Santa Barbara Music Club

Member Type: Musician

Miriam Arichea , Pianist

Miriam Arichea, piano, is active as both musician and attorney, and earned her JD Degree from Duke University School of Law. She has been featured soloist in annual concerts with the Channel Islands Chamber Orchestra (CHICO), including performances of Brahms’ Piano Concerto No. 1, Dvorak’s Piano Concerto, Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, and Rachmaninoff’s Paganini Variations, and has been pianist in numerous chamber music ensembles throughout Southern California. She is currently Deputy District Attorney for Ventura County.

SBMC Concert Performances

DeAndre Simmons , Bass

DeAndre Simmons, bass, has gained international recognition for his wide-ranging repertoire of concert and operatic performances in the U.S. and Europe. A graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music, he also studied at the American Institute of Musical Studies in Graz, Austria. Honors accorded him include First Place Prize in both the George London Foundation Vocal Competition and the National Association of Teachers of Singing Competition, and he has been featured at Carnegie Hall in recitals and workshops, with the Opera Company of Philadelphia in the East Coast premiere of David DiChiera’s opera Cyrano, in The Beggar’s Opera by Benjamin Britten under Lorin Maazel, in Regina with the Pacific Opera Victoria, and with the Music Academy of the West Orchestra in both Aaron Copland’s Lincoln Portrait and the West Coast premiere of A Wedding by William Bolcom. He sang the Shepherd Boy in a recording of Tosca, performed in Aida, Carmen, Tosca, and Porgy & Bess, was a principal in the West Coast revival of A Bayou Legend by William Grant Still, and has sung for noted mezzo-soprano Florence Quivar (also his mentor). His singing credits in musicals including Showboat, Ain’t Misbehavin, The Wiz, Dream Girls, and Sweet Charity (in which he was also principal dancer), and his many television guest appearances and commercials include The Cosby Show and Sesame Street.

SBMC Concert Performances

Adelfos Ensemble

The Adelfos Ensemble was founded in 2004 as a men’s a-cappella ensemble and pursued that path until 2010, when it became a mixed voice choral ensemble. Temmo Korisheli took over direction of the group from Dr. Michael Eglin in 2008. Our goal is to offer the best of a-cappella and other choral music to audiences in the Santa Barbara area through live performances, radio broadcasts, and recordings. The group programs a broad repertoire of music spanning more than a millennium, from ancient chant and Renaissance motets to folksong arrangements and contemporary works. Adelfos Ensemble exists to explore the wide world of choral literature and, as the Santa Barbara News-Press observed, to “move right and left of center in the choral tradition.”

Temmo Korisheli

Director Temmo Korisheli is an active performer in many musical styles, especially medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque. Recent early-music engagements have included concerts with Ensemble Ciaramella in Los Angeles, Victoria, and New York, and with the Texas Early Music Project in Austin. He has been on staff with the Amherst Early Music Festival of New England for the past 22 years, where he has collaborated with many luminaries of the early-music world; he also serves as bursar of the Festival. Mr. Korisheli has appeared as soloist with ensembles such as the Los Angeles Baroque Orchestra, the New York Collegium under Andrew Parrott, and regional oratorio societies; as a guest artist with several university early music programs around the state and beyond; and sang for many years in the UCSB Cappella Cordina. He is a founding member of the UCSB Middle East Ensemble, sings frequently in the Opera Santa Barbara Chorus, and plays clawhammer banjo. This December, he celebrates 20 seasons of spreading Christmas cheer with the Santa Barbara Holiday Carollers. Mr. Korisheli is assistant music director at All Saints’-by-the-Sea Episcopal Church in Montecito. He holds the MA and PhD (ABD) degrees in historical musicology from UCSB, where he studied with Alejandro Planchart and William Prizer and where he presently supervises the Music Library.

Joey Malvinni

Joseph Malvinni, from Santa Barbara, began classical guitar studies at age four with his father. Already a virtuoso player, he has honed his performance level in masterclasses and recitals throughout the US and Europe, including the Chigiana (Siena, Italy), Mozarteum (Salzburg, Austria), Eliot Fisk International Seminar (Granada, Spain), Boston GuitarFest, Cleveland Guitar Festival, Baltimore Classical Guitar Society and Pepperdine University. He has played for some of the world’s greatest living maestros of the instrument, including Eliot Fisk, Oscar Ghiglia, Rene Izquierdo, Leo Brouwer, Manuel Barrueco, Meng Su, Benjamin Verdery, Jason Vieux, Phillip de Fremery, David Tanenbaum and Joaquín Clerch. Joseph was the winner for the Santa Barbara Youth Symphony Concerto Competition which led him to solo with the Santa Barbara Symphony at the Granada Theater. He won first prize at the Latin American Guitar Festival, second prize at the Performing Arts Scholarship Foundation, and second prize at the URI Guitar Festival; he was also a finalist at the Stroud Competition.At the young age of 10, Joey was a finalist at Boston GuitarFest and the Christopher Parkening Junior Competition. Joey is a graduate of Dos Pueblos High and was a member of the Engineering Academy. In his school, Joey was a founding member of the Coding club and led his coding team to win first place in an International Hack-a-thon.
Joey, currently a college freshman, is a proud recipient of the Parkening and Regents scholarship at Pepperdine University and studies classical guitar with Christopher Parkening. Joseph is honored to play for the Santa Barbara Music Club, whose scholarship has been a major supporter of his playing since he was seven years old.

SBMC Concert Performances

Lynnette McGee , Organist

Dr. Lynnette Ball McGee has forged an active career as an organ recitalist, teacher, collaborative musician, and conductor. She is presently on the organ faculty at California State University, Fullerton, and is Music Director at First Presbyterian Church, Fullerton, where she conducts the Kirk Choir, Kirk Handbell Choir, and is principal organist.

As an organ recitalist, Lynnette has performed numerous concerts, including performances at First Congregational Church of Los Angeles, Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall, United Church of Christ, Claremont, and First United Methodist Church, Pasadena. Internationally, performance venues include the famed churches in Paris of St. Sulpice, St. Eustache, La Trinité, and St. Séverin, as well as the Basilica of Santa Maria del Coro in San Sebastian, Spain. Her collaborative work includes performances with the Aliso Viejo Symphony, California Concert Artists, Redondo Beach Baroque Festival, Corona del Mar Baroque Festival, Southern California Brass Ensemble, and university choirs and orchestras of Chapman University, Concordia University, Biola University, and Saddleback College. Her work with organist Dr. Brenda King Durden may be heard on the disc, Double Fantasy: Organ Duets.

Lynnette earned her Doctorate of Musical Arts from Claremont Graduate University where she was awarded a Music Fellowship and the CE and Bertha Harsh Fellowship. She also holds degrees in organ performance from California State University, Fullerton, where she graduated with highest honors and was inducted into the Phi Kappa Phi and Pi Kappa Lambda honor societies. Her organ teachers include Dr. Carey Robertson, Esther Jones, Dr. Frances Nobert, and Dr. Leslie Spelman.

SBMC Concert Performances

Mariusz Adamczak , Pianist

MARIUSZ ADAMCZAK, pianist, has concertized in Austria, Belgium, Germany, Italy, Republic of Moldava, Morocco, the Netherlands, Romania, Spain, Switzerland, Uzbekistan and the United States, and has been prize winner in piano competitions in Greece, Italy, Poland, and Romania. As concerto soloist, he has been featured with major European orchestras, and as chamber music pianist he has appeared with the Camerata, Consonante, and Gaudeamus Quartets, the Cracow Royal Quartet, and the Camerata Vistula and Varsovia Ensembles. He has been invited to present concerts at national and international festivals, including the “Fryderyk Chopin Music Festivals” in Ghent (Belgium) and in Gaming (Austria) the “Forum of Young Pianists” in Darmstadt (Germany), the “Young Pianists Interpretations” in the Chopin Festival in Valldemossa (Mallorca), and the “Floralia Music Festival in Warsaw (Poland), and has recorded live studio concerts for the BBC and Polish Radio.

Born in Poland, Mr. Adamczak graduated from the Fryderyk Chopin State School of Music in Warsaw, receiving the Artistic Scholarship from the Polish Ministry of Culture and Arts, graduated with distinction from the Cracow Academy of Music, and also studied at the National University of Music in Bucharest, Romania. In 2014 he instituted his private piano class, from which his students have been awarded prizes in national and international piano competitions.

SBMC Concert Performances

John Villar , Composer

John Villar, composer, has had his instrumental and vocal works performed in venues across the United States, ranging from the Hammer Theatre Center in San Jose, CA to the National Opera Center in New York City, the latter featuring the premiere of his Serenata bajo la luna performed by mezzo-soprano Anna Tonna, guitarist Francisco Roldán, and pianist Max Lifchitz. John Villar is a graduate of the Thornton School of Music at USC, having studied there with Ellis Kohs and Robert Linn, and thereafter studying privately with William Kraft and Mario Pelusi. His compositions range in scope from solo pieces to works for large orchestra, and in style from atonal to tonal. He is currently at work on a set of symphonic variations.

SBMC Concert Performances

Steven Gross , Hornist

Steven Gross, French horn, is UCSB Professor of Horn and Head of the Wind, Brass, and Percussion Area. His renowned concert and teaching career worldwide has featured solo and ensemble performances in Europe, China, Russia, East Africa, and the U.S., as well as positions with distinguished symphony orchestras, including 24 years as Principal Horn of the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra. He has recorded 6 solo CDs, all to impressive critical acclaim. Please view StevenGrossHorn.com.

SBMC Concert Performances

Robert Cassidy , Pianist

Pianist Robert Cassidy has performed in solo and collaborative recitals and with orchestra throughout the United States and Canada, and has received critical acclaim for his performances and recordings of both solo piano repertoire and chamber music. He received his Bachelors and Masters Degrees in Piano Performance from the Manhattan School of Music, where he studied with Solomon Mikowsky, Constance Keene, and Marc Silverman, and subsequently studied with Menahem Pressler at Indiana University. He holds a Doctor of Arts Degree in Piano Chamber Music and Accompanying/Piano Performance from Ball State University, where he studied with Robert Palmer.

Dr. Cassidy has appeared in such venues as New York City’s Merkin and Weill Halls, the Lyceum in Alexandria (VA), Santa Barbara City College (CA), and the Banff Centre for the Arts in Alberta, Canada. He has also been presented on radio stations WFMT in Chicago (Dame Myra Hess Series), WCLV and WCPN in Cleveland, and WNYC in New York (Around New York). A strong advocate of contemporary music, Dr. Cassidy has premiered works by the American composers David Noon and Keith Fitch. He is the pianist in the Cleveland-based Almeda Trio and regularly performs chamber music with members of The Cleveland Orchestra.

He has served on the keyboard faculties at Cleveland State University and The Cleveland Music Settlement, and is also a former faculty member of New York University, the University of Indianapolis, the 92nd Street Y School of Music (New York), Marian College (Indiana), Queens College Preparatory Division (New York), and Indiana University-Purdue University-Indianapolis (IUPUI), among others.

An active and highly sought-after teacher and chamber music coach, Dr. Cassidy is in demand for master classes, workshops and lectures, private teaching, and adjudication. He has maintained a private studio at The Music Academy of the West since August, 2014.

SBMC Concert Performances