Alumni: If you would like to let your classmates know what you have been doing, please send your information to our online submission form, or submit via email to fanfare@northwestern.edu. You can also send the information to Fanfare, Henry and Leigh Bienen School of Music, 711 Elgin Rd., Evanston, IL 60208. (Note: If you are submitting digital images to go along with your news item, you must use the email address and attach those images to the email.) Your information may also be included in the next issue of Fanfare, the school's alumni magazine. We reserve the right to edit your item for either online or print publication.

| 2010s | 2000s | 1990s | 1980s | 1970s | 1960s | 1950s | 1920s | In Memoriam | 

2010s

David Becker (G10) has been selected for a Fulbright award to study contrabass trombone in the Netherlands next year with renowned virtuoso Brandt Attema. He was one of 20 recipients of a Fulbright grant to study in the Netherlands, out of approximately 1,500 people to receive grants this year.

2000s

Paul S. Marchegiani (00, WCAS 00) was recently promoted to senior counsel, Legal Affairs at NBCUniversal in Los Angeles, where he drafts and negotiates talent and license agreements for the NBC broadcast network and affiliated studios.  He is also teaching an Entertainment Law course at UC Berkeley School of Law.

Andrew Dahan (02, G08) will end his nine-year tenure at Addison Trail High School in Addison, Illinois, after the 2010-2011 school year. He will head back to Miami, Florida, to begin work on his PhD in Music Education at the University of Miami’s Frost School of Music. This summer, he will serve as piano accompanist with the Chicago-based cabaret ensemble The Chicago Red Line, as well as sing with the Grant Park Festival Chorus.

Matt Leisy (03), a tenor, received a $1,000 award as one of 12 finalists for the 2011 Lotte Lenya Competition last April.  The competition recognizes talented young singer-actors between 19 and 30 years old.

Chaipruck Mekara (G03) was invited to join the faculty of the College of Music of PAYAP University after receiving his degree from Northwestern. In 2010 he was appointed dean of the newly-named "Duriyasilp" College of Music, Payap University, ChiangMai. Apart from being a well-known composer, he is an outstanding clarinetist and conductor. Dr. Mekara, a composer, clarinetist and conductor, is part of the 10-member Duriyasilp New Music Ensemble, which plays both ancient and contemporary Thai music. They will attend and perform at two international conferences in the US: the International Trumpet Guild’s 2011 Conference in Minneapolis, MN; and the Asian Young Musicians' Connection at California State University in San Bernardino. They will also perform in other US cities during May.

Colin Lynch (04) has been appointed assistant director of music and organist at Trinity Church, Copley Square in Boston, Massachusetts. Last March, he led the St. Paul's School Madrigal Singers and String Ensemble on tour to Cuba, where they visited schools for musical exchanges and gave several nationally televised concerts. This spring, Colin will complete an Artist Diploma at Oberlin Conservatory, where he studied with James David Christie and Olivier Latry.

Genevieve Thiers (G04) stepped down in 2010 as CEO of Sittercity, the web-based company she founded, and is currently preparing to launch a new web start-up in September. The new venture, Contact Karma, will match business users with service providers through deals and references from trusted contacts.

Carl Ratner (G05) performed the first opera concert hosted by the Jule Collins Smith Museum of Fine Art at Auburn University in Auburn, Alabama, last April. He lives in Chicago and serves as director of opera at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, Michigan. 

Travis C. Stalcup (05, WCAS 05) received a full scholarship to attend the Bush School of Government and Public Service at Texas A&M University. He will earn a master's degree in international affairs specializing in diplomacy.

Michael A. Figueroa (06) has received a 2011-12 Fulbright award to complete his dissertation research on music and memory in Jerusalem after the 1967 Arab-Israeli War.

Daniel Berkowitz (07, WCAS07) is manager of Youth Orchestra Los Angeles, a program that uses music for social change. The initiative includes two programs: YOLA at EXPO, run by Paloma Udovic Ramos (WCAS03); and YOLA at HOLA, run by Christine Witkowski (07). Violist Nikki Shorts (G07) is the programs string instructor. Each program provides free instruments, up to 15 hours/week of free instruction, performance opportunities at Walt Disney Concert Hall and the Hollywood Bowl, and, most importantly, resources for the parents and families in difficult communities.

Jeongmin Lee (G07) was one of three winners of the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music's annual Beethoven Piano Competition. She is currently pursuing a DMA degree in piano performance and pedagogy at the university.

Andrew Nogal (07, G10, WCAS 07) is oboist in The City of Tomorrow, a wind quintet that awarded the gold medal in the Senior Wind Division of the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition in May 2011. The Fischoff is the nation's largest chamber music competition. Other Bienen alumni in the quintet include clarinetist Lauren Cook (G11), bassoonist Amanda Swain (G11), and horn player Leander Star (G10).

Joshua Moshier (08) is co-leader with Mike Lebrun (07) of a jazz ensemble, the Moshier Lebrun Collective, featured last May on the NPR program JazzSet. The performance featured the new jazz work “Touch and Go: The Studs Terkel Project.” Joshua and Mike started this group in 2007 while we were students at the Bienen School.

Jeffrey Strong (G08), a staff sergeant and trumpeter in “The President’s Own” United States Marine Band, was profiled on the Memorial Day Weekend edition of National Public Radio’s nationally syndicated program All Things Considered. His first performance for the President came during the White House’s Easter 2010 festivities.

Michael Morris (G09) has been living and freelancing as a woodwind player in Chicago. He received a full fellowship to attend the Texas Music Festival in 2009 and was a finalist in the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Young Artist Competition. He has been teaching flute and clarinet privately. Michael played in various musical theatre productions in the Chicago area and has also performed with the Illinois Symphony, Chicago Children's Choir, and for the Department of Music at Columbia College and Judson College. In 2011, he taught clarinet and saxophone at St. Edward School in Chicago. In June he was accepted into the US Air Force Band of Mid-America at Scott Air Force Base and will relocate to St. Louis, Illinois, in November after basic training. 

1990s

Timothy Loest (G93) is the band director at F.E. Peacock Middle School in Itasca, Illinois. He co-authored MEASURES OF SUCCESS™: A Comprehensive Musicianship Band Method (FJH Music Company Inc.). He guest-conducted the OMEA Middle School Honor Band at the Oregon Music Educators Association All-State Conference last January, and he presented at the Jefferson County Public School Professional Development Day in Louisville, Kentucky, last June. Loest taught a band literature class at Villanova University last summer. His young band compositions and arrangements have been performed worldwide and he has received the ASCAP Special Award for Composition for eleven consecutive years. Please see timothyloest.comfor more information.

Hans Sturm (G95) has been appointed assistant professor of double bass at the University of Nebraska’s School of Music and Dance. He was previously professor of double bass and jazz studies coordinator of the string department at Ball State University. He has performed around the world as a soloist, chamber, orchestral, jazz and improvisational musician.

Eric Branscome (G96) joined the Austin Peay State University Music Department in Fall 2011 as assistant professor of music and coordinator of music education. He teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in music education, and supervises music student teachers.

Kyle Dzapo (G96) saw the release of her CD, Joachim Andersen: Etudes and Salon Music (Naxos) in March. She is a professor of music at Bradley University.

Amy Hardison Tully (G97) is an assistant professor of music at Coastal Carolina University in Conway, South Carolina. In March she and a colleague, Daniel Hull, presented a recital of music for flute and guitar at the recital hall of the university’s Thomas W. and Robin W. Edwards College of Humanities and Fine Arts.

Betty Anne Younker (G97), previously the associate dean for academic affairs at the University of Michigan, has been appointed to a five-year term as dean of the Don Wright Faculty of Music at the University of Western Ontario, beginning August 1.

1980s

Frankie J. Kelly (80), an instructor and accompanist at the University of New Orleans, continues to advance the interests of classical music as they relate to Latin America and the United States. In addition, she supports the outreach efforts of the Greater New Orleans Youth Orchestra, opera in New Orleans (BonOperatit), and an emerging new chamber orchestra, The New Resonance Orchestra.

David Evan Thomas (81) saw his chamber work In the blue glen performed at the 2011 World Harp Congress in Vancouver, British Columbia, by The Debussy Trio.

Glenn Freeman (86, G87) released the world premiere recording of John Cage’s 108 (1991), a symphony in four movements for large orchestra, through his recording label, OgreOgress Productions. The symphony received its North American premiere performance at Northwestern in 1992. Christina Fong (86, G87) was featured on the recording.

Scott Anderson (G87) was promoted to professor of trombone at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln School of Music. Dr. Anderson has taught at UNL since 1996.

David Wohl (G87) is composer and co-creator of the award-winning musical Uncle Jed’s Barbershop. The production was presented in four special concert performances in May 2011 at the Aurora Fox Theater as a fundraiser for Denver’s Shadow Theatre and Brother Jeff’s HIV/AIDS prevention initiative.

Lomas de Ayarci (88) has played trumpet with the National Symphony Orchestra of Costa Rica for 20 years. During that time, he has appeared as guest conductor for that orchestra, general director of bands and music director for Banda de Conciertos de Cartago. De Ayarci is founder and first general director of the Costa Rica National System of Music Education.

Janice L. Minor (G88) is the clarinet professor at James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia, and the Saarburger Serenaden: International Music Festival and School in Saarburg, Germany. Active as an orchestral player, solo recitalist, chamber musician, clinician, and music educator, Dr. Minor has performed and appeared in a wide variety of venues throughout the United States and Europe. She has been a soloist with the United States Army Europe Band; the United States Army Band “Pershing’s Own;” the Northwest Symphony Orchestra; the Cincinnati Conservatory Eighteenth Century Ensemble; and the James Madison University Symphony Orchestra, Jazz Ensemble, and Wind Symphony. She has performed with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, the Cincinnati Pops, the Cincinnati Opera, the Richmond Symphony Orchestra, Opera Roanoke and the Roanoke Symphony Orchestra. Appearances as soloist, chamber musician and clinician include the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the Aspen and Staunton Music Festivals, the Lucca Music Festival in Lucca, Italy, the Interlochen Arts Academy, the International Clarinet Association/ClarinetFest, the University of Oklahoma Clarinet Symposium, The Midwest Clinic: An International Band and Orchestra Conference, the Virginia Music Educators Association Conference, the International Double Reed Society, and the National Flute Association Conference. She is a member of the Montpelier Wind Quintet, the faculty woodwind quintet in-residence at James Madison University; and the award winning Prestige Clarinet Quartet. She has also performed on soundtracks for The Discovery Channel and National Geographic.

1970s

Roger Nelson (70, G86) retired from the musical theater faculty at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, where he served for 15 years, six of them as program coordinator. At the university he directed or music directed 27 productions and organized and accompanied more than 90 outreach concerts. His career also spanned 20 years performing and music directing in New York City, including playing the role of El Gallo in the original off-Broadway production of The Fantasticks.

Bruce Houglum (G71) is retiring after a 16-year career as the conductor of The Concordia Orchestra at Concordia College in Moorhead, Minnesota. His final concert in April featured a performance of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9.

Sandra L. Seefeld (G71) won a competitive audition to serve as a flute studio sabbatical replacement at Shenandoah Conservatory of Shenandoah University in Winchester, Virginia, last spring. She lives in Somerville, Ohio, and is a music professor at Miami University.

Marilyn Shrude (G72, G84), a distinguished artist professor at Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, Ohio, was named a 2011 Fellow by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. Guggenheim Fellowships are bestowed on “scholars or artists who have already demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the arts,” according to the foundation. Marilyn’s compositions have been performed across the United States, in Europe and in Asia, and she has been a guest artist at festivals around the world. Nearly 20 of her compositions have been recorded on various labels.

Robert Hanson (G73, G83) retired from his post as music director of the Elgin (IL) Symphony Orchestra in July in order to devote more time to writing music and to spend time with his wife. He had held the position since 1985, and during that time shepherded the organization to a reputation as one of the finest regional orchestras in the United States. Three times during his tenure, the Elgin Symphony Orchestra has been named "Orchestra of the Year" by the Illinois Council of Orchestras. The council also tapped Hanson "Illinois Conductor of the Year" in 2001 and 2009.

Hollis Thoms’ (73) composition Requiem for 9/11 (2003) was performed during the 10th anniversary week of the 9/11 tragedy at three commemoration events: at Christ Lutheran Church Inner Harbor, Baltimore, Maryland; at The Medicine Show Theater in New York; and at Concordia University New York in Bronxville, New York.  At all three performances, Dr. Jason Thoms conducted and Treva Foss was the featured soprano soloist. The work is based on five poems by contemporary American poets Diane Suess, Lucille Lang Day, Rachel Vigier, David Mason, and Aliki Barnstone. It ends with a setting of Rainer Maria Rilke’s poem “Herbst.”

Dan Spalding (74, G76) has been music director of the Philadelphia Virtuosi Chamber Orchestra for the last 20 years. He is also music director of the American Youth Philharmonic Orchestras, based in suburban Washington, D.C. His recent released recordings include performances with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra (on Naxos) and the London Symphony Orchestra (on Vienna Modern Masters).

Jane McKinley (77) is artistic director of baroque chamber music group the Dryden Ensemble in Princeton, New Jersey. She also plays oboe professionally. In 2011 she wroteVanitas (Texas Tech University Press), a collection of poems. Her poetry has appeared in the Georgia Review and the Southern Review. Her sonnet “Mud Season” won the Patricia Dobler Award from Carlow University in 2008.

Marie Miller (G77), a music professor at Emporia State University in Emporia, Kansas, has been named interim dean at the university’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

1960s

Richard Ditewig (62, G63) has devoted more time as a substitute organist in the San Francisco Bay Area since his retirement. He also attends organ-related conventions under the auspices of The American Guild of Organists. He has visited historic organs in Spain, France and England.

David A. Nichols (G64) published his new book, Eisenhower 1956: The President’s Year of Crisis--Suez and the Brink of War (Simon & Schuster) in March. The book makes the case that the Suez crisis and the Soviet Union's invasion of Hungary destabilized the cold war's balance of power.

Darleen Mitchell (G67), a music professor at the University of Nebraska at Kearney, received a 2011 Distinguished Artist Award in Performing Arts from the Nebraska Arts Council in April. The individual artist fellowship, a cash award of $5,000, recognized her exemplary achievement in music composition. 

1950s

Martha J. Bradley (52) is retired but still working as an ordained deacon at Springfield’s (Illinois) Cathedral Church of St. Paul, where her focus id on pastoral care with the dying.

Donald Stephen Condon (53), known professionally as “Stephen Condon,” has appeared in over 265 national television commercials and on more than 137 magazine covers during his career. He continues to perform on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and Jimmy Kimmel Live.

Thomas L. Davis (57, G58), professor emeritus at the University of Iowa, was honored in May with a percussion alumni concert at the university's Riverside Recital Hall. Professor Davis taught percussion at the university for 38 years before his retirement in 1996. He wrote many compositions for different arrangements of instruments but is best known for the works written for percussion instruments. 

1920s

Estaline Watkins (28) celebrated her 105^th birthday in September. Her life has been about music, from the traveling troop of musicians she traveled with after graduating from Northwestern to her years as a music teacher in Missouri. She has three children, eight grandchildren and 10 great-grand-children. Her latest creative outlet is writing poetry.

In Memoriam

Mildred S. McMahon (36), in Bradenton, Florida, on September 12, 2011

Naomi Jones Donaldson (40), in Atlanta, Georgia, on August 6, 2011.

Yvonne Catherine Angarola Daly (41), in Glen Arbor, Michigan, on August 24, 2011.

Alice Lucille Hostetler Loewen Kreider (G43), in North Newton, Kansas, on August 14, 2011.

Mary Alice Downing (G46), in Chandler, Arizona, on August 31, 2011.

Betty “Pooch” Christofferson (49), in Luxemburg, Wisconsin, on July 29, 2011.

John Robert Sailors (50), in Sterling, Illinois, on August 17, 2011.

Donald Robert Oakes (51, G52), in Augusta, Maine, on July 2, 2011.

Frank Romano Sr. (G51), in Roanoke, Virginia, on August 18, 2011.

Pearl M. Schultz (G51), in Fremont, Nebraska, on July 25, 2011.

Robert H. Young (G51), in Waco, Texas, on July 29, 2011.

Ruth Ann Jones (G52, WCAS50), in Columbia, Missouri, on August 18, 2011.

Helene P. Gilchrist (G62), in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on July 22, 2011.

Maynard H. Johnson (G68), in in Leavenworth, Washington, on August 31, 2011.

C. Lawrence Campbell (70), in Bloomington, Illinois, on July 25, 2011.

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