Ink Ensemble's Wet Ink Archive, and Q2 Music.

Kifferstein teaches at the United Nations International School and is on faculty at The Composers Conference summer festival.

Personal life

Kifferstein uses she/they pronouns.

Discography

Ecstatic Music: TAK play Brook (New Focus Records, 2016)

Chance Monsoon – Dai Fujikura (Minabel, 2017)

Torrent – Wet Ink Ensemble (Sound American, 2017)

Sanctuary (Denovali, 2018)

Wet Ink: 20 – Wet Ink Ensemble (Carrier Records, 2018)

The Rhythm Method: A Very Wandelweiser Christmas Vol.

Editorial summary

This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Marina Kifferstein” as american violinist, composer, improviser, and educator. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.

Editorial reviewStrongest as a route into the people, institutions and dated events that shaped the subject’s public record. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1989, 2013, 2014, 2016—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1989-01-01. The account is most persuasive where Marina, Kifferstein and American can be independently traced.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The subject matters to the people & ideas register because the source frames it as american violinist, composer, improviser, and educator. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.

Evidence profile

The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 14, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q104971672. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1989, 2013, 2014 and 2016.

Critical limits

A concise life account rarely captures disputed attribution, private networks or the changing language used to describe a career. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Marina Kifferstein”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Marina Kifferstein primary sources, Marina Kifferstein archive and Marina research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Marina Kifferstein”?
  2. Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
  3. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Marina Kifferstein” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.