Meet the faculty
Mori Achen / Paul Ackah / Rosana Barragan / Dan Cawthon / Michael Cook /Catherine Marie Davalos / Reid Davis / Rebecca Engle / Pope Flynn / Dawn Foster-Dodson / Pamela Freund-Striplen / Patrice Hambelton / Donald Kennelly / Dana Lawton / Louis Lebherz / Sharon Lee / Adam Luftman /Dave Maier / John Maltester / Delia MacDougall / Frank Murray / Donald Kennelly / Lino Rivera / Martin Rokeach / Anthony Striplen / Michael Williams / Renée Witon / Jia Wu
Mori Achen
Classical guitar
Mori Achen earned his M.A. in Guitar Performance from California State University, East Bay, where he studied with James Bertram. He has performed contemporary music in several Composer's Inc. concerts and a wide range of repertoire in solo and chamber recitals throughout the Bay Area. In addition to Saint Mary's, he teaches at the Crowden School of Music and maintains a private studio. He is a member of WindString Duo and the Mori Achen Trio.
Paul Ackah
African dance,dance class accompanist/percussionist
Ghanaian performer/composer/educator Paul Ackah (a.k.a. Pope Flynn) is best known as lead vocalist for the legendary Sweet Talks band of Ghana, where he brought the art of highlife music to new heights. When not on stage, he shares his joyful spirit and vast knowledge of African folk music, dancing and percussion with his legions of American students. He joined the Performing Arts Department of Saint Mary's College in 2001, where he is percussionist/accompanist in dance classes and teaches African dance.
Rosana Barragan
Dance, choreography, yoga
Rosana Barragan is a performing artist from Colombia. She earned a Bachelor’s degree in Communication and Social Studies from Universidad Javeriana in Bogota and a Master’s degree in Dance from the Laban Centre in London. She is also certified in Yoga, Participatory Arts and Somatic Movement Education. She has worked as professor at Universidad Javeriana and Academia Superior de Artes de Bogota in her native country, and during the past two years as educational program director of the Latin Ballet of Virginia. She has been around dance since birth, inheriting the art form from her mother, a flamenco dancer, dance studio owner and teacher.
Ms. Baragan’s technique evolves from her range of experience in movement, combining a background in European contemporary dance with early training in classical ballet, her Latin American roots, Yoga and a strong influence of the world of Somatics (Bartenieff, Body Mind Centering, Laban Movement Analysis and Alexander Technique). As a choreographer, she questions and explores new approaches to the body and creates challenges for her work to be defined outside the traditional realm of dance. Her artistic work focuses on social and political issues, while her aesthetic concerns move her to build unique performance sites that create unusual audience perspectives. Her site-specific works have received several awards and have been performed at the Thames River beaches of London, parks, plazas, churches, rooftops, glass cubes and art galleries.
She has received various grants for choreography from the Government of Colombia and in 2006 obtained the National Dance Research Award from the Colombian Ministry of Culture. She has published in arts journals and dance books in Colombia, and her artistic work has been performed in Central America, South America, Europe and the United States.
Dan Cawthon (Professor Emeritus)
Acting, theatre history, history of musical theatre
Fascinated by the intersection of spirituality and theatre, Professor Dan Cawthon holds a Ph.D. in theology from Union Theological Seminary in New York City, where he wrote his doctoral dissertation on the theological underpinnings in Eugene O'Neill's late plays. He holds a graduate degree in theology from the Gregorian University in Rome and another in literature from the University of Tulsa.
From 1971- 1980, he taught in the Religious Studies Department at the University of Manitoba (Canada). He then joined the Religious Studies faculty of Saint Mary's College, and was instrumental in establishing its Performing Arts Department, which he chaired for 12 years. He has directed more than two dozen student productions at the college that cover a wide range of styles and traditions including Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, The Zoo Story, Inherit the Wind, Rashomon, The Fantasticks, Hippolytus, Man of La Mancha and Our Town. He is also a founding member of the Graduate Liberal Studies faculty at Saint Mary's and served for many years on its advisory board.
Dan is a member of Actors' Equity Association, and has performed at the Berkeley Repertory Theatre, the San Jose Repertory Theatre, the California (Berkeley) Shakespeare Festival, and other theatres in the Bay Area. His performance of DAMIEN, a one-man play recounting the life of Father Damien de Veuster, the Leper Priest of Molokai, which was first performed at the Berkeley Stage Company, toured extensively—culminating in a two-week run at the Edinburgh Festival in 1989. The production was remounted in 2007 and numerous performances took place throughout California.
Dan is the Artistic Director of the Eugene O'Neill Foundation, Tao House (in Danville), Along with his many directing assignments there and at Saint Mary's College, he has directed at the Willows Theatre (Concord) and the Walnut Creek Center Repertory Theatre.
Michael Cook
Design, technical theater, children's theater
Michael R. Cook has been designing and directing professionally in and around the Bay Area for the past thirty years. Among the professional companies and colleges he has designed for are Berkeley Shakespeare Festival (Resident Designer and Production Manager — 8 years), California Shakespeare Festival, San Jose Rep. (Resident Designer — 3 years), Shakespeare at Paul Masson (VITA — Resident Designer - 4 years) and Saint Mary's College (Resident Designer — 18 years). In addition he has been a Guest Designer for the California Actors Theatre, Contra Costa Music Theatre, The Attic Theatre, Saratoga Chamber Theatre, Berkeley Jewish Theatre, San Jose Stage Company, Sunnyvale Repertory Theatre, Solano College and Tau House among others. He has also Stage Managed and Tour Managed in Europe, United States and Canada. Michael is also an actor, (a longstanding member of the Actors Equity Association) and a director, and has directed at many theatres around the Bay Area. His two most recent directing assignments were “City Of Angels” (the only Broadway show with a jazz score) and “A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum." He now home bases out of Saint Mary's College of California where he teaches and is the resident Scenic and Lighting Designer for the Performing Arts Department. He is also the Theatre Manager, in charge of all the technical aspects of running the theatre. Last year he received the “Freeman Award” from the Eugene O'Neill Foundation in Danville, California
Michael is most proud of having created and directed all the shows for the Children's Theatre Program at Saint Mary's College. Now in it's 15th season, its offerings have included Hansel and Gretel, Snow White, Charlotte's Web, Goldilocks and the Three Bears, The Ugly Duckling and The Princess and the Pea, and each year draws capacity audiences of elementary and pre-school students. In 2004 Michael wrote and performed around the country a one-man show based on the life of Saint John Baptist De La Salle, called “Saint John Baptist De La Salle — Journey Of A Man.” He was blessed to have Jeffra (his wife) and SMC theatre professor Dan Cawthon co-direct this production. Jeffra also wrote and produced all the original music for the play. Also a painter and sculptor, Michael recently had an exhibit called “portraits," presented by the Library at Saint Mary's College.
Catherine Marie Davalos
Modern dance, choreography, dance history, dance criticism and analysis
A Chicana choreographer, the work of Catherine Marie Davalos emerges from her Mexican voice and the constant rediscovery of identity. She utilizes a movement style that is rooted in breath and momentum. Her dances are often multilayered interweaving theatre with pure movement, humor with satire, and a political agenda with sexuality. Her passion is to cross many borders and delve into the coalescence and contradictions of being a Chicana and a Mexican American Princess.
The Davalos Dance Company has been presented at various venues in Northern and Southern California since its inception in 1994. Her latest dance, Finding Equal, premiered in December 2007 at the Vision Series dance festival held at the Cowell Theater in San Francisco, CA. Borders, Spaces and Brown-Eyed Girls premiered August 2007 as a solo at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities Campus, St. Paul, MN. In 2006, Blue Monkeys was created after visiting Guadalajara, Mexico. It premiered at Raw and Uncut, Footloose Dance Studio, San Francisco, CA, was also performed at Centrum Center for the Arts, Port Townsend, WA, and Works in the Works, Berkeley, CA. The company was chosen for the Women on the Way Festival in January 2006 for the full evening work “Dreams Suite.” January 2005 marked the 10th anniversary of the Davalos Dance Company and they celebrated with a concert at ODC Theater in San Francisco. The concert, Sacral Queens, Latinas, and Dreams was praised by Rita Felciano in DanceViewTimes.com. In January they also performed in the Women of the World Festival at Dance Mission and at the Dance IS Festival 2005, at the Julia Morgan Center for the Arts, in Berkeley. In 2004, they were part of the Printz Dance Project's performance, Encore 2, in San Rafael, CA and the Saint Mary's College Dance Company spring concert, Mandala, Moraga, CA. In 2002 they were produced by ODC Theater for Rock, Paper, Song, as part of the series, Migrations. This honor was awarded after performing One Size Fits All in Pilot 33 and Moon Dance in Pilot 35. July of 1998 marked the company's Northern California debut when they performed two new dances for Summerfest/Dance '98. Later that year, the company performed at Saint Mary's College with the CLAM series. In 1997 Ms. Davalos received a second multi-cultural grant to perform at the Martha B. Knoebel Dance Theater at California State University, Long Beach (CSULB). The first grant was awarded in 1995 for Mixed Company. In 1996 she was presented by Highways (Santa Monica, California) for American But Hyphenated. Highways also presented her full-evening work Borders, Spaces, and Brown-Eyed Girls in 1995. The Davalos Dance Company has performed at Beyond Baroque (Venice, CA) with VIVA for Chicks and Salsa ‘95, the Long Beach Museum of Art (Long Beach, CA) for the Children's Cultural Festival; Highways for Fierce Tongues, A Celebration of Latina Art & Artists, produced by Luis Alfaro and Monica Palacios; and they performed with Voices In Motion V, at LACE (Hollywood, CA). Ms. Davalos performed at the Kennedy Center (Washington, D.C.) when her duet Doblez was chosen to represent the Southwest region at the National College Dance Festival in 1994. She was nominated for the Dance Magazine “Outstanding Choreographer” award for 1994 and the Los Angeles, Lester Horton Award for Outstanding Achievement in Choreography, 1997. The Davalos Dance Company has been praised in the Washington Post, Los Angeles Times and the San Francisco Bay Guardian. Ms. Davalos earned a BA in Philosophy and Dance and an MFA in Dance from CSU, Long Beach, where she was honored as “Most Outstanding Graduate for the College of the Arts.”
Reid Davis
Acting, theatre history
Reid Davis completed his doctorate in Performance Studies at the University of California, Berkeley in 2006. He joined the Saint Mary's College faculty in 2005 as an adjunct professor in theatre, and since then has directed Urine Town and Twelfth Night. His work as a professional director has included three years as Associate Director of the Apprentice Company at Actor's Theatre of Louisville, directing “Lynette at 3 AM for the Humana Festival of New American Plays, assisting internationally reknowned writer/director Athol Fugard on the American premiere of MY CHILDREN! MY AFRICA!, and directing at American Conservatory Theatre and California Shakespeare Festival. He is a core company member of Shotgun Players (Berkeley) and won several Bay Area Critics Circle awards for his work with the company. Recent credits include teaching appointments at UC Berkeley and Los Medanos College; directing THE LARAMIE PROJECT at Los Medanos College; performing in the world premiere of Mark Jackson's THE DEATH OF MEYERHOLD for Shotgun Players in 2004 (Bay Area Critics Circle awards for production and ensemble); originating the role of Mau Tant in the world premiere of Jackson's FOREST WAR for Shotgun Players (2006); and collaborating with Dr. Maya Roth (Georgetown University) on the Jane Chambers Award workshop of TROJAN BARBIE by Christine Evans at the 2007 conference of the Association of Theatre in Higher Education (ATHE) in New Orleans.
Rebecca Engle
Theatre history, acting, theatre masterpieces
Rebecca Engle has worked as a professional actress and director at such Bay Area institutions as the Berkeley Shakespeare Festival, the Eureka Theatre and the Bay Area Playwright's Festival. Before joining the Performing Arts faculty at Saint Mary's College, she taught in the theatre training programs of San Jose State, UC Berkeley and the Drama Studio of London at Berkeley, among others. As a director, Ms. Engle is known for her physically-heightened ensemble-driven productions of contemporary American plays - Ellen McLaughlin's Iphigenia and Other Daughters, Anthony Clarvoe's The Brothers Karamazov, Octavio Solis' Marfa Lights and Susan Lori Parks' Venus among them. Her directorial work has been frequently honored by the Kennedy Center/American College Theatre Festival. In 2005 she received their "Excellence in Education" award, and at the start of 2009 she was awarded the 2009 Kennedy Center National teaching Artist Grant. Ms. Engle has extensive experience with the collaborative process, and her work with playwrights, poets, dancers and musicians has yielded a number of original, movement-based works of theatre.
Dawn Foster-Dodson
Cello, chamber music
Dawn Foster-Dodson has performed as a soloist on most of the major concert series in the Bay Area. She is frequently the Principal Cellist of the Best of Broadway theatrical productions at the Orpheum, Curran and Golden Gate Theatres. For twenty-three years she played with the San Jose Symphony, and she has also been a member of the California Symphony, Oakland East Bay Symphony, and most other Bay Area orchestras. She has played with many of the world's favorite vocalists, including Pavarotti, Marion Anderson, Ray Charles, Liza Minelli, Stevie Wonder, George Benson, Al Jarreau, Ben Vereen, Rod Stewart, and Smoky Robinson. She maintains an active teaching studio, and joined the Performing Arts Department faculty in 1998, coaching chamber music ensembles and teaching string classes.
Pamela Freund-Striplen
Violin, viola
Violist Pamela Freund-Striplen is a member of the St. Mary's College faculty and Artistic Director of the Gold Coast Chamber Players. Her chamber music credits include San Francisco Symphony's Chamber Music Sundaes, Midsummer Mozart, Composers, Inc., UCSF's Chancellor's Concert Series and the California Mozart Society. In April 1999, she was a guest artist in chamber music concerts in Germany, and was invited in November 2001 to join the Amati Quartet in Holland for a quintet concert. Her recent solo appearances include performances in Holland with members of the Rotterdam Philharmonic. She studied at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music and with the Curtis Quartet in Philadelphia, where she received the Young Musician's Award in chamber music two consecutive years. Pamela has performed with the San Diego Symphony and as Principal Violist with the San Diego Opera before relocating to the Bay Area. She became Principal Violist of San Francisco Opera's touring company, Western Opera Theater, touring nationally for three years, and performs frequently with the San Francisco Symphony and Opera Orchestras. In 1994 she was invited to tour Europe with the New European Strings, under the direction of Dmitry Sitkovetsky, and has performed with them at the Seattle International Music Festival. Pamela is an active recording artist, performing regularly for film projects at George Lucas' recording studio, Skywalker Sound. She has a private teaching studio in Lafayette and is a frequent guest coach throughout the state, most recently for the American String Teachers Institute for Chamber Music in Los Angeles and the University of the Pacific in Stockton.
Patrice Hambelton
Flute
Patrice Hambelton studied flute at Whittier College and the Music Academy of the West, and was the winner of the Prestigious Los Angeles Phi Beta Auditions for Young Artists. She has performed in master classes with Julius Baker, Geoffrey Gilbert, Alain Marion, and James Galway. She served as Principal flutist for the Arch Ensemble in both concerts and recordings, touring with the ensemble throughout the United States and Europe. Currently, she performs with the Berkeley Symphony in their Music Education Program and freelances throughout the Bay Area.
Donald Kennelly
Trombone
Donald Kennelly is a member of the San Francisco Opera Orchestra’s trombone section, where he has held a position since 1980. A graduate of San Francisco State University, he has been Principal Trombonist with the San Francisco Chamber Orchestra and a featured soloist with that ensemble on both alto and tenor trombones.
He has also performed as a member of the Carmel Bach Festival, the Lake Tahoe Summer Music Festival, the Midsummer Mozart Festival, and Sinfonia San Francisco. In addition to his responsibilities with the Opera, Don enjoys an active schedule with the Golden Gate Brass Quintet.
Dana Lawton
Director, SMC Dance Company
Dana Lawton is Director of the Saint Mary's College Dance Company. She is also a faculty member at Shawl-Anderson Dance Center in Berkeley, and a certified yoga instructor. In the studio she teaches choreography, modern dance and yoga, and in the classroom "Perceiving the Arts" and "World Music and Dance." Ms. Lawton danced professionally with the renowned San Francisco company Janice Garrett & Dancers from 1997-2004. She has choreographed her own work and was presented at ODC and the Cowell Theater in San Francisco, Eighth Street Studios and the Temescal Arts Center in Berkeley, and several stages in the northwest. She served as Artist-in-Residence at Shawl-Anderson Dance Center 2006, was awarded Outstanding Performer in the 2000 Vision Series, and was nominated for an Isadora Duncan Award for her performance in Janice Garrett's Wayfarers. Ms. Lawton holds an MFA in Choreography from Mills College and a BFA in Dance from California Institute of the Arts. Upcoming, she will perform a new work, Coasting, with original score by David Karagianis, at the Cowell Theater in San Francisco as part of the theater's Vision Series.
Louis Lebherz
Brother Vincent Malham Memorial Artist-in-Residence
Louis Lebherz is the first recipient of the Brother Vincent Malham Memorial Artist-in-Residence position at St. Mary's College, where he teaches voice and chamber music. Mr. Lebherz is a retired international opera singer. His bass voice has taken him to major opera houses world-wide, including the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, London, Le Grand Theatre Geneva, Teatro Massimo Palermo, The Athens International Festival, The Finnish
International Opera Festival, L'Opera de Montreal, and the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., to name a few. He was the principal dramatic bass with the Los Angeles Opera with Placido Domingo from 1987 to 2003.
Mr. Lebherz is a noted opera director. He has directed and co-produced seven operas with the Redlands Bowl Summer Music Festival. He has also directed for Nevada State Opera and the Capitola Opera.
Mr. Lebherz was on the faculty at Chapman University School of Music from 1990 to 1997. He was the Director of Music Liturgy at Corpus Christi Catholic Church in Pacific Palisades, California from 1999 to 2005.
Sharon Lee
Piano
Sharon Lee joined the St. Mary's College Music Faculty in the fall of 2008. She actively performs as choral accompanist, collaborative pianist, vocal coach, music director, and piano instructor. She has performed and recorded throughout New England and the nation, with various colleges, companies, and organizations including the Handel and Haydn Society, Boston Children’s Chorus, MassTheatrica, Bay Area Summer Opera Theater Institute, New England Conservatory, Wellesley College, and Boston College. During past summers, Ms. Lee attended the Music Academy of the West, SongFest Professional Program, and Mendocino Music Festival's Emerging Artists Program. She has participated in masterclasses with Mitsuko Shirai, Martin Katz, Graham Johnson, Pierre Vallet, Thomas Quasthoff, Warren Jones, Craig Smith, John Harbison and Myung-Hwa Chung.
Ms. Lee graduated with honors in music from UC Berkeley and continued her studies at the New England Conservatory where she received her Master's degree with honors and distinction in performance in Collaborative Piano. She then furthered her Collaborative Piano studies at the conservatory to receive her Graduate Diploma. Ms. Lee's teachers have included Irma Vallecillo, Kayo Iwama and John Greer, and Barbara Shearer.
Aside from working at St. Mary's College, Ms. Lee accompanies for the Voci Women's Choral Ensemble, teaches and accompanies at the Crowden Music School in North Berkeley, and loves teaching students of all ages in her private piano studio. Sharon, her husband Eurus, and her two young daughters love living in the Bay Area, close to family and friends.
Adam Luftman
Trumpet
Originally from Longmeadow, Massachusetts, Adam Luftman joined the San Francisco Opera Orchestra as Principal Trumpet in 2007. Before moving to San Francisco, Mr. Luftman spent two seasons with the Baltimore Symphony, and before that was Co-Principal Trumpet of the New World Symphony and a member of the Canton Symphony Orchestra. Prior to joining the New World Symphony, Mr. Luftman spent a season with the Civic Orchestra of Chicago. He has also toured and performed on numerous occasions with The Cleveland Orchestra. In recent years, Adam has been a regular guest with the Philadelphia Orchestra and performed with the Seattle Symphony, Sarasota Opera Orchestra, and Grant Park Music Festival Orchestra.
During the summer, Mr. Luftman has performed at the Tanglewood Music Center, National Repertory Orchestra, National Orchestral Institute, Spoleto Festival, Music Academy of the West, Breckenridge Music Festival, and the Pacific Music Festival in Japan.
As a soloist, Mr. Luftman has been featured with the New World Symphony, Canton Symphony, and twice with the Breckenridge Music Festival Orchestra. In addition to his orchestral work, Mr. Luftman has also performed with the New World Brass Quintet, Breckenridge Brass, and is an avid jazz musician.
Adam has recorded with the Philadelphia Orchestra, Baltimore Symphony, and for ESPN Sunday Night Football. He can be heard on Naxos, Ondine, and Sony records.
An honors graduate of the Cleveland Institute of Music and the Interlochen Arts Academy, Mr. Luftman's teachers have included Michael Sachs, Raymond Mase, Mark Gould and Adolph Herseth.
In his free time, Adam enjoys all sports, hiking in the mountains, and being pleasantly terrible at guitar. He looks forward to exploring the Bay Area with his amazing wife, Reva.
Dave Maier
Fight Director/ Stage Combat Instructor
Dave Maier is an award winning fight director whose recent work includes Macbeth (Shotgun Players), Rich & Famous (ACT), and Crime and Punishment (Berkeley Rep). In addition to working with St. Mary’s Theatre program, he has built fights for UC Davis,The Magic Theatre, African American Shakespeare, Impact Theatre, Cal Shakes, Shakespeare Santa Cruz and Berkeley Opera, among others. He is an Associate Instructor of theatrical combat with Dueling Arts International and a member of Actor Equity Association. Dave also teaches at Berkeley Rep School of Theatre, where he serves as Outreach Coordinator, and has taught courses at UC Santa Cruz and Cal State University East Bay. Some current projects include The Lieutenant of Inishmore (Berkeley Rep), Romeo and Juliet (Cal Shakes), and A Midsummer Night's Dream (Impact Theatre).
John Maltester
Director, SMC Jazz Band
John Maltester earned his Bachelors and Masters of Arts degrees from Cal-State University at Hayward. In addition to directing the Jazz Band at Saint Mary's (a position he's held since 2006), he has been Professor of Music and Director of Bands at Los Medanos College for thirty-five years and is also Music Director Emeritus of the Contra Costa Chamber Orchestra and Artistic Director for the Diablo Wind Symphony.
Mr. Maltester brings a diverse background of abilities to the conductor's podium. He directs bands, orchestras, jazz bands, and chamber ensembles. Recognitions include a Lifetime Achievement Award from the California Parent Teacher Association, Outstanding Educator of the Year Award (1989-90) at Los Medanos College, the KABL Citizen of the Day award (1984), the President's award for Lifetime Contribution to Education at Los Medanos College (1999), and the Contra Costa County Regional Arts Council award for Outstanding Achievement in the Arts (1999). He has been listed in the “Who's Who in Education” in 1998, 1999, 2001, 2002, and 2004. He is involved in several community-oriented activities including the Contra Costa Arts Council as well as several advisory board positions. He is one of only two conductors to conduct both the California State Honor Band and Honor Jazz Band.
His ensembles have performed at countless local, regional, state, and national music conferences, as well as many international venues. The LMC Jazz Ensemble received a Superior rating at the Pacific Coast Intercollegiate Jazz Festival for twenty-six straight years. The LMC Concert Band and Jazz Ensemble have toured Hawaii, Europe, Australia, Jamaica, China, and the Pacific Northwest as well as throughout the Western United States. In the brief time he has directed the Saint Mary's Jazz Band, the ensemble has enjoyed dramatic growth both in numbers and musical quality.
Mr. Maltester is also active as a trombonist, rehearsal techniques clinician, adjudicator, and guest conductor and lecturer throughout Australia, the Western United States, Hawaii, and Alaska. In addition he is the American Youth Soccer Organization Regional Referee Administrator for Area 2C (Contra Costa, Solano, and San Joaquin counties), a National referee and assessor, a USSF referee, and is also active as an ASA umpire. He resides in Martinez, California with his wife and two daughters.
Delia MacDougall
Guest Director
Delia has been an actor and director for the past twenty years, working mainly in San Francisco. An actor, director and company member of Word for Word, she has directed over ten shows for company since 1996. Most recently she directed Gertrude Stein’s Miss Furr and Miss Skeene as part of a co-production with Theater Rino. Other original works with Word for Word include: Amy Tan’s Immortal Heart, Upton Sinclar’s Oil! The Ride, Sherwood Anderson’s Winesburgh Ohio, Virginia Woolfe’s Mrs. Dalloway’s Party and Dorothy Bryant’s The Confessions of Madame Psyche. Delia has been a part of the Intersection for the Arts resident theater company, Campo Santo, since its beginnings; directing their second production, the world premiere of Erin Cressida Wilson’s Hurricane. Other world premieres directed for Campo Santo include: Naomi Iizuka’s 17 Reasons (Why) and The Language of Angels and Denis Johnson’s Purvis. West Coast premieres include Iizuka’s, Polaroid Stories and Jose Rivera’s Sonnets for and Old Century for the Harbor Theater. Delia MacDougall is the theatre program's guest director for the Fall of 2009.
Frank Murray
Frank Murray joined the Performing Arts Department in 1988. He has taught a wide range of theater courses, including theater history of all periods, theater theory and literature, acting, Perceiving the Arts, and theater/film courses during January Term. He is particularly interested in both the origins of theatre and 19th and 20th century drama. He has directed numerous college productions, including Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, Trojan Women, She Stoops to Conquer, The Bacchae, Goodnight Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet), The Actor's Nightmare, and Little Shop of Horrors. From 2002-04 he served as Chair of the Performing Arts Department, and since that time as Dean for Academic Development. On the side, he sings in the baritone section of "Cantare," one of the Bay Area's finest choirs.
Lino Rivera
Piano, chamber music, music history
Born in the Philippines, Dr. Lino Rivera won his first national competition at age eight. He has performed as a solo recitalist, concerto soloist, and accompanist on three continents. He has been featured on several radio and television broadcasts, notably live performances with the Manila Symphony Orchestra and the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra. Rivera makes it his mission to advocate and premiere contemporary works; to explore and meet the artistic, creative, and technical challenges of piano transcriptions (the subject of his doctoral dissertation); and to discover and perform obscure solo piano repertoire throughout the ages.
Rivera is a celebrated performer for Composers, Inc. an organization based in San Francisco dedicated to promoting works by contemporary American composers. Recently he performed many of the Beethoven sonatas in conjunction with renowned music historian Robert Greenberg on a concert lecture series presented at Villa Montalvo in Saratoga, California. He is a frequent soloist at Music Teachers' Association of California conferences, and regularly serves as an adjudicator of piano competitions. Recent solo recitals have taken place in Miami, Corpus Christi, Savannah, Chicago, Los Angeles and Anchorag
Martin Rokeach
Theory, European music history, jazz and blues history, chamber music, world music
The music of composer Martin Rokeach has been performed by the Berkeley Symphony, Romania's Constanta Symphony, the United States Army Orchestra, Pacific/Mozart Ensemble, Cygnus Ensemble (NY) Dunsmuir Piano Quartet (San Francisco), League of Composers (NY), the Chicago Ensemble, Musica Nova (Macedonia), Wyck Trio (U.K.), Vermont Contemporary Music Ensemble, Chameleon Ensemble (Boston), the St. Petersburg (Russia) Chamber Players, the Sheridan Players (Chicago), the Webster Trio (Houston), Guitarinet (Poland) and many other outstanding ensembles and soloists throughout the United States, Europe, and Australia. His works have earned honors in 12 composition competitions, most recently those sponsored by Audio Inversions of Austin, International Clarinet Association, and the Chicago Ensemble, and he has been commissioned to write music for New York's Cygnus Ensemble, Switzerland's Dobrzelewski/Marrs Duo, Left Coast Chamber Ensemble, Music Teachers Association of California, California Association of Professional Music Teachers, New York's Eight Strings and a Whistle, San Francisco Symphony Principal Hornist Robert Ward and numerous soloists. His music has been published by Fallen Leaf, RonCorp, Go Fish and ALRY, and recorded on the Albany, Furious Artisan, Arizona, Emeritus, North/South, Capstone, and Amie labels. He has been a featured composer and speaker at the Hartt Conservatory of Music, New York University and Wichita State University, and concerts devoted exclusively to his music have been held at Washington State University and Western Carolina University.
Recent performances of Mr. Rokeach's music have taken place at the Manhattan School of Music, Sacramento's Festival of New American Music, the USC Contemporary Music Ensemble, NYU, Sarah Lawrence College, West Virginia's Marshall University, The Boston Conservatory, Third Street Music School (NY), and the Left Coast Chamber Ensemble (San Francisco).
Mr. Rokeach earned his Ph.D. in music composition and theory from Michigan State University, and bachelor's and master's degrees from San Francisco State University. He is one of the founders and artistic directors of San Francisco's contemporary music concert series, Composers, Inc. In 1999 he was named "Saint Mary's College Professor of the Year."
Anthony Striplen
Clarinet
Anthony Striplen, Clarinetist and Bass Clarinetist, is a native of Bakersfield, CA and has been a member of the San Francisco Opera Orchestra since 2000. He has been associated with San Francisco Opera for many years, initially as Principal Clarinet with the company's touring arm, Western Opera Theater.
In addition to performing his duties with the Orchestra, Mr. Striplen has been active at various studios (including Skywalker Studios) recording soundtracks for numerous motion pictures, television programs, and video games, among them Jurassic Park III, a video/CD with rock band Metallica, and commercials for Dove Soap featuring cartoon characters Wilma Flintstone and Jane Jetson. As chamber musician, Tony appears with the Gold Coast Chamber Players, of which he is a co-founder.
Outside the Bay Area, Mr. Striplen has performed at Carnegie Hall, Orchestra Hall in Chicago, the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., and at the Jerash Festival in Amman, Jordan.
Tony attended San Francisco State University, studying clarinet with Donald Carroll of the San Francisco Symphony. Other mentors include Boston Symphony clarinetists Rosario Mazzeo and Harold Wright, as well as his first teacher, Mary Moore. Tony has been a participant at the Berkshire Music Festival at Tanglewood, a clinician at Bay Area music camps, and a guest speaker at the 1997 California Music Educators Conference for Northern California. Tony is on the faculty of St. Mary's College.
Mike Williams
Jazz guitar
Mike Williams earned his Master of Arts from Caifornia State University, Hayward and has performed professionally as a guitarist for thirty years in the San Francisco Bay Area. In 1995, he authored the advanced guitar instruction book, Guitar Lessons with the Greats, for Warner Brothers Music. His private students continue to receive major local, state and national awards, and many have become prominent performers in the music industry.
Renée Witon
Class Piano
Renée Witon is a pianist, accompanist and composer. She received her Bachelor of Music Degree from Alverno College (Milwaukee) and the Master of Music Degree from Catholic University of America (Washington, DC). In addition to working as a lecturer at St Mary's College, Renée is director of music theory for the San Francisco Girls Chorus, is Assistant Director of Music at First Unitarian Church in Oakland, and maintains a private piano studio in Oakland. She has also taught at the Community Music Center in San Francisco and George Washington University in Washington, DC. While in Washington, she also worked as a music specialist at the Library of Congress. In addition to solo and chamber concert performances, Renée frequently appears as a guest host on KUSF radio's contemporary music showcase, “Classics Without Walls.” In 2000, she released a solo piano CD, Coming Home, featuring music of Brahms, Beethoven, Suk, Ravel, and her own compositions.
Jia Wu
Modern dance, choreography
Jia Wu joins the Performing Arts Department in the fall of 2008. A native of China, she earned a BA in Choreography and Performance from Beijing Dance Academy and an MFA in Choreography from the University of California, Los Angles. As a choreographer, performer and dance filmmaker, her daring kinetics and provocative works applies Asian dance vocabularies and aesthetics to explore modern issues such as globalization, feminism, and multiculturalism. She has earned numerous honors, including an award for outstanding performance and choreography at the Chinese National Dance Competition in 2000 and a prix d'excellence for best performance at the 2004 Festival International de Musique Universitaire in Belfort, France. She is the recipient of the Evelyn and Mo Ostin Performing Arts Award, Edna & Yu-Shan Han Scholarship, and the Clifton Webb Scholarship from the school of Arts and Architecture at UCLA. Most recently she received the "Jumping Frames 2008 Dance Video Award" in the Jumping Frames Dance International Video Competition in Hong Kong.
Ms. Wu has performed both her contemporary choreography and traditional works on programs in China, France, Germany, Mexico and the United States. Her work The Other Shore was recently included in the premiere performance of Los Angeles Movement Arts at the Nate Holden Theater, and also was selected by Pina Bausch for the NRW International Dance Festival in November 2008 in Essen, Germany. In 2007 Bird Cage was programmed on the Gala Concert of the American College Dance Festival at the University of San Francisco and subsequently performed in the Los Angeles Dance Invitation. Born to Search premiered in 2007 at the Dance in August Festival in Berlin. That same year Ms. Wu's solo piece, Situ-Asian, was selected for the Dancing in the Margins Festival at Electric Lodge and also the International Meeting on Research in Dance in Mexico. In 2006 The Flying Peacock was performed at two UCLA venues, Royce Hall and the Fowler Museum of Cultural History. Ms Wu has received commissions from Ren Min University, Peking University, Tsinghua University, and South China Normal University, and her dance works have been televised throughout China. In 2003 Enjoy our world was commissioned for the Opening Ceremony of the Asian Gymnastics Championships at Tian He Stadium in Guangzhou. About Xiang Zi, a full-evening work created in collaboration with four other choreographers, premiered in 2001 at the Tian Qiao Theatre in Beijing.
As a filmmaker, Ms Wu's dance films have been presented at festivals in Germany, Switzerland, Hong Kong, Brazil, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Mexico, UK and the U.S.A.
