2008-2009 Season Soloists

September 27, 2008:  Opening Night

Tonight, Bruce Tiu, age 11, will be performing Mozart Piano Concerto in C Minor, K.  491.  Bruce began his formal piano training with Violette Hu at age 5.  Under Ms. Hu’s instruction and guidance, Bruce has won numerous piano competitions.  In the coming 2008-2009 season, he will also be featured as a piano soloist performing with the CSUN Youth Orchestra.  Bruce’s piano achievements include: second place winner of the 2008 MTAC State Piano Concerto Competition; winner of the 2008 State Concerto Competition Southern California Regional Auditions; winner of the 2008 CSUN Youth Orchestra Concerto Competition; winner of the 2008 MTAC San Fernando West Valley Branch Concerto Competition; gold medalist and silver medalist of the Southern California Junior Bach Festival Complete Works Audition in 2007 and 2006 respectively; winner of the MTAC Branch Contemporary Festivals; and third place winner of the 22^nd Annual Young Musician Piano Competition in 2006 sponsored by Chinese American Education Association.  While piano is Bruce’s primary instrument, he also studies violin and is a member of the CSUN Chamber Orchestra.  Bruce is now a seventh grader at Chaminade College Preparatory in Chatsworth.  He excels in his academic studies and is the vice president of the Chaminade Student Council.  In his free time, he enjoys reading, swimming, playing lego and video games, and above all, listening to music composed by his favorite composers: Vivaldi, Chopin, and Rachmaninoff. 

Jamie Kim, 15, is a junior in high school and has studied cello since the fifth grade. She attends Harvard-Westlake School, where she was principal cellist of the Symphony Orchestra last year. She was a member of the All-Southern California Orchestra for two years, and was principal cellist in 2006. Jamie placed second at the 2008 VOCE State Competition, third in the senior category for the Branch Memorial Awards competition for San Fernando West Valley Branch, and was also a prizewinner at SYMF. Last year, after winning the Westside Music Foundation SMC Concerto Competition, she soloed with the Santa Monica College Orchestra. Jamie has participated in several music festivals, including Summit Music Festival, Boston University Tanglewood Institute, and the Gold Coast Chamber Music Festival. She currently studies with Andrew Cook.

Sixteen year old violinist Jacqueline Pabst has been playing the violin since she was seven years old.  She won first place in the Southwest Youth Music Festival in 2006 and 2007.  Jacqueline attended the Summit Music Festival in New York in the summer of 2006 and this past summer at the Montecito Music Festival.  She performed in recital and chamber music concerts at each.  She was selected to be in Junior Chamber Music this year and performed with her quartet, at their gala concert, at Santa Monica College in May.  Miss Pabst has been concertmaster of the string orchestra at the Colburn School and last season played with the Debut Orchestra.  Currently, she attends the Buckley School and is a violin student of Linda Rose.

November 8, 2008:  Musical Portrait:  Notes on a String

 Living the life of a true valley girl, Ruth Bruegger spent her youth in LAUSD schools, graduating from Pacoima Junior High to Polytechnic High and then to UCLA (at the same time, unknowingly, as our esteemed conductor!  Boy do we have stories to tell...please ask!).  In between all that schooling she got a housekeeping diploma from a boarding school in Switzerland (a family tradition that couldn't be ignored until she had her own three daughters).  Thanks to this experience Ruth discovered she'd much rather play violin.  Forty years later, you can still hear her play in all corners of this great city...traffic allowing, of course.  Ruth has played and been let go of some of the finest orchestras in L.A. and Santa Barbara, as well as toured with a variety of artists including Eric Clapton and Boccelli.  She has sperformed in so many weddings that she will not only never eat another piece of wedding cake, but would like to start a tradition of playing the divorces, too.  Chamber music is a favorite outlet and Ruth was thrilled to have performed at Sainte Chapelle in Paris and many of her relatives' farms in Switzerland.  If you listen very closely, you can hear her beautiful strands gracing countless LPs and movie soundtracks (her specialty being horror films).  Her greatest achievement to date, besides having soloed the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto with the San Fernando Valley Symphony, is her new grandson, a future violinist...or maybe a rock guitarist, if not a doctor.

Agnes Szekely Schwartz was born in Budapest, Hungary, into a musical family.  Her ancestry includes conductors, organists, pianists, and composers, as well as well-known Hungarian poet (Vorosmarty).  Her father studied with Gyorgy Litegi and students of Kodaly.  At the age of three, she declared that her wish was to become a violinist and travel the world.  At age six , she started at the Kodaly Educational system, where children are required to write and read music every day, play the recorder, and listen to classical music, as well as two violin lessons per week.  By the age of fifteen, she began substituting for her father as a choral conductor.  She later earned her Bachelor's degree in viola performance and her Masters in viola private teaching at the Ferenc Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest.  Her teachers have included Pal Lukacs, Istvan Kertesz, and Dr. Laszlo Somfai.  On a three-year fellowship to the Aspen Music Festival, she studied with John Graham and Dorothy Delay.  In Germany, she was the leader of the Arcana String Quartet.  Currently, she is concertmaster of the Rio Hondo Symphony, alternating concertmaster of the Cypress Pops Orchestra, principal second violin of the Thousand Oaks Philharmonic, and the leader of the Valencia String Quartet.  She is currently working on a second Master's degree in violin performance and orchestral conducting at CSUN.

Dr. Paul Pitman has been the resident organist at the First Presbyterian Church of Encino for the past eight years.  He is an accomplished performer who consistently continues to hone his virtuoso skills by preparing and presenting several chamber music concerts and solo recitals each year.  As a teacher he successfully nurtures and maintains a large studio of select piano students of all ages. He is a graduate of the University of Southern California in Los Angeles where he was awarded the Doctorate of Musical Arts degree as well as the Master of Music degree.  He is also an acclaimed performer in Germany at the Amerika Haus.  Dr. Pitman proclaims it to be a great honor to be invited to perform the Three Miniatures for Piano of Maestro Sandro Zaninovich at Maestro James Domine’s San Fernando Valley Symphony Orchestra at the upcoming November 8^th concert. Dr. Pitman is presently performing the complete Beethoven Sonatas as a part of a life-long ambition and is preparing the 6^th in the series to be presented on November 23^rd at the Presbyterian Church in Encino at 4:00 pm.  The public is invited.

February 28, 2009:  Bartok  +  The Kodaly Choir = A Symphony of Sound

April 25, 2009:  An Alto Saxophone and an Orchestra

Geoff Nudell received his musical education at the Grove School of Music and California State University, Northridge. His instructors included William Calkins, Abbey Fraser, Victor Morosco, Sam Most and Phil Sobel. As a professional musician Geoff has played, toured or recorded with Frankie Avalon, Tony Bennett, Carol Burnett, Cab Calloway, Johnny Crawford, Fleetwood Mac, Peggy Lee, Liza Minelli, Rita Moreno, Frederica von Stade, Leslie Uggams and Ian Whitcomb. In addition, his extensive symphonic background has included performances with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Los Angeles Opera Orchestra, Downey, Glendale, Pasadena, San Diego and New West Symphony Orchestras. Conductors he has played for have included Leonard Bernstein, Michael Tilson-Thomas, Charles Dutoit, Placido Domingo, and Kent Nagano.  His jazz experience has included performances with the Buddy Collette and Gerald Wilson big bands and the Pasadena Jazz Orchestra.  His recording experience continues to include jingles, motion pictures and a variety of network and cable television programs. Geoff is also active as a theater musician, having performed in the pit orchestras for Beauty And The Beast, Chicago, Fosse, Showboat, Swan Lake, The Last Empress, and Phantom Of The Opera. In 1993, Geoff performed as alto saxophonist with the Doug Masek Saxophone Quartet in a concert tour of South Africa.  He currently plays principal clarinet with the San Fernando Valley Symphony Orchestra, and can be seen performing around Los Angeles with the "vintage" swing band, Mora's Modern Rhythmists. Geoff has also been a private music instructor and clinician for over twenty years and is currently on the music faculty at California State University, Northridge as a woodwinds instructor.

A native of Los Angeles, violist J. Lee Graham has been associated with Maestro Domine and what is now the San Fernando Valley Symphony for much of the last 26 years. He joined the orchestra shortly after his graduation from high school in 1980 and served as the orchestra’s first principal violist until 1995 when he relocated briefly out of state. An accomplished singer and composer as well, Graham has enjoyed the honour of having several of his works performed by the orchestra, including his Symphony #1 in B-flat, Sinfonia Concertante in e minor for violin, ‘cello and orchestra and Christmas Cantata. As a singer, Graham created the role of The Preacher in early performances of Maestro Domine’s opera Luke and Sarah; he sings professionally with the Los Angeles Chamber Singers and Cappella, the Pacific Chorale, the John Alexander Singers and the choir of St. James' Episcopal Church, Los Angeles. Graham is primarily a self-proclaimed “Classical Revivalist” as a composer, and has recently completed several other large-scale works, including Sundry Dances After the Fashion of the Age of Enlightenment – a set of twenty-one 18th Century dances for chamber ensemble – and two symphonies: #2 in G, and #3 in A. Symphony #2 in G will be performed by the orchestra on the September 30, 2006 programme.

Tom Pease was born and raised in Burbank, California. He earned both his Bachelor's and Master's Degrees in Music Composition at USC. He has taught music in the Los Angeles Unified School District since 1977 and currently teaches choral music at Taft High School where he is also the lead teacher and the coordinator of the Visual and Performing Arts Academy. Mr. Pease is a member of the Media City Ballet's board of directors and is actively involved in their educational outreach program.

The Taft High School Vocal Ensemble is the premier choral group at Taft High School in Woodland Hills, California. The Ensemble performs regularly at community events, school concerts, and choral festivals where it has garnered an impressive number of top awards. It has also performed with the Media City Ballet Company and the San Fernando Valley Symphony Orchestra. The Taft Vocal Ensemble has been under the direction of Tom Pease since 1993.

May 25, 2009:  Season Finale

Living the life of a true valley girl, Ruth Bruegger spent her youth in LAUSD schools, graduating from Pacoima Junior High to Polytechnic High and then to UCLA (at the same time, unknowingly, as our esteemed conductor!  Boy do we have stories to tell...please ask!).  In between all that schooling she got a housekeeping diploma from a boarding school in Switzerland (a family tradition that couldn't be ignored until she had her own three daughters).  Thanks to this experience Ruth discovered she'd much rather play violin.  Forty years later, you can still hear her play in all corners of this great city...traffic allowing, of course.  Ruth has played and been let go of some of the finest orchestras in L.A. and Santa Barbara, as well as toured with a variety of artists including Eric Clapton and Boccelli.  She has performed in so many weddings that she will not only never eat another piece of wedding cake, but would like to start a tradition of playing the divorces, too.  Chamber music is a favorite outlet and Ruth was thrilled to have performed at Sainte Chapelle in Paris and many of her relatives' farms in Switzerland.  If you listen very closely, you can hear her beautiful strands gracing countless LPs and movie soundtracks (her specialty being horror films).  Her greatest achievement to date, besides having soloed the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto with the San Fernando Valley Symphony, is her new grandson, a future violinist...or maybe a rock guitarist, if not a doctor.

Sarah Knauer, 16, was literally born with a piano at her fingertips. Her family owns Knauer Pianos in Northridge, and when Sarah was small, her house was always full of pianos, talk of pianos, and people playing pianos. Her formal studies began at the age of four, under the tutelage of San Fernando Valley Symphony Orchestra member Joanna Ezrin, who remains her teacher to this day. Sarah is an honors student in her junior year at Agoura High School, where she plays piano in the school’s acclaimed Jazz “A” band. In spring 2008, Sarah and the band participated in the prestigious Essentially Ellington Festival in New York City, one of only fifteen high school bands chosen for that international honor. The bronze medalist in the Liana Cohen Festival in 2003, Sarah is also an active award-winning participant in the festivals and programs of the Music Teachers Association of California. In the 2007-2008 year she was a winner in the branch MTAC Junior Bach Festival and also the Contemporary Music Festival, in which she played Maestro James Domine’s fiery Sonata #3. She has garnered accolades from playing numerous other compositions by Maestro Domine, which have led to multiple awards and performance opportunities. “I love the excitement in his music,” she says. Sarah completed her Advanced level Certificate of Merit in 2007, and has been invited to play at the MTAC annual convention every year since she was seven. This is an honor reserved for students who excel in music theory and sight-reading as well as demonstrating the highest levels of performance.  Sarah is also an accomplished music teacher, having coached and taught since she was in sixth grade; she currently teaches about a half dozen students. When her busy schedule permits, Sarah loves to spend time outdoors, camping or going to the beach with family and friends.