NEWS AND NOTES

from around the state

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BAY AREA

As schools are starting and church and community choirs are returning to in-person rehearsals, we don’t have any performance news to share just yet, but the choral arts are alive and well in the San Francisco Bay Area! In conjunction with the CCDA Summer Summit 2.0, we hosted meet-ups in the South, East, and North Bay regions. Thank you to

Bret Peppo, Julie Ford, LaNell

Martin, and Jenny Bent for organizing and hosting! (See photos from meet-ups from around the state on pages 20-21!)

With the new school year there are also a few job celebrations to mention. Congratulations to Bruce Koliha on his retirement from his long-term church position at San Ramon Valley United Methodist Church. We know Bruce will be missed! Kristen Redaniel will be teaching elementary and middle school music in Hayward, and Noah Rulison is directing the choral program at Menlo-Atherton High School. We are also overjoyed to welcome Christy Rohayem back to the Bay Area as choir director at Mt. Eden High School.

CENTRAL COAST REGION

Cricket Handler and Jill Anderson, directors of the Canzona Women’s Ensemble, have been attending the bi-monthly “Living with the Pandemic: Safety Guidance for the Arts” webinars hosted by Dr. Neha Nanda (Director of the Center for Emerging Pathogens at the Keck School of Medicine) and sponsored by Californians for the Arts. Cricket and Jill also meet regularly with a group of directors of women’s choirs in weekly Zoom meetings organized by Morna Edmundson, director of Elektra Women’s Choir in Vancouver, Canada. The choir directors involved are from across Canada and around the US, and cover a variety of topics related to music-making in the COVID era.

Vocal Arts Ensemble director Gary Lamprecht has announced dates for the Central Coast Spring Choral Festival: March 17-18, 2022. Find more details on the Central Coast Regional page on the CCDA website.

CENTRAL REGION

In July about half of the 120-member Modesto Symphony Orchestra Chorus met for the first time in sixteen months. Socially distanced in a church parking lot and under the direction of Daniel Afonso, the Chorus learned four short works and “performed” them at the conclusion, to the great delight of all involved.

Amanda Marsh was named the new choral director of Clovis High School. The position was previously held by Jennifer Appleby, who has taken a position in elementary music with Houston ISD.

Dylan Walters was named director of Choral Music at Culter-Orosi School District. Dylan is an alumnus of the Fresno State Choral Department.

The Bakersfield City School District hired Maritza Borja as a Visual and Performing Arts Department Academic Coach. She will be providing education and training to choral directors and spending time in classrooms to assist new teachers. In the Kern High School District, Christy Rohayem will leave East High, and recent CSUB graduate Neiman McDuff will become the new director at East. Ridgeview High director Elizabeth Provencio will be moving to pursue her master’s degree at CSUF while Ryan Clippinger, former director at Arvin High, will be taking over at Ridgeview. Arvin’s new choral director, Abbie Rosenthal, is a recent alumni of CSULB, and Michael Ellsworth moved back to Bakersfield just in time to become the choral director at Frontier High.

Jenepher Lapp retired in June after 37 years of teaching (35 of those at East Bakersfield High School). Throughout her teaching career she served in several roles for California ACDA and within Kern High School District. She was a recipient of many awards including the CMEA California State Choral Music Teacher of the Year, and the Kern County Choral Music Educator of the Year. Although she retires from active teaching, she plans to continue adjudicating, clinicing, and guest conducting.

The Bakersfield Master Chorale, now it its 89th season, recently announced that Jennifer Garrett will serve as the new Artistic Director, with Ryan Clippinger and Braeden Addison as Assistant Directors. Thank you to Robert Provencio for his years of service with the Bakersfield Master Chorale.

SOUTHERN REGION

Two choir camps were able to offer a summer camp experiences for young choral musicians in July and August: Pacific Chorale and Fullerton

College. The Fullerton College Summer Camp was led by camp director Nicola Dedmon, collaborative artist Samuel Grodin, voice instructors Krystle Menendez and Tyler Alessi, and section leaders Ariel May, Stacey Kikkawa, Stacey Oh, and Alan Garcia. The Pacific Chorale Summer Camp was run by camp director Molly Pontin; camp staff Chris Peterson, Tammi Alderman, Patricia Prunty, Mark Goodrich, Na-Young Shin; college student leaders Ayanna Delk-Lewis, Cameron McKay, Rigo Orozco, Jocelyne Ramirez; and camp host John Tebay, whose Fullerton Free Church donated the location for the camp.

Best wishes to these directors who are starting new jobs in the region: Rob Blaney at University High School (Irvine), Jim Blackett at Woodbridge High School; Ryan Clippinger at Ridgeview High School; Michael Fenton at Yorba Linda High School and Yorba Linda Middle School; Steven McCann at Redlands East Valley High; Reina Salcedo at Arbolita Elementary Schoo; Krista Scharf at Cope Middle School; Kelly Self at Westminster High School; Antone Rodich at Anaheim High School; Katie Villarreal at El Dorado High School; and Ryan Yoder at Bonita High School.

FAR SOUTH REGION

SACRA/PROFANA (Juan Carlos Acosta, Artistic Director) will make their debut on the St. James Music Series in La Jolla, performing music on the topic of stars, nighttime, and celestial bodies with an emphasis on recently composed music. The series will also feature VOCES8 with a program of “Choral Dances” and Chanticleer performing music by William Byrd, Claudio Monteverdi, and Augusta Read Thomas, as well as new commissions by Steven Sametz and Ayanna Woods.

During the summer, the San Diego Master Chorale, under the direction of Dr. John Russell, collaborated with The Voices of Chennai in their virtual performance to raise funds for those suffering from COVID-19 in India. This season, their annual Messiah Sing returns to St. Paul’s Cathedral as an in-person event in December.

The Martin Luther King, Jr. Community Choir San Diego (Pastor Ken Anderson, director) will appear with Bodhi Tree Concerts’ Tenth Anniversary Celebration at St. James By the Sea Episcopal Church in La Jolla. The Choir has raised funds through a series of concerts for educational grants to distribute to aspiring college-bound high school majors in Visual and Performing Arts from the San Diego County area.

The Choral Consortium of San Diego resumed their “Conversations with Conductors” series with guests Aaron Burgett and Dr. Yewon Lee in August. Aaron is a Director of Choral Worship at Solana Beach Presbyterian Church and Yewon is a Music Director at San Diego Festival Chorus.

NORTHERN REGION

The Northern California Children’s Chorus (Judy Britts, Artistic Director) is in their 14th season! They will perform John Rutter’s Visions on November 21 (location TBD). Judy will also have the honor of conducting a treble choir festival for Mid-America Productions in April 2022.

Cynthia Frank, conductor of the Mendocino Women’s Choir, reports that they participated in a parade for the postponed 100-year anniversary celebration of women’s suffrage. They sang songs from the Kansas Historical Suffrage Songbook, Dame Ethel Smyth’s “March of the Women,” Judy Fjell’s “One of us Can Make a Difference,” Melanie Demore’s “You Gotta Put One Foot in Front of the Other,” Elizabeth Alexander’s “This is What Democracy Looks Like,” and “America, the Beautiful.”

Dr. Donald Kendrick, conductor of The Sacramento Choral Society and Orchestra, have commissioned a new piece from composer Dr. Scott Perkins, a professor at Sacramento State School of Music. This new Christmas carol will receive its official premiere in December 2021 at SCS’s annual Home For The Holidays Christmas concert in Sacramento’s Memorial Auditorium.

Dr. Art Lapierre and the American River College Vocal Jazz Ensembles won two DownBeat Awards (their 21st and 22nd!). Vocal Jazz II took top honors in the community college small group category. Vocal Jazz I has been invited to Long Beach to sing for the ACDA Western Region Conference. They also performed at the 5th Sacramento Jazz Coop Celebration on September 25th in the Folsom Amphitheater, and at a Sacramento River Cats game.

Dr. Brett Judson has joined Dr. Andrew Kreckmann and the choral team at Sacramento State, and will conduct Sac State’s Choral Union. The Sac State choirs will also live-stream the closing concert for FeNAM (Festival of New American music), featuring music two brilliant trans composers: Mari Esabel Valverde & Michael Bussewitz-Quarm.  Thanks to our Regional Representatives (Andrew Kreckmann, Northern; Kristina Nakagawa, Bay Area; Jennifer Garrett, Central; Carolyn Teraoka-Brady, Central Coast; Tina Peterson, Southern; and Yewon Lee, Far South) for collecting and sharing news from their areas! Send your news to your regional representative if you’d like to be included in a future issue.