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Students, Faculty + Alumni

YSM Alumni News | November 2018

Molly Joyce

Flutist Amanda Baker ’00MM returned to Yale in April 2018 to become Senior Associate Director for Young Alumni for the Yale Alumni Fund. She was also a guest lecturer this spring at the University of Hartford, where she taught “Entrepreneurship in the Arts,” and continues to teach flute at Eastern Connecticut State University.

Double Bassist Mark Elliot Bergman ’97MM received a Performing Arts Fellowship in Music from the Wyoming Arts Council, one of four recipients in the state. Bergman’s winning original compositions include Ondine, The Temple, and Shenandoah Suite, a string trio commemorating the 75th anniversary of the founding of Shenandoah National Park.

Violist Emily Grace Brandenburg ’17MMA was named Administrative Assistant at the McDuffie Center for Strings at Mercer University in Macon, Ga.

Choral conductor Miles Canaday ’12MM graduated from the Eastman School of Music with a doctorate in conducting in May 2018 and began a tenure-track position directing the choirs at Whitman College in Walla Walla, Wash., in August.

Organist Vincent Carr ’06MM was awarded the Trustees’ Teaching Award from Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music based on his work during his first year as Associate Professor in Organ and Sacred Music.

Percussionist Peter Derheimer ’88MM completed his 27th year as solo timpanist of the Real Orquesta Sinfónica de Sevilla and the Maestranza Opera House. He also played drum set on various jazz programs that included works by Ellington and Bernstein.

The chamber vocal ensemble NOTUS, directed by Dominick DiOrio ’08MM ’09MMA ’12DMA, released NOTUS: Of Radiance & Refraction on Innova Recordings. Featuring world premieres and the Zorá String Quartet, the commercial album is the first in the ensemble’s nearly 40-year history.

Double bassist Brian Ellingsen ’09MM accepted a position with the United States Air Force Bands and will begin playing with the U.S. Air Force Band of the West in San Antonio, Texas.

Bassoonist Larisa Gelman ’99MM was named Vice President of Community Impact at the Peace Center in Greenville, S.C. She previously served for 10 years as Director of the Center for Education Outreach at the 92ndStreet Y in New York City.

Flutist Isabel Gleicher ’14MM joined the International Contemporary Ensemble for the 2018-2019 season.

Pianist Christopher Goodpasture ’18MMA, double bassist Ha Young Jung ’15AD, flutist Leo Sussman ’18MM, violinist Suliman Tekalli ’16AD, and bassoonist Yen-Chen Wu ’16MM were five of the 18 musicians who joined the New York City fellowship program Ensemble Connect in the fall.

Flutist Jennifer Grim ’98MM ’99MMA ’03DMA joined the faculty at the University of Miami Frost School of Music.

Art songs by composer Juliana Hall ’87MM were performed by Metropolitan Opera mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe and pianist Alan Smith at the Fall Island Vocal Arts Seminar in May.

Soprano Leah Hawkins ’15MM joined the Lindemann Young Artist Development Program at the Metropolitan Opera, where she will make her debut as the Alms Collector in Suor Angelica and the High Priestess in Aida.

Violinists Ethan Hoppe ’16MM ’18MMA and Yefim Romanov ’16AD joined the New World Symphony for the 2018-2019 season.

Trombonist Maureen Horgan ’83MM is now Professor Emeritus at Georgia College in Milledgeville, Ga., where she taught brass, jazz, and aural skills for 16 years. She retired from her position as Second Trombone of the New Hampshire Music Festival Orchestra following the 2017 season, having performed with the ensemble for 33 consecutive summer seasons.

Kemp Jernigan ’15MM was appointed Professor of Oboe at The Hartt School at the University of Hartford and at SUNY Purchase.

Since 2016, guitarist Seth F. Josel ’85MM ’88MMA ’94DMA has been a research fellow at the Orpheus Institute in Ghent, where he is working on a critical edition of Helmut Lachenmann’s Salut für Caudwell. Josel also maintains an active performing career, playing with such ensembles as the Berlin Philharmonic, the Berlin Radio Symphony, and the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin.

Molly Joyce ’17MM was one of four composers commissioned as part of the Washington National Opera’s American Opera Initiative. Joyce’s one-act opera Relapse, with a libretto by James Kennedy, will receive its world premiere on Jan. 12, 2019, at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

Jiyeon “Jiji” Kim ’17MM will premiere light, beloved, a new guitar concerto by composer Natalie Dietterich ’16MM’17MMA, with Michael Repper and the New York Youth Symphony on December 2, 2018.

Wayne J. Kirby ’73MM moderated a panel discussion at the International Continuum Conference in Paris. He also performed Paul Hindemith’s7 Triostücke für 3 Trautonienwith Edmund Eagan and Sally Sparks at the Gaîté Lyrique.

Harpsichordist Mark Kroll ’71MM recently recorded seven CDs of François Couperin’s harpsichord music for Centaur Records. The project, which will result in a box of 10 compact discs of the complete works of Couperin, will be completed next year.

The compositions of Anne Leilehua Lanzilotti ’08MM were featured at the 14th edition of the Thailand International Composition Festival.

Conductor Stuart Malina ’87MM, a finalist for the position of Music Director of the Lake Placid Sinfonietta, will direct the ensemble from July 15 to July 28 as part of the audition process. He is now in his 19th season as Music Director of the Harrisburg Symphony Orchestra.

Percussionist Mitya (Dmitrii) Nilov ’18MM was awarded a management prize at the Concert Artists Guild Victor Elmaleh Competition.

Pianist Naomi Niskala ’01AD performed in October as part of Pacific Lutheran University’s Artist Series in Tacoma, Wash.

Composer Andrew Norman ’09AD had his new symphonic work, Sustain, premiered by Gustavo Dudamel and the Los Angeles Philharmonic in October.

Pianist Esther Park ’12AD ’13MMA ’17DMA and violinist Dawn Wohn ’08MM ’09AD recorded an album that celebrates diversity in works by female composers, including Florence Price and alumna Reena Esmail ’11MM ’14MMA ’18DMA, to be released by Delos Music in 2019.

Bassoonist Hanul Park ’17MM was appointed Acting Second Bassoonist of the Sarasota Orchestra in Sarasota, Fla.

Composer Greg Sandow ’74MM began his 21st year on the faculty at The Juilliard School, teaching the graduate course “How to Speak and Write About Music” in the fall, and a course on the future of classical music in the spring.

Tenor Rolando Sanz ’02MM ’03AD made his Metropolitan Opera debut in Mozart’s Idomeneo, and won an Emmy Award for his work on a television special for Maryland Public Television (PBS) celebrating the works of Sir Tim Rice. Sanz also became head of the young artist division of the Bel Canto in Tuscany program.

Trumpeter Kyle Sherman’11MM performed the trumpet solo in Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 2 with the Dallas Chamber Symphony.

David Snow ’78MM was one of 13 composers who contributed scores to Le Ballet de la Nuit, a 13-hour collective work of screendance that premiered in May 2018 at the Festival International de Vidéo Danse de Bourgogne in Cerisy-la- Salle, France.

Violinist David Southorn ’09MM ’10AD became Concertmaster of the New Haven Symphony Orchestra and was featured in Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade at Woolsey Hall last October. Southorn continues to play with the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, the Delaware Symphony Orchestra, and the New York Philharmonic.

Violinist Matheus Garcia Souza ’14MM and the Unheard-of// Ensemble finished recording their first album, which is slated to be released in February 2019. Formed three years ago, the group has premiered more than 30 works by such composers as Reiko Füting, Erin Rogers, and Christopher Stark.

Trumpeter Carl Stanley ’15MM and his quintet Collective Brass released the album In Thy Sweet Name last May. Featuring new arrangements of Renaissance works for brass quintet, guitar, and percussion, the album includes works by Salomone Rossi, Christopher Tye, Henry VIII, Claudio Monteverdi, and Samuel Scheidt.

Organist Paul Braxton Thomas ’13MM was named Director of Music at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Chattanooga, Tenn.

The Ulysses Quartet, whose members include violist Colin Brookes ’13MM ’14AD, won first prize in the Chamber Group division of the Alice & Eleonore Schoenfeld International String Competition.

Violist Chris Williams ’10MM was named Vice President of Artist Management at the Concert Artists Guild in New York City.

Trombonist Martin Wittenberg ’04MM joined Columbia Artists in New York City as an artist manager, working with a distinguished roster of instrumentalists, conductors, and orchestras.