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Jason Ham
Visiting Specialist
Euphonium
973-655-7212
Jason Ham - Website

Euphonium solo artist Jason Ham grew up in South Carolina, studied with Ken Kroesche at Western Carolina University (Cullowhee, NC) and attended the University of Georgia (Athens, GA). In 2001 he won the Euphonium Solo Artist Competition at the International Tuba and Euphonium Conference, which was held that year in Lahti, Finland. That year he also won a job in the United States Military Academy Band at West Point, NY. Through his job at West Point, he has visited about 30 colleges or universities, along with many festivals throughout the USA and beyond. He has given the first euphonium performances in Bulgaria and Macedonia, and performed for sold-out audiences in Beijing, China. He has commissioned new works for euphonium and performs with the New Amsterdam Brass Band, based at Montclair State University.

Billy Hart
Visiting Specialist
Jazz Drum Set
973-655-7212

Billy Hart is known for his work in many styles of jazz drumming including electronic and rock-influenced styles, free jazz, and bop. He played in rhythm-and-blues bands while in high school, accompanying Otis Redding, Joe Tex, and Smokey Robinson as house drummer at the Howard Theater in Washington DC. He has performed with Shirley Horn, McCoy Tyner, Herbie Hancock, Jimmy Smith, Stan Getz, Charlie Rouse, Cecil Taylor and Pharoah Sanders. He also performed or recorded as a sideman with many notable artists, including Miles Davis, Jimmie Rowles, JoAnne Brackeen, Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen, Doug Raney, Lee Konitz, Pierre Dørge, Louis Smith, Clark Terry, Duke Jordan, Chico Freeman, Johnny Coles, James Newton , Jimmy Knepper, Peter Leitch, Johnny Dyani, Paul Bley, and Idrees Suliemann. Hart has been a member of the New York Jazz Quartet and co-founded Colloquium III, a group that led percussion workshops at the New York Drummers’ Collective. He worked intermittently with Mingus Dynasty and was a member of the group Quest, led by Dave Liebman and Richard Beirach. He appeared in two videos, Jazz in America: Gerry Mulligan (1982) and Jazzvisions: All Strings Attached (1988). He has made more than 400 albums and is the author of book Jazz Drumming. He has recorded on Steeplechase, A&M, Warner Brothers, ECM, Choice, Arabesque, Pathfinder, Sunnyside, Freelance, Evidence, Gatemouth, Atlantic, Muse, and Nonesuch.

Marsha Heller
Visiting Specialist
Oboe
973-655-7212
mhellerobo@aol.com

Oboist Marsha Heller has been recognized for her expressive playing and beautiful tone by the New York Times and Performing Arts Magazine, among many others. She studied with Harvey McGuire of the Cleveland Orchestra, at Oberlin Conservatory with DeVere Moore, at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, and in New York with Harold Gomberg and Henry Schuman. Since her debut as winner of the Concert Artists' Guild Competition in 1971 she has performed with diverse groups including the American Symphony, Dance Theatre of Harlem, Martha Graham Dance Company, Bronx Arts Ensemble, and New York Pops. She has been a frequent guest soloist at the Berkshire Bach Society, Ogunquit Chamber Music Festival and the New Jersey Chamber Music Society. She is a member of the Queen's Chamber Band, which performs Baroque and contemporary works. Her recordings include Music of Carlos Surinach, Ritmo Jondo and Three is Company, all with the Bronx Arts Ensemble, JCF-the Buckeburg Bach and Ragtime at the Ritz with the Trio Bell'Arte, and Viva Italia with the Queen's Chamber Band. Ms Heller has taught oboe and chamber music at MSU since 1991.

Andrew Hertz
Accompanist
973-655-7212

Ting Ho
Professor of Music
Theory-Composition
Coordinator
973-655-7221
hoti@mail.montclair.edu

Ting Ho, a New Jersey Distinguished Artist (1988), has received composing grants and awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, the American Music Center and Meet-the-Composer. He is the recipient of the Louis Lane Prize, and his works have been performed at Alice Tully Hall and Weill Recital Hall in New York City, and in concerts and new music festivals in the United States and Europe. Born in Chungking, China, he composed a two piano work that was featured in a Voice of America broadcast to the Orient. In 1991, Prof. Ho's composition Wild Geese Alighting was the required Chinese performance piece for children eight years old or younger at the Sixth Annual International Young Artist Piano Competition Featuring Chinese Music held in Washington, DC. Prof. Ho received his Ph.D. in music composition from the Eastman School of Music of the University of Rochester (NY). He is a new music specialist, adjudicator and consultant for numerous community and educational arts organizations and schools.

Paul Hostetter
Assistant Professor of Music
Director of Orchestral Studies
973-655-7584
hostetterp@mail.montclair.edu
Paul Hostetter's blog

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Robert Ingliss
Visiting Specialist
Oboe
973-655-7212

Robert Ingliss is principal oboe of the Riverside Symphony and the Northeastern Pennsylvania Philharmonic, and was recently appointed Acting Principal Oboe of the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra by its music director, Neeme Jarvi. He tours worldwide with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, with whom he has appeared as soloist on several occasions. He has also been the principal oboist of Philharmonia Virtuosi, the American Symphony Orchestra, the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra and the Mexico City Philharmonic. As a chamber musician he is a member of An die Musik - oboe strings & piano, and the Jupiter Symphony Chamber Players. An avid proponent of contemporary music, Robert is the oboist of the Cygnus Ensemble and Ensemble Sospeso, is a founding member of the Columbia Sinfonietta, now called the Manhattan Sinfonietta, and has premiered works by composers such as Babbitt, Carter, Dalbavie and Murail with the aforementioned groups and others including Speculum Musicae, Parnassus, SEM Ensemble, Fireworks and Ensemble 21. He has recorded for dozens of labels and has appeared on numerous soundtracks for film and television. Mr Ingliss teaches oboe at Columbia University, Sarah Lawrence College and the Brooklyn College Conservatory.

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Clay James
Assistant Professor
Musical Theater
973-736-7341
jamesbr@mail.montclair.edu

Director and choreographer Clay James teaches musical theater in MSU's Departments of Music and Theater/Dance. He came to Montclair in 2005 after serving as head of musical theater for the Department of Theater Arts at the University of Miami. He has also taught at Florida Atlantic University, Miami Dade Community College and New World School of the Arts. His directing and choreography credits include the St. Louis Muny Opera, Playhouse in the Park, Shores Performing Arts Center, North Shore Music Theater, and Walt Disney Productions, among many others.

Yi-Wen Jiang
Artist-in-Residence
Shanghai Quartet
Violin
973-736-7212
yiwenjiang@gmail.com
Shanghai Quartet Website

Born in Beijing, Yi-Wen Jiang has appeared as a soloist with the Victoria Symphony and the Montreal Symphony. He has also performed for NBC and PBS television specials, National Public Radio, CPB in Beijing, WQXR in New York, and KFUO in St. Louis. He made his concerto debut with the Central Opera House Orchestra in Beijing when he was 17. In 1981, after winning a top prize at the First China Youth Violin Competition, he was accepted into the class of Professor Han Li at the Central Conservatory of Music. In 1985 he came to the United States on a full scholarship to the St. Louis Conservatory, where his teachers included Taras Gabora, Jaime Laredo, and Michael Tree. He also spent two summers in Dallas participating in master classes with Pinchas Zukerman. In 1990, with the support of the Ken Boxley Foundation, he went to Rutgers University to work with Arnold Steinhardt of the Guarneri Quartet. A prizewinner at the Mae M. Whitaker and Montreal competitions, Mr. Jiang has appeared at many international music festivals, collaborating with such prominent artists as Alexander Schneider, Michael Tree, Jaime Laredo, and Lynn Harrell. He has recorded for the Record Corporation of China.

Aaron Jodoin
Music Direction
Musical Theater
973-655-7212

Steve Johns
Visiting Specialist
Percussion
Jazz Drum Set
973-655-7212
sjohns2001@aol.com
Steve Johns - Website

Visiting percussion specialist Steve Johns studied with master drummers Alan Dawson and Bob Gullotti and attended the New England Conservatory of Music, where he studied classical percussion with Fred Buda and Vic Firth. He moved to New York in 1982. He has worked, recorded and collaborated with Donald Byrd, Nat Adderley, Eddie Henderson, the Count Basie Orchestra under Frank Foster, the Vanguard Orchestra, Toshiko Akiyoshi/Lew Tabakin Big Band, Benny Carter, Phil Woods, Illinois Jacquet, Michael Brecker, Stanley Turentine, Slide Hampton, Kenny Burrell, and many others. Steve was the drummer for NPR's Billy Taylor's Jazz at The Kennedy Center in which he recorded 75 shows with guest including Wynton Marsalis, Nancy Wilson, Joe Lavano, Arturo Sandoval, Ray Barreto, Milt Jackson, Jon Faddis, Randy Brecker, Grover Washngon, Gary Burton, and Harry Sweet Edison. Mr. Johns's recordings include Ceremony on Malaco with saxophonist Peter Brainin (Cats Paw Records) and No Saints/No Sinners (Playscape Records). As well as having a busy performance schedule, Mr. Johns has taught at the Vermont Jazz Center, the Jazz In July Program at the University of Massachusetts, the Thelonius Monk Institute in Aspen Colorado and Williams College in Massachusetts.

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Tatyana Kebuladze
Adjunct Faculty
Secondary Piano
Accompanist
973-655-7212
NUSYA@netzero.net

Tatyana Kebuladze, is a native of Ukraine, where she graduated from the Gliere State Music College, the alma mater of virtuoso Vladimir Horowitz. As a pianist for four years with the New Jersey Children's Choir, Ms. Kebuladze has accompanied the choir in concerts in New York and on their Canadian tour. She was also a guest artist with the New Jersey Chamber Music Society. Ms. Kebuladze graduated with honors from Montclair State University, where she received various awards, including the School of the Arts Talent Award with full tuition scholarship. Tatyana holds a Master in Music degree from Rutgers University. In addition to her work at MSU, she is an adjunct faculty member at Westminster Choir College.

Monsoon Han Kim
Adjunct Professor
Secondary Piano
Accompanist
973-655-7212

Mansoon Han Kim has won numerous competitions including the Yale Gordon Competition, the Yook Young Competition, the Piano Music Competition, and Nan Pa Music Competition. She received her Bachelor of Music degree from Seoul National University in 1991. In 1992, she began studies with concert pianist Ann Schein at the Peabody Institute in Baltimore (MD), where she received her Master of Music and Doctor of Musical Arts degrees. She has performed throughout the United States, Canada, South Korea, and China. She has performed with members of the Maia String Quartet, Ceruti String Quartet, the Anchor Trio, and soprano Hyunah Yu. Kim has won the Clara Ascherfeld Accompanying Award, Peabody Career Development Grant. She has studied at summer festivals such as the Aspen Music Festival, the Orford Arts Center, and the Kent Blossom Summer Chamber Music Festival and participated in master classes by Mennahem Pressler, Leon Fleisher, Abbey Simon, Jörg Demus, Sergei Dorensky, and Gabby Casadesus.

Soyeon Kim
Accompanist
973-655-7212

Dmitri Korneev
Accompanist - Coordinator
973-655-7212
korneevd@mail.montclair.edu

A graduate of the Russian Academy of Music (Gnessin) in Moscow, Mr. Korneev is a freelance accompanist. He currently serves as a staff accompanist at Call School of Music. He is also actively involved in vocal auditions and regional competitions for singers. Before coming to New Jersey, Dmitri worked at the University of Texas in San Antonio and was principal accompanist at the San Antonio Lyric Opera. As a solo pianist Dmitri spent several years giving recitals throughout Russia, Greece, Italy and United States. His performances in the States have included such prestigious concert halls as Carnegie Hall and United Nations Concert Hall in New York. Mr. Korneev also participated in master classes held by Claude Frank and Arkady Aronov as well as in La Belle Epoque Festival in New York. In 1998 he became a laureate of the International Piano Competition IBLA Grand Prize in Italy. His other awards include several scholarships at Mannes College of Music and Russian Academy of Music.

Boris Kucharsky
Visiting Specialist
Violin
973-655-7212
Boris Kucharsky - Website

A native of Germany, violinist Boris Kucharsky attended the Menuhin School in London where Yehudi Menuhin became his teacher and mentor. In 1990 Menuhin conducted the performance of Beethoven's Violin Concerto that laid the foundation for Boris Kucharsky's outstanding reputation. Other important influences were Igor Ozim at the Academy of Music in Cologne and Erick Friedman at Yale University. His repertoire encompasses the whole spectrum of styles. Several composers have written works for him, including American composer Robert Aldridge and Slovakian composer Eugen Suchon, whose violin concerto Fantasia and Burleska is dedicated to Kucharsky. His recording of this concerto was awarded Best Classical Recording of the year in 1999. Kucharsky recent performances of the complete cycle of Beethoven's violin sonatas is being released on CD. He has appeared as soloist with orchestras such as the European Chamber Orchestra, Slovak Philharmonic, Staatskapelle Schwerin, Suk Chamber Orchestra, Dortmund Philharmonic, Karlsbad Symphony Orchestra, Kammerakademie Neuss and the Prague Chamber Orchestra, and has given recitals at many of the major European festivals, including Schleswig Holstein, Gstaad, Lichfield, Dvorak, and the BHS Slovakia festivals. His is busy as a performer and recording artist in Europe, the US and Asia.

Jeffrey Kunkel
Associate Professor
Music Education
(Undergraduate Coordinator)
MSU Jazz Ensembles/Jazz Piano
973-655-7215
kunkelj@mail.montclair.edu

Jeffrey Kunkel (D.Ed., Music Education, Penn State University; M.M., Jazz Studies, New England Conservatory; B.S., Music Education, Penn State University) serves as Coordinator of Music Education and as director of the MSU Jazz Band, which performs at festivals throughout the area, including the Villanova Jazz Festival, University of the Arts Jazz Festival, and New York Vocal Jazz Festival. Prof. Kunkel is serving his third term as president of the New Jersey chapter of the International Association for Jazz Education, and is Jazz Procedures Chair for the New Jersey Music Educators Association. He is active as a jazz pianist, composer, adjudicator, and clinician, and was selected to direct the Pennsylvania District IV Jazz Band early in 2007. He also had the honor of conducting the 2006 and 2002 New Jersey Intercollegiate Jazz Ensemble, the 2003 New Jersey Region II Jazz Ensemble, and the 2000 New Jersey Region I Jazz Ensemble. He can be heard on a CD release by jazz trumpeter and composer Peter Sciaino. He was also featured prominently on piano, keyboards, and trumpet on a 2001 CD release by singer/songwriter Julie Aaron entitled Borrowed Time.

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Gregory Lamar
Visiting Specialist
Voice
973-655-7212
gl5@aol.com

Gregory Lamar has an international reputation as a teacher, performer, scholar and consultant. He has been recognized for his versatility as a singer, being equally at home in recital, opera and oratorio. Mr. Lamar has performed with various opera companies, orchestras and concert organizations. As a teacher, his students perform regularly in major opera houses and concert halls throughout the world, including the Metropolitan Opera, San Francisco, Munich and Vienna. Also, many of his students have performed on Broadway stages and national tours. Mr. Lamar maintains vocal studios in New York City, Cologne and Berlin. He has also taught in Vienna. Mr. Lamar has conducted master classes for young artist programs of various opera houses, and workshops in voice and speech for actors. He has collaborated with noted voice specialists in working with injured voices. Mr. Lamar works regularly with artists' management agencies in the U.S., Germany and Austria, and has been an adjudicator for the Metropolitan Opera Regional Auditions. He earned a Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Georgia and a Master of Music degree from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. He also did postgraduate work at the Indiana University School of Music.

Jerome Landsman
Professor Emeritus
Strings

Martha Learner
Concert Manager
973-655-7263
learnerm@mail.montclair.edu

Ron Levy
Accompanist
973-655-7212

Ron Levy has been called "first-class" by the New York Times.  He regularly appears as soloist and in partnership with many of the world's leading singers and instrumentalists. A graduate of Oberlin, Mr. Levy is a founding member of the Hudson Trio, Kaleidoscope, the New World Trio, the Manchester Chamber Players, the Breuckelen Trio, and the Palisades Virtuosi; he has been pianist and harpsichordist of the Oberlin Orchestra, the Adelphi Chamber Orchestra, the New Jersey and North Jersey Philharmonics, the Westchester Symphony, and the Albany Symphony.  Presently he is Associate Artist with the All Seasons Chamber Players, and is the pianist of the Orpheus Men's Chorus and Ridgewood Choral.  Recordings by Mr. Levy are available on the Albany, Centaur, Eroica, Koch International, MMF and High Point labels.  In the summer of 2008, Mr. Levy made his debuts in St. Petersburg, Russia, and at the venerable Stratford Summer Music Festival, CA.

Honggang Li
Artist-in-Residence
Shanghai Quartet
Viola
973-736-7212
shangva@yahoo.com
Shanghai Quartet Website

Honggang Li began his musical training studying the violin with his parents at the same time as his brother, Weigang. When the Beijing Conservatory reopened in 1977 after the Cultural Revolution, Mr. Li was selected to attend from a group of over five hundred applicants. He continued his training at the Shanghai Conservatory and was appointed a faculty member there in 1984. Mr. Li has also served as a teaching assistant at the Juilliard School and has appeared as soloist with the Shanghai Philharmonic and the Shanghai Conservatory Orchestra. In 1987 he won a violin as a special prize given by Elisa Pegreffi of Quartetto Italiano at the Paolo Borciani competition in Italy.

Weigang Li
Artist-in-Residence
Shanghai Quartet
Violin
973-655-7212
weigangliviolin@yahoo.com
Shanghai Quartet Website

A native of Shanghai, Weigang Li has been a featured soloist with the Asian Youth Orchestra, the Shanghai Symphony, the BBC Symphony Orchestra and the BBC Scottish Symphony. Mr. Li began studying the violin with his parents at the age of five and went on to attend the Shanghai Conservatory at age 14. He then came to the United States in 1981 to study at the San Francisco Conservatory through an exchange program between the sister cities of San Francisco and Shanghai. Upon graduating from the Shanghai Conservatory in 1985, Mr. Li was appointed assistant professor of violin at the school. Shortly thereafter he left China to continue his education at the Northern Illinois University. From 1987-1989, Mr. Li studied and taught at the Juilliard School as teaching assistant to the Juilliard Quartet. His other teachers have included Shmuel Ashkenasi, Pierre Menard, Shu-Chen Tan, and Isadore Tinkleman. Mr. Li was featured in the film From Mao to Mozart: Isaac Stern in China.

Michael Lipsey
Visiting Specialist
Percussion
973-655-7212
liptal1@yahoo.com

Michael Lipsey holds masters degree from Manhattan School of Music. He has performed with such prestigious ensembles as the Lincoln Center Chamber Music Society II, Riverside Symphony, Ensemble Sospeso, Philharmonia Virtuosi, Newband and is a founding member of the Talujon Percussion Quartet. The Talujon Percussion Quartet has performed for the Lincoln Center Chamber Music Society, La Jolla Chamber Music Society, BAM, Tan Dun, Taipei Red Lantern Festival and recorded for Tzadik and CRI Records. He has also recorded for Sony Classical with the BBC Symphony, CRI, Albany, Red Poppy, Mode, and Nonesuch Records. He has performed at festivals around the world including Berlin, Mexico City, Taipei, Tokyo, Moscow, Bang on a Can, Chautauqua, Library of Congress and the Lincoln Center Out-of-Doors Festival. He is very interested in creating new works for hand drums and commissions and premieres works in this medium. Recently he traveled to Cuba to study the religious music of that country and continues to study South Indian percussion.

Renée Louprette
Visiting Specialist
Organ
973-655-7212
loupretter@yahoo.com

Hailed by the New York Times as “a technically nimble and dynamic organist,” Renée Anne Louprette is the Associate Director of Music at the Church of St. Ignatius Loyola in New York City where she collaborates in the direction of the music ministry program and the Sacred Music in a Sacred Space concert series, including the N.P. Mander Organ Recital Series. She has recently appeared at the festivals of Magadino, Switzerland, In Tempore Organi, Italy, Ghent and Hasselt, Belgium, and Toulouse Les Orgues, France. Ms. Louprette has performed with a number of New York City ensembles including the Clarion Music Society, American Symphony Orchestra, the Dessoff Choirs, Gotham City Orchestra, the Oratorio Society of New York, Cantori New York, the National Chorale and Orchestra, Orchestra of Our Time and Piffaro in venues including Carnegie, Avery Fisher and Merkin Halls and the Miller Theatre of Columbia University. She holds a Bachelor of Music degree in piano performance and a Graduate Professional Diploma in organ performance from the Hartt School of Music, University of Hartford, where she began organ studies with Larry Allen. She has pursued private studies with Dame Gillian Weir in London and with James David Christie. She earned a Premier Prix mention très bien from the Conservatoire National de Région de Toulouse, France studying with Michel Bouvard, Jan Willem Jansen and Philippe Lefebvre. In 2005, she won a Diplôme Supérieur in organ performance from the Centre d'Etudes Supérieures de Musique et de Danse de Toulouse.

Reggie Lucas
Adjunct Professor
Rap and Rock
973-655-7212