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musical director . singers . composer . pianist
musical
director Dr. LINDA RANEY Linda prepares the Santa Fe Symphony Chorus for performances with the Santa Fe Symphony. The group looks forward to singing Handel’s Messiah, Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, and Mozart’s Requiem this season. She is also organist and music director at First Presbyterian Church, where a new C. B. Fisk organ has been installed. She has worked for the church for 22 years and is very proud of their commitment to beautiful music. Linda is married to Raymond, who is rector of the Church of the Holy Cross in Edgewood, New Mexico. Walking, hiking, yoga, reading and movies are her leisure passions.
Barbara Doern Drew,first/second soprano, is in her 27th season with the Women’s Ensemble. A choral singer since the seventh grade, she periodically sings with the Santa Fe Symphony Chorus; she also helps lead congregational singing at the Santa Fe Center for Spiritual Living. Barbara is a freelance editor and writer, as well as a professional tarot reader, bringing ancient wisdom to assist in our modern challenges. She and husband Walter went on a fabulous 20th-anniversary trip to China in fall 2009! Gwen Gilligan, alto, has been singing with SFWE for most of its existence. She has lived in Santa Fe for 36 years, singing with many choral groups, and was a founding member of the Sangre de Cristo Chorale. She studied music at Bennington College. Gwen’s children, Johanna and Patrick, have been loyal audience members, along with Gwen’s mom, Lois, who attended nearly every performance over the 25 years she lived in Santa Fe. Gwen wants to know when the Ensemble gets to go to Italy again! Sue Katz, first alto, has been with the Women’s Ensemble since 2005. She has sung with the Santa Fe Symphony Chorus and with Santa Fe Pro Coro, and has studied with Margaret Pettengill. More recently, she was invited to sing with Canticum Novum. Sue has been a family physician with La Familia Medical Center for 19 years and is the medical director at the Villa Therese Clinic. Julie Kirk, first soprano, sang with the Women’s Ensemble from 1986 to 1990 and then rejoined the group in 2004. She also sings with the Zia Singers and Canticum Novum. She enjoys painting, tin work and wood carving. She is a volunteer with the Santa Fe Civitan Club and the Library for the Blind and Physically Disabled, and has recorded six books for the Library for the Blind. Kirsten lawson,first soprano, is in her first season with the Women's Ensemble. From the East Coast originally, Kirsten got a taste for choral music in high school when she got the chance to sing with the New England Conservatory's Youth Chorale. She later studied musical theater at American Musical and Dramatic Academy in New York City and piano at Antioch College in Ohio before moving to Santa Fe. Kirsten has worked as a piano technician for the last six years, which makes her outrageously happy. connie marks,first alto, is in her first season with the Women’s Ensemble. She also performs with the Zia Singers and sang with Coro de Camara in their spring 2009 concert. Connie retired from teaching in California and moved to Santa Fe last year with her life partner, Karen. For many years, she has sung with church and community choruses, including 16 years with the South Coast Chorale in Long Beach. Mary Mittnacht, first soprano, joined the Women’s Ensemble in 2007 after moving to Santa Fe in 2006 from New York City, and she serves on the board as vice president for development. Mary also sings with Canticum Novum and the Santa Fe Symphony Chorus. Her choral experience includes the New York Choral Society (NYC) and the Back Bay Chorale, Harvard University Choir and Radcliffe Pitches (Boston area). She is thrilled to be in Santa Fe with her husband, Stewart, and their pups. Tina Ossorgin, second alto, is in her third year with the Ensemble. A resident of Santa Fe since coming to study at St. John’s College in 1976, she has developed a deep love of the Southwest, often by explorations on horseback. While she and her husband raised their three children, she sang with various groups in and around Santa Fe, and she frequently attends workshops on Russian Orthodox liturgical music. She sings with and conducts the choir at St. Juliana of Lazarevo Russian Orthodox Church. Susan Phillips,first alto, is a lifelong singer and has sung with the Women’s Ensemble for 17 years. She has sung with the UNM women’s chorus, Las Cantantes, and the UNM Symphony Chorus with conductor/composer Brad Ellingboe, as well as with the Santa Fe Symphony Chorus. She is a clinical exercise physiologist by profession but has assumed responsibilities at her late husband’s business, Reynolds Insurance. Susan has lived here for 31 years and enjoys weight training, walking and hiking with her dogs, traveling and reading. Pam Unger, second soprano, returns for her second season with the Women's Ensemble. A native New Yorker, she relocated to New Mexico last year and has performed as a soloist in the Abiquiu Chamber Music Series and worked at the Santa Fe Opera. She received her master's in vocal performance and pedagogy at Westminster Choir College. Pam has performed leading roles in Sweeney Todd, The Gondeliers and Die Fledermaus. She currently teaches music and chorus in the Santa Fe Public Schools.
Sarah weiler, alto, is in her second season with the Women's Ensemble. She also sings with Pro Musica, the Santa Fe Symphony Chorus, and Canticum Novum. Sarah made her solo debut with the Santa Fe Symphony in July, singing selections from Beethoven's Mass in C, and will sing the alto solo in Vivaldi's Gloria in February 2009. Sarah received dual master's degrees in arts administration from the University of Cincinnati and currently works at the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival. Marty Noss Wilder, second alto, has sung with the Women’s Ensemble since 1983. She has a BA in music from Stanford University, where she sang with the University Chorus and the Memorial Church Choir. Locally, she has sung with the Chorus of Santa Fe, now the Santa Fe Symphony Chorus. Marty and her husband, Richard, own Wilder Landscaping, Inc., and have one son, Andrew, a junior at Santa Fe Secondary School. Marty is a licensed massage therapist and a registered polarity therapy practitioner.
pianist pianist, began studying piano at age eight in Linden, New Jersey. Further studies were at the Chicago Musical College and Harvard University. In 2002, Bill moved with his wife, Sheila, to Santa Fe. His work here has included church jobs, playing for eurythmy dance at the Santa Fe Waldorf School, and accompanying Canticum Novum, the Men’s Camerata and the Santa Fe Community College Chorus. Bill began accompanying for the Women’s Ensemble in 2006. commissioned composer Kinley Lange is a musician of considerable diversity. Though much of his career has been devoted to church music, he is equally comfortable playing blues guitar, drumming in the rhythm section of a salsa band, or conducting a major work with orchestra. In any context, he brings energy and passion to the music. Kinley's childhood was spent in west Texas and New Mexico, but a stint in the U.S. Navy introduced him to the University of Hawaii. There, after his discharge at Pearl Harbor, he began studying music theory and composition, receiving bachelor's and master's degrees. He was active in the world-renowned ethnomusicology department, which greatly influenced his career as a composer. Kinley also studied graduate-level composition and choral conducting at the University of Texas at Austin. Kinley’s choral music is widely performed by school, church and civic choruses. Many of his pieces have appeared in festivals and concerts in Europe, South America, the Philippines, Japan and Korea. He fulfills several commissions each year and, as a choral conductor, has toured extensively in Europe. Kinley says, “My work as a composer and conductor is, at its core, a search for passion—sometimes intense, sometimes playful or gentle, but always leaning into, reaching for a deeper and clearer expression of passion. The music I write is primarily text driven—the flow of the music a dance partner for the words, supporting them, nurturing them, adding strength or backing away.” He continues, “Making music with and for other people is the finest kind of community—an intimacy that makes us more than we are individually, connects us to each other in powerful ways, and illuminates before us the path to feeling and passion.” poet A graduate student in Boston, Charlotte Lange has published poetry and short fiction in various amateur collections starting from an early age. Winner of two first-place literary magazine awards while an English and comparative literary studies major at Occidental College in Los Angeles, she continued to write and collaborate with writers and musicians at every opportunity after moving to the East Coast. This is her first “official” collaboration with her father, though she takes partial credit for dozens of songs from her childhood that remain as yet unpublished. harpist Rosalind Simpson has been a resident of Santa Fe since 1980. She has appeared with all the major musical organizations in New Mexico, in particular for 15 years with the Santa Fe Opera Orchestra. She plays annually with the “Music in the Mountains” Festival in Purgatory, Colorado, the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, and many symphony orchestras. She is a regular guest artist with area choral groups, including the Santa Fe Women’s Ensemble and the Santa Fe Desert Chorale, and is featured on the Desert Chorale’s recent Christmas in Santa Fe CD. Chamber music has always been an important part of Rosalind’s work, and for several years she managed, as well as performed with, Serenata of Santa Fe. She is a frequent guest of the Taos Chamber Music Group and Santa Fe Pro Musica. She has performed as a guest artist at conventions of the American Harp Society and the World Harp Congress, most recently in Amsterdam in July 2008, and will be a featured soloist at the AHS 2010 convention. Prior to moving to the United States, Rosalind held professional appointments in Belgium, Switzerland and in her native South Africa. She received degrees in both harp and chamber music from the Brussels Conservatoire, the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa, and the Trinity School of Music in London. flutist Charly Drobeck's music-loving family sent her off to earn a BA in music from Indiana University, and from there she wandered to Creede, Colorado, and on to Santa Fe, working in professional theater and playing jazz and classical flute. In Santa Fe, she has played with Santa Fe Pro Musica, members of Santa Fe Symphony, Moveable Music, Oncydium Chamber Baroque and the San Miguel Trio, as well as in numerous recitals and street theater. She is delighted to return to play again with the Women’s Ensemble. Cellist Dana Winograd is the principal cellist of the Santa Fe Symphony and Chorus. Dana received her Bachelor’s and Master’s Degree from the Juilliard School in New York. Before moving to Santa Fe, Dana was busy as a freelance cellist in New York City, where she performed in many Broadway shows as well as with the American Composers Orchestra and the New Jersey Symphony. However, she grew tired of trying to get over the George Washington Bridge, and she wanted to own her own horse. Since moving to New Mexico in 1999, Ms. Winograd has also joined the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra, and is also currently the principal cellist of the Chamber Orchestra of Albuquerque. In addition, she plays in many chamber music groups, from Taos to Los Alamos and Santa Fe. She is the music teacher at the Willow School in Santa Fe, and has a large private cello studio.
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