Aaron Alon
Composition

Aaron Alon’s music has been performed around the world by such acclaimed musicians as Leone Buyse, Ian Davidson, Andrea Ceccomori, Catherine Branch, Daniel Neer, Michael Fennelly, Mark Whatley, and new music groups Sounds New and the Vientos Trio. His works have been released on three CD labels and awarded numerous national and international composition honors, including those from the National Federation of Music Clubs; the National Association of Composers/USA; the Society of Composers, Inc.; ASCAP; Meet the Composer; the Lotte Lehmann Foundation; the Renée B. Fisher Composer Awards; and Mu Phi Epsilon.

Dr. Alon is a member of ASCAP and a past chapter president of Mu Phi Epsilon. He is also highly active as a teacher. In addition to serving as the Director of Composition and Music Theory at the American Festival for the Arts, he is currently on faculty with the Women’s Institute of Houston, where he teaches courses in classical music and musical theatre. He has also taught for Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music, Rice University’s School of Continuing Studies, the University of Texas Exploritas Program, and Alvin Community College. Current projects include an opera with librettist Michael Remson, two new musicals, and a cycle of songs for bass David Keck. Dr. Alon is also active as a playwright and producer in Houston and currently serves on two arts boards in Houston and New York.

Dr. Alon holds a DMA from Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music, an MM from the Cleveland Institute of Music, and a BA from the University of Chicago. For more information, please visit his website at www.aaronalon.com.

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Karim Al-Zand
Guest Composer

The music of Canadian-American composer Karim Al-Zand (b.1970) has been called “strong and startlingly lovely” (Boston Globe). His compositions are wide-ranging, from settings of classical Arabic poetry to scores for dance and pieces for young audiences. His works explore connections between music and other arts, and draw inspiration from diverse sources such as 19th century graphic art, fables of the world, folksong and jazz. The themes of many of his pieces speak to his middle-eastern heritage as well. Al-Zand’s music has enjoyed success in the US, Canada and abroad and he is the recipient of several national awards, including the Sackler Composition Prize, the ArtSong Prize, the Louisville Orchestra Competition Prize and the “Academy Award” from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He holds degrees from Harvard and McGill Universities and is currently on the faculty of the Shepherd School of Music (Rice University) in Houston. Al-Zand is also a founding member of Musiqa, Houston’s premiere contemporary music group, which presents concerts featuring new and classic repertoire of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.

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Estevan Azcona
Electives

Estevan Azcona recently joined MECA as Music Director, having previously served on its Board of Directors. He has directed the mariachi ensemble of the University of Texas at Austin, Mariachi Paredes de Tejastitlán, and is himself a guitarronero. He is also a member of the Austin-based Mexican son group, Mitote. zcona studied ethnomusicology and Mexican American Studies at the University of Texas at Austin, where he completed his PhD in 2008. He has taught courses on Chicano cultural and musical history, and ethnomusicology at Indiana University, DePauw University, UT Austin, and University of Houston. In 2005, he co-produced the Smithsonian Folkways Recordings CD compilation, Rolas de Aztlán: Songs of the Chicano Movement, based on his doctoral research.

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Isabelle Ganz
Vocal Electives

The New York Times has called Isabelle Ganz "a virtuosic" performer. This accomplished American mezzo-soprano explores the world of today's composers, as well as the classics of the mezzo literature. She has appeared as vocal soloist with symphony orchestras and chamber ensembles throughout the world, including the Seattle Symphony, the Brooklyn Philharmonic and the Slovak Radio Orchestra. Works that she has premiered include "Ryoanji for Voice and Percussion" by John Cage and recorded for MODE records.
A specialist in theatrical works, her performance as the "Proprietess of the Cafe de Chinitas" in The Houston Ballet's production of "The Cruel Garden" was called "riveting" and "compelling" by the press. Her Sephardic music ensemble, ALHAMBRA, based in New York, has toured Europe, South America, Turkey and the U.S.

Ms. Ganz received a Fulbright grant to teach voice and twentieth century music at the Rubin Academy of Music in Jerusalem (1997) as well as a Solo Recitalist grant from the U.S. National Endowment for the Arts (1992-1993). Currently based in Houston where she is on the Faculty of the University of Houston, she also performs concerts and conducts master classes and workshops in contemporary vocal techniques throughout Europe, as well as in America. She has produced over 20 recordings, primarily of works by living composers and of Sephardic music from Turkey and the Balkans.

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Hannah Goodwin
Alexander Technique

Biography coming soon!

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Jasmine Hatem
Piano

Pianist Jasmine Hatem has performed in concerts both in the United States and Europe. In the Houston area, she has performed with the Greenbriar Consortium, the Houston Civic Symphony, where she appeared as a soloist, and AURA, the contemporary music ensemble of the University of Houston. She has also collaborated with the Dominic Walsh Dance Company, playing the music of Arvo Pärt. In 2006, Ms. Hatem completed a Master's Degree in piano performance with Nancy Weems at the University of Houston. She received a second Master’s degree in chamber music and accompanying from Rice University as a student of Brian Connelly. Prior to her studies in Houston, Ms. Hatem attended the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, where her teachers included Richard Fields, and Eugene and Elizabeth Pridinoff. A native of New Orleans, Ms. Hatem's early studies were with Russian pianist and Professor at Tulane University, Faina Lushtak. She is currently on the faculties of the University of St.Thomas and the Bridges Academy at St. Luke’s United Methodist Church.

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George Heathco
Music Theory

George Heathco composes music for a variety of ensembles in a wide range of styles. His music blends elements of contemporary concert music with rock, jazz, and various other pop genres. He has taught guitar and music theory privately in the Houston area and has taught music fundamentals at the University of Houston. Mr. Heathco has performed all over Texas with various musicians, ensembles, and bands; playing classical, jazz, rock, hip-hop, blues, funk, and free-improvisation. He is currently the guitarist for progressive/math metal band, The Pant Factory. He received a B.M. in music business from the University of Houston in 2006, and is currently completing graduate work at U.H. for an M.M. in composition. Some of the musicians he has studied with include: Robert Nelson, James Bishop, Jim Vassallo, Noe Marmolejo, Dennis Dotson, and Mike Wheeler.

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Pierre Jalbert
Guest Composer

Earning widespread notice for his richly colored and superbly crafted scores, Musiqa co-founder Pierre Jalbert (b. 1967) has developed a musical language that is engaging, expressive, and deeply personal. Among his many honors are the Rome Prize, the BBC Masterprize, and the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center's 2007 Stoeger Award, given biennially "in recognition of significant contributions to the chamber music repertory."

His music has been performed throughout the United States and abroad, including four Carnegie Hall performances of his orchestral music, one of the more recent being the Houston Symphony's Carnegie Hall premiere of his orchestral work, big sky, in 2006. Other major works for orchestra include In Aeternam (2000), performed by the London Symphony Orchestra, Symphonia Sacra (2001), written for the California Symphony; Les espaces infinis (2001), written for the Albany Symphony, Chamber Symphony (2004), commissioned by the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, Fire and Ice (2007), commissioned for the Oakland East Bay, Marin, and Santa Rosa Symphonies through Meet the Composer Foundation's MAGNUM OPUS Project, and Autumn Rhapsody (2008), commissioned by the Vermont Symphony. He has served as Composer-in-Residence with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra (2002-2005), California Symphony (1999-2002), and Music in the Loft in Chicago (2003). He has also written a Marimba Concerto for marimba virtuoso Makoto Nakura (recently perfomed by the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra) and a Horn Concerto for William Ver Meulen, prinicipal horn of the Houston Symphony. Select commissions and performances include those of the Ying, Borromeo, Maia, Enso, Chiara, and Escher String Quartets (the Escher Quartet recently performed his Icefield Sonnets at the Louvre in Paris); violinist Midori; and the symphony orchestras of London, Budapest, Seattle, Houston, Fort Worth, Colorado, and Albany among others.

Jalbert is Professor of Composition and Music Theory at Rice University's Shepherd School of Music in Houston. Current projects include works for the Emerson String Quartet and the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble.

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Judy Malone-Stein
Art Car

Biography coming soon!

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Marcus Maroney
Guest Composer

Marcus Karl Maroney studied composition and horn at The University of Texas at Austin (B.M.) and the Yale School of Music (M.M., M.M.A., D.M.A.). His principle composition teachers were Joseph Schwantner, Ned Rorem, Joan Tower and Dan Welcher. In 1999, he received a fellowship to the Tanglewood Music Center, the First Hearing award from the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (for Those Teares are Pearle) and an ASCAP/Morton Gould Young Composer's award. Other awards and fellowships followed, including: a Charles Ives Scholarship from The American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Music 2000 Prize from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, further awards from ASCAP, and consecutive Woods Chandler Memorial awards from Yale University.
The Norfolk Chamber Music Festival commissioned Introduction and Barrage for the Gryphon Trio, who have performed the work internationally since its premiere at Norfolk. The Orchestra of St. Luke's Chamber Ensemble commissioned and premiered Hudson for flute and string trio, and eighth blackbird is touring Rhythms around the U.S., a work they commissioned for their 10th anniversary season. In March and April 2005, Mr. Maroney was in residence at the Copland House as a recipient of the Aaron Copland Award. Current projects include a work for solo soprano saxophone commissioned by Timothy McAllister.

Mr. Maroney served on the faculty of the Yale School of Music from 2002-2004. He is currently Assistant Professor of Music at the University of Houston's Moores School of Music.

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Crista Miller
Music Theory

In demand as a solo artist, choral conductor, sacred musician, scholar, and teacher, Crista Miller has performed in Europe, Canada, and throughout the United States. In Houston, Dr. Miller serves on the Music faculty of the University of St. Thomas and Houston Baptist University. As Music Director and Cathedral Organist at the Co-Cathedral of the Sacred Heart in Houston, she was responsible for the procurement of Martin Pasi’s Opus 19 for the new cathedral building. Dr. Miller earned the DMA in organ performance and the Sacred Music Diploma at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York, studying with Hans Davidsson, where she received the graduate award for the Eastman Rochester Organ Initiative, was the sole US competitor in the 2004 Odense International Organ Competition and Festival in Denmark, and was a semifinalist in the 2002 American Guild of Organists national Young Artists’ Competition in Organ Playing. She earned the Master of Music from the University of Houston under Robert Bates. In 2003, research on cultural influences in the organ works of Naji Hakim found Dr. Miller working with the composer in southern France.

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Rodolfo Morales
Piano

Rodolfo Morales performs regularly as soloist and chamber musician in addition to being in great demand as a teacher and coach. He has performed with the Houston Symphony, the San Antonio Symphony, the Woodlands Symphony, the Dallas Chamber Orchestra and the World Youth Symphony Orchestra in Michigan; his appearances as concert soloist include performances at the Juilliard Theater and Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall in New York City, the Wortham Center, Zilkha Hall, Jones Hall and Stude Concert Hall in Houston, the Hall of the Army in Sarajevo Bosnia, the San Fernando Cathedral and the Scottish Rite Cathedral in San Antonio TX and the Latin Center for the Arts in Dallas, among others.

Mr. Morales is the Piano Department Director for the High School for the Performing and Visual Arts (his alma matter) since 2004. An advocate of modern music, he was the Artistic Director for the Foundation for Modern Music for the 2004-05 concert season, a non-profit performing institution specializing in contemporary classical music for which he remains an active and frequent performer. During the summer Mr. Morales is Piano Director for the HSPVA Summer Academy as well as Piano Director for the American Festival for the Arts, where he has been teaching since 2002.

He has been heard as soloist on National Public Radio’s “Performance Today” performing the music of Spanish composer Enrique Granados as well as being a frequent guest on Houston’s KUHF’s “Front Row”. Some of the awards he has been given include the first ever Distinguished Alumni Award from the American Festival for the Arts, a Robert McNair Foundation grant for performance studies, the Isabel Scionti Award at the Isabel Scionti International Piano Competition, and two-time winner of the National Concerto Competition.

Rodolfo Morales attended The Juilliard School of Music where he studied with the world-famous Israeli teacher Yoheved Kaplinsky and from which he received his Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degrees. He was also a student of composer-pianist Robert Avalon and Juilliard-based Russian pianist Viktoria Mushkatkol during high school.

Mr. Morales is native of Piedras Negras, Mexico. In addition to his teaching duties mentioned above he maintains a small private teaching studio in the Montrose area of Houston, where he lives with his beloved wife Donell and his godson Jacob.

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Bryan Parkhurst
Music Theory

Bryan recently graduated from Rice (B.M. summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa) where hestudied harp with Paula Page and harmony, counterpoint, and analysis with Karim Al-Zand. Right now he isworking on a Ph.D. in music theory at the University of Michigan. Some of Bryan's musical and music-theoretical interests include: the aesthetics of music, philosophies of art and beauty, the history of music theory, the history and practice of figured bass and continuo accompaniment, Bach's life and music, and eighteenth-century countrapuntal practices, and solfege.

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Michael Remson
Guest Composer

Michael Remson is a composer, author, educator and is proud to have been part of the AFA since its inaugural season. Dr. Remson has been Exectuive Director since the 2005 season. Prior to his appointment to AFA, Dr. Remson served as Assistant Director of the Carnegie Mellon University Pre-College Program and as CFO/Senior Consultant with Downey Associates International.

In addition to his service to AFA, Dr. Remson maintains an active schedule as a composer and librettist. He has received numerous grants, commissions and fellowships and his works have been performed throughout the United States and in Europe. Dr. Remson served as an Affiliate Artist at the Moores School of Music and is on faculty of the Houston Ballet Academy. He received his training at New York University, the University of Houston and Carnegie Mellon University and his primary mentors include Carlisle Floyd and Edward Albee. He is active in Houston's arts community through his board service with Dragon's Gate, Houston Youth Symphony, Houston Boychoir and The Lone Star Lyric Theatre Festival.

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Julie Sacks
Piano

Pianist Julie Loeb Sacks is a staff accompanist and coach at the University of Houston Moores School of Music. She is on the faculty of the American Festival for the Arts in the piano and chamber music departments, and from 2001-2007 served as staff pianist for the Meadowmount School for Strings in New York. A passionate chamber musician and art song recitalist, Julie enjoys performing with Col Canto, an ensemble dedicated to the preservation and performance of the Art Song repertoire. She often serves as accompanist for the Houston Symphony Chorus, Choral Artists, and is an official staff pianist of the Entergy Young Texas Artists Competition.

Julie has performed around the country, including her 2000 New York City debut, an art song recital with soprano Adele Crawford, formerly of the Metropolitan Opera. Other local performances include the Channing Concert Series, the Houston Grand Opera Education Department, Corpus Christi Young Artist Competition, Opera in the Heights, Katy Performing Arts Society, Encore School for Strings, Gilbert & Sullivan Society, Masquerade Theatre, Cleveland Art Song Festival and TUTS. She has been heard on radio broadcasts in Cleveland, New York, and Houston. Awards include the Koldofsky Prize in Collaborative Piano and the Edna Ocker Accompanist Award. Julie is a graduate of the Cleveland Institute of Music, the University of Texas, and studied at the Music Academy of the West and Eastern Music Festival. Her teachers and mentors include Anne Epperson, William Race, Gustavo Romero, Danielle Martin, and Jean Deutsch. She lives in Manvel, Texas, with husband Steve, and sons Ryan and Jacob.

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Kathy Sarra
Alexander Technique

Kathy Sarra has both a BA in English (1991, summa cum laude) and an MFA in Theatre/Acting (1994) from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. She completed a three-year teacher-training course for Alexander Technique teachers in 2000 and also studied with such well-known Alexander Technique teachers as Marjorie Barstow, Elizabeth Walker, Frank Ottiwell, Michael Frederick, Glenna Batson, Meade Andrews, and Marsha Paludan. Kathy has been recognized as a certified teacher of the Alexander Technique by Alexander Technique International since 2000.

She also has trained in various movement traditions, including Contact Improvisation, Developmental Technique, and T’ai Chi. Kathy has acting credits in theatre, commercials, industrials, and independent films. From 1994 to 2000 she was an adjunct member of the Theatre faculty at UNCG, teaching courses in Acting, Voice and Diction, the Narrative Self, Drama Appreciation, and Oral Interpretation, while maintaining a private practice as an Acting, and Voice/Dialogue coach. Since moving to Florida in 2001, she has served as adjunct faculty at UF in the School of Theatre and Dance, teaching a year-long course in the Alexander Technique for first year MFA candidates, as well as a semester-long course for undergraduates. Kathy has taught workshops in the Alexander Technique in North Carolina, Georgia, Florida, and Texas, including the Eastern Music Festival, an international summer music camp which convenes yearly in Greensboro, North Carolina. She maintains a private practice in the Alexander Technique as well.

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Carolyn True
Piano

Hailed as “an artist with commanding technique, always at the service of the music and capable of taming any tigers the composer has unleashed” (Windeler, San Antonio Express News), Carolyn True is a pianist equally at home on the concert stage and in the teaching studio. Celebrating her fifteenth year on the faculty of Trinity University, True teaches individual lessons, accompanying, piano ensemble, piano literature, piano pedagogy, and other related courses. She walks the delicate balance between teaching in San Antonio, giving workshops, master classes, seminars, and adjudicating and actively performing solo, chamber, and orchestral repertoire.

A prize winner in national and international competitions (most notably the Kapell International, MTNA, and the Eastman Concerto Competitions) she has performed in more than half of our fifty states, as well as in Tours, Paris, Lyon, and Biarritz (France) and Graz (Austria). She was awarded the prestigious Performer’s Certificate from the Eastman School of Music where she also received her DMA. Other degrees were earned at the University of Maryland, College Park (MM) and Central Missouri State University (BM) where she, in 2001, was chosen as the Distinguished Music Alumna. Major teachers have included Nelita, Wesley, and Marilyn True, Charles Fisher, and Thomas Schumacher. Thanks to a generous Rotary Foundation Scholarship, she spent a year studying at the Conservatoire National de la Musique de Lyon, France with one of Cortot’s final pupils - Eric Heidsieck.

A compassionate and challenging professor, True is carrying on the family tradition. In 2000, True was recognizes as the Texas Music Teachers Association’s Collegiate Teacher of the Year. Recently, True and nationally known pedagogue Jody Graves gave duo-workshops at the Eastman School of Music; they presented a series of sessions inviting teachers to re-experience their creativity and celebrate music through all of the musical senses (seeing, hearing, singing, feeling, and being).

True is drawn not only to the great works of the past but also to that of the present. With verbal commentary she draws audiences in to music perhaps not immediately accessible (she would hasten to add, contemporary music is always immediately accessible to younger audiences). Through her work with SOLI Chamber Ensemble, she has performed many premieres, most recently a commission by Ned Rorem. She has recorded works of Ligeti, Bach/Brahms, Beethoven, and Bennett.

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Ann Witherspoon
Guest Composition Faculty

Biography coming soon!

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