Allan Pollack has served as the music director and conductor of the Symphony of the Redwoods for the past twenty-five years. He also currently serves as Artistic Director for the Mendocino Music Festival and the Camellia Symphony Orchestra in Sacramento.
Pollack received a PhD in composition from UC Berkeley in 1984, and has since written several works for orchestra and chamber ensemble. Among his compositions are The Spiral Dance for chorus and orchestra, From the Song of Songs for soprano and orchestra, Two Movements in Time for orchestra, a Vibraphone Concerto, and A Summer Evening at the Boonville Fair for orchestra. His jazz concerto for saxophone, Albion Song, was recently premiered at the Mendocino Music Festival and subsequently performed by the Camellia Symphony Orchestra.
Dr. Pollack has had an extensive teaching career in the Bay Area, including a 35-year lectureship at the UC Berkeley, various appointments at the Conservatory of Music, San Francisco State University, and the San Francisco Community Music Center. He also taught clarinet and saxophone out of his Berkeley studio for decades. His work as a clarinetist and saxophonist embraced a myriad of styles, and he played in many chamber groups, orchestras and jazz bands. Some say he still plays a mean jazz saxophone.
Pollack now divides his time equally between Berkeley and Mendocino, enjoying a career of conducting in both Sacramento and Mendocino. His commitment to excellence has inspired musicians and audiences alike and, over the years, he has played a significant role in developing and sustaining musical life on the North Coast.
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FALL CONCERT
Matthew Miksak
bass-baritone, is a frequent performer in the Mendocino area. He graduated with a major in vocal studies from San Francisco State University and continued his studies at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and in Germany. He has performed with the San Francisco Opera Chorus, West Bay Opera, Marin Opera, Lamplighters, and Oakland Opera. In the Mendocino Music Festival he most recently performed in the 2010 season of the Mendocino Music Festival as the Toreador in Bizet’s Carmen. Other roles performed include bass soloist in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Figaro and Bartolo in Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro, Colline in Puccini’s La Boheme, the Commendatore in Mozart’s Don Giovanni, Sparafucile in Verdi’s Rigoletto, Don Bartolo in Rossini’s The Barber of Seville, Angelotti in Puccini’s Tosca, Sarastro in Mozart’s The Magic Flute, Don Magnifico in Rossini’s La Cenerentola, Gugliemo in Mozart’s Cosi fan Tutte, Frank in Strauss’s Die Fledermaus, Falstaff in Nicolai’s The Merry Wives of Windsor, and the bass soloist in Verdi’s Requiem. In 1995 he performed the role of Don Quixote in the Gloriana production of The Man of La Mancha. He concertizes in the Mendocino area, having performed Schubert’s Winterreise and Scwanengesang, as well as other solo recitals. He often concertizes with his wife, soprano Elaine Miksak. Matthew lives and works in the Mendocino area. |
College of the Redwoods Community Choir
Jenni Windsor, Director, College of the Redwoods Community Chorus
Trained at Westminster Choir College, which led to solos at Carnegie Hall and with the Metropolitan Opera in New York, Jenni Windsor taught music at the Friends Academy on Long Island and the laboratory school for the Bank Street College of Education in Manhattan before earning her Masters degree from the Conservatory of Music at University of the Pacific. Lured to the North Coast by family, she was a featured soloist with the College of the Redwoods Community Choir before becoming its Director. She has performed featured roles in The Secret Marriage and The Medium with the Mendocino Chamber Opera and was choirmaster for the Mendocino Music Festival’s production of Carmen. With the Gloriana Opera Company she has been the vocal director of The Aristocats, Alice In Wonderland, and Gloriana’s Broadway. Jenni is the theater arts and choir teacher for the Fort Bragg Unified School District, where she set a record for the most students appearing onstage at Cotton Auditorium. For the FBUSD she recently produced Little Women and will direct Just Another High School Musical at Cotton next Spring. She also teaches music theory and music history classes for College of the Redwoods.
Soloists
Elaine Miksak, soprano
Elaine has been soloist with the Symphony of the Redwoods in Carmina Burana, The Creation, the Magnificat, the Mozart Requiem, Poulenc's Gloria, and Beethoven's Mass in C. With Opera Fresca she sang the role of the Mother in Hansel and Gretel. the title roles in Puccini's Suor Angelica and Madame Butterfly, as well as Anne in The Merry Wives of Windsor, the Countess in Marriage of Figaro, Rosalinda in Die Fledermaus, and Fiordigligi in Cosi fan tutte. Elaine and her husband Matthew were two of the six founders of Opera Fresca. For Mendocino Chamber Opera. she sang the title role in Menotti's Amelia Goes to the Ball, Fidalma in The Secret Marriage by Cimarosa, Ma in Copland's The Tenderland, Georgetta in Puccini's Il Tabarro, Mrs. Waters in Ethel Smyth's The Boatswain's Mate, as well as a concert version on Samuel Barber's excerpts from Vanessa. For the Mendocino Music Festival, she was seen as the First Lady in The Magic Flute, Serpina in La Serva Padrone, and Musetta in La Boheme.
Ana Lucas, mezzo soprano
Ana Lucas has enjoyed singing with the Symphony of the Redwoods many times, and has especially fond memories of Les Nuits D'ete (Berlioz), Leider eines fahrenden Gesellen (Mahler), Poeme de l'Amour et de la Mer (Chausson) and the Exultate Jubilate (Mozart). Ana also sang with Opera Fresca, Gloriana, the Mendocino Music Festival, Cinnabar Opera Theatre, Opera San Jose, and Pocket Opera in San Francisco. Her favorite operatic roles are Cio-Cio San (Madama Butterfly) and Donna Elvira (Don Giovanni).
Patrick Gomes, tenor
Patrick Gomes first performed on the Mendocino Coast in the 1989 production of Cabaret with the Fort Bragg High School. Since then he has sung and acted in productions with Gloriana Musical Theater, Mendocino Chamber Opera, Opera Fresca, Mendocino Music Festival, Symphony of the Redwoods, and Mendocino Theater Co. He also performed opera in student productions at Sacramento State, and with choirs and local theater in the Sacramento area. Patrick is a voice student with Claudia Kitka, professor of voice at CSUS and is a classical DJ for KZYX&Z. Serenade to Music is his solo debut with the Symphony of the Redwoods.
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WINTER CONCERT
Laura Reynolds,
has been an active chamber and orchestral performer Northern California for over 20 years. She is principal oboist with the California Symphony and a member of the Santa Rosa and Marin Symphonies, and has appeared as soloist with all three organizations. Ms. Reynolds also performs regularly with a number of other orchestras throughout the Bay Area. A chamber music enthusiast, she is a member of the wind trio Trois Bois and was a founding member of Citywinds, a San Francisco based woodwind quintet dedicated to performing music by living composers.
A former member of the Virginia Symphony, Ms. Reynolds has attended the Music Academy of the West, the National Orchestral Institute, the Sarasota Music Festival and the Bach Aria Festival and Institute at Stonybrook. A student of Harry Sargous and William Bennett, she received a B.M. from the University of Michigan and a M.M. from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.
Ms. Reynolds enjoys teaching and joined the applied faculty of UC Davis in January 2000. She is also a member of the Preparatory and Extension Division faculty at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, where she teaches oboe and also works with young musicians in her role as Summer Programs Coordinator.
Outside of her musical pursuits, Ms. Reynolds enjoys hiking, bird watching, traveling to National Parks, and visiting international destinations. |
SPRING CONCERT
Carolyn Steinbuck has been active in the musical life of the Mendocino community as a pianist, conductor and teacher for over 35 years. Her piano teachers include her mother, Marion James (through high school); Robert Dix Lincoln at Douglass College in New Jersey (B.A. '67); Gunnar Johansen and Tait Sanford Barrows at the University of Wisconsin in Madison (M.M. '69); Barbara Shearer of Berkeley; and Karl Ulrich Schnabel, with whom she studied for over 20 years. She was a part-time music instructor at College of the Redwoods from 1976 through 2007 and at Santa Rosa Junior College from 1982 through 2007. From 1986 to 1996, she was Executive Director of the Mendocino Music Festival. Over the past 25 years, she has performed with the Mendocino Music Festival as a chamber player, chorus master, piano soloist and conductor. For 24 years, she directed the College of the Redwoods Community Chorus and the South Coast Community Chorus/Hwy 1 Jazz Choir, and was a regular guest conductor of Symphony of the Redwoods, retiring in 2007. She recently returned to conducting as director of the Coastal Singers in Point Arena, and she continues as Chorus Master of the Mendocino Music Festival Chorus. In October 2010, she performed a solo piano recital for Concerts Grand in Ukiah and Opus in Mendocino. |
