Claire Johnson , Floot Fire Director, is retired from her positions as Affiliate Artist at the University of Houston and Professor of Flute at Southern Methodist University. She is a member of Gemeinhardt Flutemakers National Teacher Advisory Panel and serves on the Pedagogy Committee for the National Flute Association. A frequent speaker at the National Flute Association Conventions, Ms. Johnson is in great demand as a pedagogue and clinician. Ms. Johnson studied at Juilliard with Arthur Lora. She is the founder of The Texas Flute Society Flute Festival.
Pam Adams has expressed her talents in many venues: music educator, soloist performer, and, currently, as assistant principal flute and piccolo in the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra, where she also has held leadership positions among the musicians. She completed a Master of Music degree from her undergraduate alma mater, the University of North Texas, and is on the summer faculty of the MasterWorks Festival in Winona Lake, Indiana. Personal interest has led her to become an advocate for learning disability diagnostics and literacy. She has used her own talents in music and education in various settings to mentor many young people. Pam is a former president of the Texas Flute Society and was the first winner of the Myrna W. Brown Artist Competition. Married to fellow musician, Robert Adams, together they have three adult children, the third who is currently completing the family's eighth music degree!
Rita Almond has the dream job of teaching many award-winning private flute students in the Grapevine/Colleyville ISD, the Birdville ISD, in Flower Mound, in Irving, and in her home studio in Euless. She is a former adjunct instructor of flute at Tarrant County College Northeast as well as Richland College. She is frequently an adjudicator in UIL music competitions and other solo and ensemble competitions. She has performed frequently with Camerata Chamber Winds and with Flutes Unlimited, a professional flute choir. Rita enjoys playing solos and chamber music on the faculty recital series of Floot Fire. She has performed with Texas Wind Symphony, Metropolitan Wind Symphony, Dallas Civic Symphony, Richardson Symphony, and Dallas Symphony. As a competition winner, she was a featured soloist with the Amarillo Symphony.
Rita Almond is a past President of the Texas Flute Society. Having been an active member of the TFS for over 30 years, she has served in many capacities including Newsletter Chairman, Festival Co-Chairman, Trustee, and Historian.
Education credentials include a Master of Music from SMU; a Bachelor of Music from the University of New Mexico. In order to hone her skills, she attends master classes and seminars and performs regularly. She credits Claire Johnson as having been her best flute teacher as well as a great life inspiration. Her other flute teachers of considerable influence are Frank Bowen, Darlene Dugan, and Patricia George. Her most memorable master class teachers are Julius Baker, Jean-Pierre Rampal, Marcel Moyse, James Galway, Linda Chesis, and Jeanne Baxtresser.
Wesley Beal enjoys a prolific performing career both as a solo and collaborating pianist and organist. He is the recipeint of an award from Arts International, funded by the National Endowment for the Arts, to further the performance of American music internationally. He as been featured on European television and radio programs on American music. His concert appearances include performances for the Sofia Music Weeks International Festival, Varna Summer International Music Festival, and the Killington Music Festival in Vermont. Mr. Beal is the first prize winner of the 1993 J.S. Bach International Competititon and the William B. Hall Organ Competition.
His diverse career includes chamber music coaching, choral conduction, and liturgical composition. Mr. Beal graduated with high distinction in piano performance from the Eastman School of Music and earned two Master's degrees (one in piano performance and one in organ performance).
Mr. Beal worked for 17 years at Southern Methodist University teaching and overseeing the accompanying program. He currently is Organist and Assistant Director of Music at St. Rita Catholic Community in Dallas, TX.
Dr. Kimberly Clark is an active recitalist and chamber musician who has performed across the United States and in Europe. She is a member of Scirocco Winds, a woodwind quintet dedicated to the promotion of modern American works.
Formerly on faculty at the University of Houston Moores School of Music, Dr. Clark is highly sought as a teacher and clinician. She has performed, lectured, or conducted at the National Flute Association's conventions in Kansas City, Albuquerque, Nashville, Las Vegas, New York, and Dallas. Dr. Clark has also been a guest artist at the Florida Flute Fair, Costal Bend Flute Symposium, Kentucky Flute Society, Texas Flute Society, and Texas Music Educators Association. She has also performed and given masterclasses at universities across the US.
Dr. Clark's interests are wide and varied. Her publications include a transcription of Ibert's Histoires for Flute and Piano (available soon from Leduc) and articles in Flute Talk Magazine and the Flutist Quarterly. She is an Andover Educator trainee working for certification in Body Mapping and is simultaneously working towards Alexander Technique Teacher Certification.
Dr. Clark is the director of Floot Fire-Houston and co-director of Floot Fire-Austin. She currently serves on Board of Directors for the National Flute Association. She has previously served the NFA as the Piccolo Artist Competition Coordinator and as the Flute Clubs Coordinator. She is former President and Flute Fest Coordinator for the Houston Flute Club.
Jane Fore is a private teacher and freelance artist in the Plano area as well as instrumental music coordinator for Custer Road United Methodist Church.
Dr. Sarah Frisof is currently the assistant professor of flute at University of Texas at Arlington. Dr. Sarah Frisof completed her doctoral work at the University of Michigan and continued her study at the Juilliard School and the Eastman School of Music. She was a semi-finalist in the 2009 Kobe International Flute Competition, and the 2nd prizewinner of the National Flute Associations’s Young Artist Competition and the Heida Hermanns International Woodwind Competition.
Dr. Frisof has attended the Verbier, Tanglewood and Aspen Music Festivals, and she has substituted with the New York Philharmonic, Detroit Symphony, and Boston Symphony.
As a teacher, Dr. Frisof has maintained a private studio for over 10 years, and she served as the graduate assistant at the University of Michigan. Her interests in outreach and education have taken her to Zimbabwe and Brazil, where she ran music programs and participated in humanitarian work. Dr. Frisof is an avid runner, and she has completed two marathons.
Jocelyn Goranson , Instructor of Flute at Texas A&M - Commerce, is a Dallas-area performer, teacher, director of the Greater Dallas Flute Ensemble, and member of Triforia Winds and the Irving Symphony. A native of West Virginia, she received her Bachelor of Music degree (Flute Performance) summa cum laude with a minor in English from West Virginia University, and her Master of Music degree from the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University. Her principal teachers have been Joyce Catalfano and Leone Buyse, with additional influence from Robert Langevin.
Ms. Goranson has performed solo, orchestral and chamber music in nine countries. Additionally, she has performed in some of the most prestigious venues in the United States, including Carnegie Hall, The Kennedy Center, and the Apollo Theater. A prize-winning competitor, Ms. Goranson was named winner of the 2006 Frank Bowen Competition and one of six semifinalists in the 2006 National Flute Association Young Artist Competition. She was a Yamaha Young Performing Artist in 1996, National Winner of 1995 and 1998 Music Teachers National Association Woodwinds Competitions, and a finalist in the 2004 Byron Hester Competition and the 2003 Myrna Brown Competition. She has performed as a featured concerto soloist with the New Mexico Symphony, as well as other ensembles throughout the mid-Atlantic and Texas. She adjudicates at the Texas State UIL Solo and Ensemble Competition, and has also served as an adjudicator for the National Flute Association's Flute Choir and Newly Published Music Competitions. Ms. Goranson has performed with the Dallas Wind Symphony, Longview Symphony, Wheeling Symphony, Plano Symphony, Shreveport Symphony, and the Orquesta Filarmónica de Jalisco. Also an accomplished pianist, Ms. Goranson frequently accompanies for recitals and solo & ensemble competitions.
Debby Johnson is principal flute of the Richardson Symphony Orchestra, flutist with the Texas Winds, and a private teacher in the Dallas area.
Dr. Ellen Kaner is a free-lance woodwind performer and instructor in the Dallas/Fort Worth area where she can be heard in various area theaters. She is on the private lesson staff for the Mansfield and Grand Prairie School Districts. Currently the treasurer of the Texas Flute Society, Ellen also manages and directs an adult flute choir, Flutes Unlimited.
Julia North Lawson is a band director and flutist in Richardson, TX.
Dr. Priscilla Ochran-Holt directs the orchestra program at Centennial High School in Frisco, Texas. A flute student of Bernard Goldberg, she attended Duquesne University and spent her Sundays playing flute in the Pittsburgh Youth Symphony! She spent summers studying flute and chamber music with Marcel Moyse in Brattleboro and later attended New England Conservatory studying flute with James Pappoutsakis. Inspired by Moyse, she wrote her doctoral dissertation, Twentieth Century Woodwind Chamber Music, while attending the University of Miami and performing in the Boca Raton Symphony, Ft. Lauderdale Symphony and Miami Ballet. Her flute articles have been published in the National Flute Association magazine and she serves as a flute clinician throughout the southwest. Locally, she performs with Texas Winds Musical Outreach and The Grand Avenue Trio.
Gabriel Sanchez was a top prize winner in the 1997 Casablanca International Piano Competition in Morocco and is a laureate of other international competitions, including the Marguerite Long in Paris (France), the Gina Bachauer in Salt Lake City (USA), and the Paloma O’ Shea in Santander (Spain). He has performed throughout the United States and internationally in recital and with orchestra, including performances at Pianofest in the Hamptons, New York, with the Dallas Symphony under Kerry-Lynn Wilson and the Orquesta Filarmonica de Jalisco and the Irving Symphony under Hector Guzman. In London, he performed at the Royal Academy of Music, in Paris at the Salle Gaveau, in Santander, Spain at the Palacio de Festivales, in Casablanca, Morocco at the Salle de l’Office des Changes, and in the Dominican Republic with the Orquesta Sinfonica Nacional. In Thessaloniki, Greece, he performed a solo recital to benefit Lions Club International.
He studied at London’s Royal Academy of Music under a full scholarship and continued his studies at the University of North Texas under his beloved teacher and mentor, Vladimir Viardo.
Mr. Sanchez is also a dedicated educator. He taught piano, music history, and music theory at the celebrated Booker T. Washington High School for the Arts in Dallas from 1996-2003. He continues to teach piano privately in Dallas and is also in high demand as an accompanist.
He has collaborated with such artists as Jacques Zoon, Alexa Still, Marco Granados, Thomas Robertello, Rolf Smedvig and Ian Clarke. He can be heard on the following MSR label CDs, Rever en Couleurs with Lisa Garner Santa, Scree with Elena Yarritu and Ballade with Kara Kirkendoll Welch.
Terri Sanchez has earned prizes in many national flute competitions, including 2nd Prize Winner of the National Flute Association Young Artist Competition (along with the award for 'Best Interpretation of a Newly Commissioned Work'), 1st Prize Winner of the NFA Orchestral Audition Competition and Finalist in the Myrna W. Brown Artist Competition. In addition, she performed in Chicago as a Finalist in the Walfrid Kujala International Piccolo Competition and in Dallas as a winner of the Southern Methodist University Concerto Competition.
Ms. Sanchez is currently a doctoral candidate and Teaching Fellow at the University of North Texas. She received her master's degree from Southern Methodist University and her bachelor's degree from the University of Colorado at Boulder. Her principal teachers include Terri Sundberg, Kara Kirkendoll Welch, Debbie Baron, Alexa Still, Jean Larson Garver, Helen Blackburn and Leticia Ledesma. She is especially grateful to her two mentors, Claire Johnson and Gabriel Sanchez. Ms. Sanchez has been a flute instructor all over the DFW area and now teaches students at her home in Carrollton. (http://www.terriflute.com)
Terri Sundberg is Associate Professor of Flute at the College of Music-University of North Texas and a member of the Crested Butte Festival Chamer Orchestra and Opera Orchestra in Crested Butte, Colorado. Ms. Sundberg has been on the faculty of several international music festivals and has presented masterclasses and performed solo and chamber recitals across the United States and abroad, including concerts in China, Korea, South Africa, Mexico, Austria, Ireland, England, Kosovo, Brazil, and the Philippines. She has performed extensively in New York City as soloist, chamber and orchestral musician, including performances at Lincoln Center/Alice Tully Hall, Merkin Concert Hall and Carnegie Hall and toured the West Coast with the North Coast Chamber Ensemble. She has been a guest artist at flute festivals across the United States and has been a featured artist, teacher, and adjudicator at several National Flute Association conventions. She has played Principal Flute with the Orchestra Sinfonica de Mineria in Mexico City, the Eisenstadter Sommerakademie in Austria, the New Hampshire Music Festival Orchestra, and has also played with the Fort Worth Symphony, Dallas Opera, Oklahoma City Philharmonic, and the Metropolitan Ballet Orchestra. Ms. Sundberg has recorded solo and chamber CD recordings for the Klavier, Innova, and Capstone Record labels.
Professor Sundberg's students have won numerous professional orchestra and wind ensemble positions, university faculty and teaching positions, summer festival positions, fellowships, and prizes in competitions. Prizes include 1st prizes in the N.F.A. (National Flute Association) Orchestral Excerpt Competition, the N.F.A Piccolo Artist Competition, the N.F.A. Masterclass Competition, Mid-South Flute Competition, Upper Midwest Flute Competition, Oklahoma Collegiate Competition, Kentucky Young Artist Competition, and the Music Teacher's National Association Young Artist Competition.
Terri Sundberg holds degrees from Yale University and Lawrence Conservatory, and her principal teachers include Jeanne Baxtresser, Thomas Nyfenger, and Ernestine Whitman. She has great passion for her work on the Board of the Shropshire Foundation, an organization that brings music education and peace building programs to children in war torn countries.
