Discussion Panel

[b]Barbara Scowcroft[/b] is currently in her 24th season in the Utah Symphony as a first violinist, where she also served as acting Assistant Concertmaster in the 1998-1999 season.

In 1986, Ms. Scowcroft became Music Director and Conductor of the Utah Youth Symphony Orchestra. The orchestra was invited to participate in the Cultural Olympiad for the 2002 Winter Olympic games in Salt lake City, for which she expanded the orchestra of 135 Utahns into an International orchestra of 170 musicians representing twelve countries and five continents.

Ms. Scowcroft was Music Director and General Manager of the Nova Chamber Music Series from 1986-2004, receiving the Governor's Award in the Arts for that organization in 1999. She was also Music Director and Conductor for the Vivaldi Candlelight concerts from 1997 to 2004. She performs annually in the Grand Teton Music Festival Orchestra, and recently conducted works for large ensembles on their chamber music series. Ms. Scowcroft has been a guest conductor at the American Festival for the Arts in Houston, Texas since 2000, for which she was recently appointed Resident Conductor. In April of 2006, Ms. Scowcroft made her debut as the first woman conductor of the Salt Lake Symphony, receiving positive reviews for her musical interpretation. Ms. Scowcroft is an adjunct professor of violin at the University of Utah.

During her high school years, Ms. Scowcroft was a member of the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra. She studied at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria, and at the North Carolina School of the Arts. Ms. Scowcroft received both her Bachelor of Arts in Violin Performance and her Masters of Music degree in Conducting from the University of Utah.

In 1992, Ms. Scowcroft received Salt Lake City's first Mayor's Award for the Arts. In 2003, she received O.C. Tanner's "Everyday Hero" award for her contributions to Utah non-profit organizations, and in 2004, was selected by the National Association of Women Business Owners, Utah Business Magazine, and the Salt Lake Chamber of Commerce as one of "Thirty Visionary Women" of Utah.

Robert Levine has been the Principal Violist of the Milwaukee Symphony since September 1987. Before coming to Milwaukee Mr. Levine had been a member of the Orford String Quartet, Quartet-in-Residence at the University of Toronto, with whom he toured extensively throughout Canada, the United States, and South America. Prior to joining the Orford Quartet, Mr. Levine had served as Principal Violist of The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra for six years. He has also performed with the San Francisco Symphony, the London Symphony of Canada, and the Oklahoma City Symphony, as well as serving as guest principal with the orchestras of Indianapolis and Hong Kong.

He has performed as soloist with the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, the Oklahoma City Symphony, the London Symphony of Canada, the Midsummer Mozart Festival (San Francisco), and numerous community orchestras in Northern California and Minnesota. He has also been featured on American Public Radio's nationally broadcast show "St. Paul Sunday Morning" on several occasions.

Mr. Levine has been an active chamber musician, having performed at the Festival Rolandseck in Germany, the Grand Teton Music Festival, the Palm Beach Festival, the "Strings in the Mountains" Festival in Colorado, and numerous concerts in the Twin Cities and Milwaukee. He has also been active in the field of new music, having commissioned and premiered works for viola and orchestra from Minnesota composers Janika Vandervelde and Libby Larsen.

Mr. Levine was chairman of the International Conference of Symphony and Opera Musicians from 1996 to 2002 and currently serves as President of the Milwaukee Musicians Association, Local 8 of the American Federation of Musicians, and as a member of the Board of Directors of the League of American Orchestras. He has written extensively about issues concerning orchestra musicians for publications of ICSOM, the AFM, the Symphony Orchestra Institute, and the League of American Orchestras.

Mr. Levine attended Stanford University and the Institute for Advanced Musical Studies in Switzerland. His primary teachers were Aaron Sten and Pamela Goldsmith. He also studied with Paul Doctor, Walter Trampler, Bruno Giuranna, and David Abel.

He lives with his wife Emily and his son Sam in Glendale.

Jennifer Higdon (b. Brooklyn, NY, December 31, 1962) maintains a full schedule of commissions, writing on average 6-12 works a year, and is now considered a major figure in contemporary American music.

Higdon's list of commissioners is extensive and include The Philadelphia Orchestra, The Chicago Symphony, The Atlanta Symphony, The National Symphony, The Minnesota Orchestra, The Brooklyn Philharmonic, The Pittsburgh Symphony, The Baltimore Symphony, The Indianapolis Symphony, The Dallas Symphony, The St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, St. Lukes Chamber Ensemble, pianist Gary Graffman, the Tokyo String Quartet, the Ying Quartet, eighth blackbird, the Gilmore Piano Festival, and the Philadelphia Singers.

She has been honored with awards and grants from the Guggenheim Foundation, the American Academy of Arts & Letters (two awards), the Pew Fellowship in the Arts, Meet-the-Composer, the National Endowment for the Arts, and ASCAP. She is currently Composer-in-Residence with the Philadelphia Singers. Her orchestral work Shine was named Best Contemporary Piece of 1996 by USA Today in their year-end classical picks. In the summer of 2003, she was the first woman to be named a featured composer at the Tanglewood Contemporary Music Festival.

Higdon enjoys more than a hundred performances a year of her works. Her orchestral work blue cathedral is one of the most performed contemporary orchestral works in the United States, receiving more than 50 performances in the '04 -'05 season alone. As of February 20, 2005, Higdon's Concerto for Orchestra, commissioned by The Philadelphia Orchestra, has received 19 performances since its June 2002 premiere.

Her works have been recorded on over 2 dozen CDs. In spring of 2003 Telarc released blue cathedral with the Atlanta Symphony, Robert Spano, conducting, on a disc that made the Classical Billboard charts. Telarc has also recently released Higdon: Concerto for Orchestra/City Scape which was nominated for 4 Grammy Awards.

She holds degrees from Bowling Green State University, University of Pennsylvania, and The Curtis Institute of Music, where she is currently on the composition faculty.

Composer and vocalist Lisa Bielawa.often takes inspiration for her work from literary sources and close artistic collaborations. Bielawa’s The Lay of the Love and Death, written for violinist Colin Jacobsen and baritone Jesse Blumberg and based on an epic poem by Rilke, premiered at Alice Tully Hall in March 2006. Her 2004 work Hurry, for soprano and chamber ensemble, was commissioned by Carnegie Hall as part of Dawn Upshaw’s Perspectives series, and was subsequently performed on the Seattle Symphony Made in America Festival in 2006, with the composer as soloist. The inaugural season of Zankel Hall included the premiere of her work The Right Weather by American Composers Orchestra and award-winning pianist Andrew Armstrong.

Bielawa will begin a three-year residency with Boston Modern Orchestra Project in 2006 under the auspices of Music Alive, a national program jointly designed and managed by Meet The Composer and ASOL. She is currently at work on a piece for migrating ensembles and soprano Susan Narucki for performance in public spaces, a multi-year project of Creative Capital. Bielawa has received grants, fellowships, and awards from the Civitella Ranieri Foundation in Italy, The Fund for U.S. Artists at International Festivals, New York State Council on the Arts, New York Foundation for the Arts, ASCAP, the Omaha Symphony International Competition, and the Fondation Royaumont in France.

Musician, administrator, and cultural entrepreneur Drew McManus has been involved with every aspect of the nonprofit performing arts world. He has become one of the most unique individuals in this business who is equally respected by administrators, academics, board members, music directors, musicians, and union officials.

Mr. McManus is the author of the highly successful daily column Adaptistration ; the first and only weblog dedicated to issues impacting the business of orchestras. His articles have been quietly addressing taboo issues which have been slowly strangling the business while simultaneously providing answers that are moving the industry toward positive change. Mr. McManus is a conservatory trained musician from the Peabody Institute in Baltimore, MD. He holds degrees in tuba performance as well as performing on piano and conducting; in addition to a regular performance schedule, Mr. McManus is an avid arranger.

Mr. McManus is regularly quoted as an industry expert in international publications such as the New York Times, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, La Scena Musicale, and the Melbourne Age. Mr. McManus has also been a featured guest on national radio programs such as NPR’s All Things Consideredand WNYC’s Soundcheck.

As the founder and president of the Gynecologic Cancer Fund, he has a singular understanding of nonprofit governance and retains six-figure development experience as an executive board officer. During its tenure, his charity returned over 85% of gross proceeds to its beneficiaries; the highest return of any 501(c) in the state of Maryland.

Currently, Mr. McManus works as a private consultant with a wide range of clients throughout the orchestra business. Recent appearances include being a featured presenter at the 2005 International Conference of Symphony and Opera Musicians (ICSOM) conference in San Diego, California and as a featured panelist at the 2006 Chamber Music America conference in New York, NY.

When he isn’t working 14 hour days, Mr. McManus spends time with his wife, avoids cutting off his fingers while pursing his love for woodworking, drinking way too much Starbucks coffee, and playing with his three cats; Carmen, Tosca, and Cody.

Winner of a Participation Prize at the 2011 Padova International Music Competition (Italy), Samuel Thompson is a Baltimore-based violinist whose career spans solo, chamber music, orchestral and interdisciplinary performance and arts journalism. During the 2011/2012 season Samuel appeared with the Nathaniel Dett Chorale in Toronto's Koerner Hall via an invitation from Tanya Charles of the Gould String Quartet (Canada), Washington DC's critically acclaimed Great Noise Ensemble, in recital with Michelle Schumann during the inaugural season of the Pro Arts Collective's Metropolitan Classical Series in Austin, Texas, and onstage with the Carpetbag Theatre Ensemble at the August Wilson Center for African-American Culture in Pittsburgh in addition to orchestral performances at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and with the Harrisburg, Knoxville, Roanoke and Delaware symphonies.

Samuel's performance during the 2011 Black Arts Movement (BAM) Festival in Austin resulted in immedate reengagement for the 2011/2012 season. During the 2010/2011 season he also performed Ryuichi Sakamoto's “Rain” in a performance for Musicians of Mercy, a collective of over seventy independent musicians and artists in the metropolitan Washington DC region. A seasoned performer, Samuel made his debut as soloist in 1998 with Robert Franz and the National Repertory Orchestra and has appeared with the Carolina Amadeus Players Chamber Orchestra, Cortlandt Chamber Orchestra, Orchard Park Symphony Orchestra and members of Orchestra X.

A sought-after recitalist and chamber musician, Samuel made his east coast debut at the New Haven International Festival of Arts and Ideas in a multimedia staged recital conceived and directed by Peter Webster, and has been presented in concert by Da Camera of Houston, Millennium Music Spotlight Series, Columbia Festival of the Arts in South Carolina, Chicago's Fazioli Salon Series under the auspices of Pianoforte Foundation Chicago and WFMT-FM, Kent State-Ashtabula Classical Concert Series, USC Cares: Renewal Through Music series at the University of South Carolina , the Tafelmusik Baroque Summer Festival and the Museo Internato Ignoto in Padova, Italy. His chamber music partners include pianists Michelle Schumann and Stephen Carey, the Marian Anderson String Quartet and members of the West Shore Trio. Samuel has also appeared with performance artists and theatre companies at alternative performance spaces throughout the United States including DiverseWorks Artspace (Houston), the Old Ironworks Building (New Orleans), On The Boards (Seattle), Rockwood Music Hall (New York), Tucker's Blues (Dallas) and the Colony Theatre (Miami). In addition to appearing with the Carpetbag Theatre Ensemble during the 2008-2009 season, Samuel is also featured on the soundtrack of Rajni Shah Theatre's Dinner With America , a performance art piece that toured the United Kingdom and Spain in 2008.

Samuel has also been noted as a “thought-provoking and erudite writer” in response to his essays and program notes. In November 2011 Samuel was invited by Barbara Day Turner of the San Jose Chamber Orchestra to write a monthly column for the orchestra's newsletter. That column, titled “Other Notes”, debuted in January 2012 and featured interviews with artists including Talise Trevigne, Jennifer Kloetzel of the Cypress String Quartet and 2012 Menuhin Competition winner Kenneth Renshaw. In recent years Samuel has contributed to Strings Magazine , online industry magazine violinist.com and Nigel Kennedy Online .

Maintaining a sense of loyalty to the New Orleans musical community as he was a member of the Louisiana Philharmonic during the 2002-2003 season, Samuel organized and performed in benefit concerts immediately after Hurricane Katrina, his efforts becoming the subject of an article in the September 2007 International Musician . Mr. Thompson has been profiled by Strings Magazine, the Austin Chronicle, Fractured Atlas, Strings Magazine, Jan Herman's “Straight-Up” at Artsjournal.com, the Boston Globe, the San Antonio Express-News, Relevant Magazine, OSU Magazine and the Crescent City Chronicles, with his live performances and interviews being broadcast on WFMT-FM's “Fazioli Salon Series”, WSCI-FM's “Conversations with Joan”, KAHL-FM's “Sonny Melendez Show” and KOSU-FM's “Concerts from OSU”.

A native of Charleston, South Carolina, Samuel studied violin at both the University of South Carolina and Oklahoma State University. He earned the Master of Music degree from the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University, where his teachers included Kenneth Goldsmith and Raphael Fliegel. Samuel has also participated in the Helen and Immanuel Olshan Texas Music Festival, the International Festival-Institute at Round Top, the National Orchestral Institute and Spoleto Festival USA. A semifinalist in the 2000 New World Symphony Concerto Competition, Samuel was a recipient of an Artistic Assistance Award from Alternate ROOTS made possible with funds from the Kresge Foundation, Open Society Foundations and the Nathan Cummings Foundation. He is a members of Alternate ROOTS and the American Federation of Musicians, and served as a member of the Maryland State Arts Council Grant Review Panel in 2012. Samuel plays a violin made in 1996 by Marilyn Wallin with a bow made by German bowmaker Sebastian Dirr.

James Nickel has been the Assistant Principal Horn of Dallas Symphony since 1999. Previously, he served as Associate Principal Horn with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra. Mr. Nickel has been featured as a soloist with the Florida Orchestra, the Southeast Iowa Symphony Orchestra, and the New England Conservatory Symphony Orchestra. In the summers, Mr. Nickel is a member of Music in the Mountains in Durango, Colorado.

As a member of the Dallas Symphony, Mr. Nickel serves on the Orchestra Committee as the ICSOM delegate since 2003. He also serves on the Healthcare Committee, and is the Chairman of the Local Internet Oversight Committee. Outside of the symphony, he serves on the Governing Boad of ICSOM as a Member-at-Large.

Mr. Nickel received his B.M. from the New England Conservatory of Music. He is a native of St.Petersburg, Florida, but now lives in Dallas with his wife Julianna and their daughter Kathryn.

Beth Meyers is an active violist in the field of contemporary music. She is a founding member of the flute/viola/harp trio, "janus", and is committed to broadening the trio repertoire. In addition to her work with janus, Beth is an active soloist and chamber musician within and without of the field of contemporary music. Beth has worked with composers and artists including Meredith Monk, Bill Irwin, Theo Bleckman, Pierre Boulez, Harrison Birtwistle, Helmut Lachenmann, Martin Bresnik, and Steve Reich. A 2001 premiere of Steve Reich’s The Desert Music included Beth in both the premiere performance at Columbia’s Miller Theater as well as the Canteloupe recording. Beth was also a member of Alarm Will Sound for the U.S. premier of Harrison Birtwistle’s Theseus Game at Miller Theater (2003).

As an orchestral violist, Beth has played with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, Eastern Connecticut Symphony Orchestra, Heidelberg Opera Orchestra, Richmond Symphony, Syracuse Symphony, Erie Philharmonic, National Repertory Orchestra, Aspen Festival Orchestra, and the Lucerne Festival Academy. She has performed with ensembles including Anti-Social Music, the Theater of a Two-Headed Calf, Trollstilt, Ensemble Pampelmousse, the Audobon String Quaret, the Axis String Quartet, and the SEM Ensemble.

Beth's study of improvisation has found her at venues such as The Knitting Factory working with artists including Ralph Alessi, Kokayi, and Mark Helias. In 2000, she collaborated with jazz pianist and vocalist, Anna Johnson for her album One More Time In The Air (Oasis). Currently, she is violist and vocalist of "The Reasons", a hip New York band led by vocalist and guitarist, Clare Muldaur Manchon and featuring violinist Olivier Monchon and guitarist Lionel Loueke.

Beth is a graduate of the Eastman School of Music where, under the direction of George Taylor and John Graham, she received her Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees. She currently lives in Williamsburg, Brooklyn and enjoys teaching pilates and the History of Jazz as part of her well-rounded free-lance career.

Matthew Fritz is currently a first-year master’s student at the Eastman School of Music, pursuing a degree in Orchestral Conducting under the direction of Neil Varon. A native of Scottsdale, Arizona, Matthew completed his Bachelor’s degree in Violin Performance at Arizona State University in May of 2005. He studied conducting privately with Robert Moody (currently music director, Winston-Salem Symphony) and has guest conducted with the Phoenix Symphony Guild Youth Orchestra. While just at the beginning of his conducting experiences, Matthew has had the opportunity to conduct concerts with the Mendoza Symphony in Argentina as well as work with the Rochester Philharmonic through their summer workshop.