ISSUED: 2 January 2018
MEDIA CONTACT: Valerie Owens
SHEPHERDSTOWN, WV — The Community Music at Shepherd program is hosting auditions for the Shepherd Community Orchestra, Junior String Ensemble, and Shepherd Youth Chorus on Wednesday, January 10, in the Frank Center.
The Junior String Ensemble, under the direction of Shepherd alumna Renee Shaw, is made up of string players in third grade through high school. The Shepherd Youth Chorus, under the direction of Dr. David Gonzol, professor of music, with assistance from Angela Weaver, Shepherd alumna and music faculty at Driswood Elementary School, includes male and female vocalists in grades three through eight.
The Shepherd Community Orchestra, co-directed by adjunct music professors Camilo Pérez-Mejía and Dr. Jeannine Sturm, includes high school string students and community members from Jefferson and Berkeley counties and Washington County, Maryland, as well as string, wind, and percussion students from Shepherd. The ensemble meets Wednesday evenings to rehearse and presents two concerts during the school year, in December and April.
Pérez-Mejía teaches strings at Saint James School, Ellsworth Music, and Barbara Ingram School for the Arts. He currently serves as principal cellist for the National String Symphonia, assistant principal of Two Rivers Chamber Orchestra and Loudoun Symphony Orchestra, and music director and conductor of the Charles Washington Symphony Orchestra. Sturm is a strings teacher in Berkeley County schools. She has served as principal viola in the Hofstra Opera Orchestra and Hofstra Symphony Orchestra, co-principal viola of the CW Post Symphony Orchestra, and as principal second violin of the CW Post Symphony Orchestra.
Younis Orthodontics and the Younis family support scholarships for the Community Music at Shepherd program.
For more information about the auditions and scholarships, contact Sherry Sykes, coordinator, at ssykes@shepherd.edu or 304-876-5248. For information about everything the Community Music at Shepherd program offers, visit www.shepherd.edu/community-program/.
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