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LOS ANGELES CHILDREN’S CHORUS APPOINTS
(PASADENA, CA) September 24, 2007 – The renowned Los Angeles Children’s Chorus (LACC) has bolstered its artistic staff with the appointment of Mandy Brigham as Associate Artistic Director and Amy Brehm as Assistant Artistic Director. Both serve under Artist Director Anne Tomlinson, whose contract was extended in March through the 2011|2012 season. “Providing additional depth to our artistic staff with the appointments of Mandy Brigham and Amy Brehm is vital to the ongoing success of the chorus,” said Tomlinson. “They are exceptional and highly experienced musicians, and we are very pleased to have them serving in these important artistic capacities. With more than 260 choristers in our ranks – our largest chorus ever – and an intensive schedule of rehearsals, classes and performances each year, their outstanding leadership skills will help ensure that our organization’s artistic and educational endeavors operate in a seamless and cohesive fashion.” Associate Artistic Director Mandy Brigham is currently celebrating her sixth season with the Los Angeles Children’s Chorus and was promoted from the post of Assistant Artistic Director, which she assumed in 2005. She has been active as a choral conductor and vocal music teacher in Southern California for more than 25 years. In addition to conducting LACC’s Intermediate Choir, co-conducting LACC’s Apprentice Choir and serving as Assistant Conductor for LACC’s Concert Choir, Brigham has assisted in preparing choristers for numerous Los Angeles Opera productions, including La Boheme, Tosca, Die Frau ohne Schatten, Hansel and Gretel, and the world premiere of Grendel. She also prepared the children’s chorus for the Lord of the Rings Symphony with the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra, and for Carmina Burana with Vox Femina Los Angeles. In the summer of 2007, she assisted with the musical preparation for the world premiere of LACC’s commissioned opera, Keepers of the Night, conducted by Grant Gershon. Brigham studies voice privately with Kyra Humphrey, and she sings in the St. Charles Borromeo Choir under the direction of Paul Salamunovich. She holds a Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Southern California, where she also did graduate work as the recipient of a School of Music scholarship. Her teachers there included James Vail, Charles Hirt, and Morten Lauridsen. She resides in Granada Hills. Assistant Artistic Director Amy Brehm joined LACC’s artistic staff in 2005 as the conducting intern. This season she will serve as conductor of LACC’s Preparatory Choir and co-conductor of LACC’s Apprentice Choir. Additionally, she teaches Elementary Vocal/General Music with the Los Angeles Unified School District and is an adjunct faculty member at Pepperdine University’s Seaver College. President-Elect of the Kodály Association of Southern California, Brehm has completed Level II Kodály coursework. She is also a member of the American Choral Directors Association, Organization of American Kodály Educators, and California Music Educators Association. Brehm received her Bachelor of Science in Music Education from the Robert E. Cook Honors College at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. She taught instrumental and general music in the Fox Chapel and North Allegheny School Districts in the Pittsburgh area before moving to California. While in Pittsburgh, she also developed a curriculum for and taught musicianship classes at the Seton Center Suzuki School for Music. Brehm lives in Altadena. Los Angeles Children’s Chorus, founded in 1986 and noted throughout the country for its exceptional artistic quality and technical ability, frequently performs with such leading musical ensembles as the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra, the Los Angeles Master Chorale, the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra and The Pasadena Symphony. Under the artistic direction of Anne Tomlinson, LACC also assists the Los Angeles Opera by providing and training children for all of its opera productions that require children’s chorus or soloists. It produces two concerts of its own – a Winter Concert to be held in December at Pasadena Presbyterian Church and a Spring Concert to be held in June at the Ambassador Auditorium. Highlights of its 2007-08 season include the Los Angeles premiere of The Cataract of Mount Lu, Chen Yi’s critically acclaimed 1999 poem for children’s chorus, and the world premiere of Etch, composed by distinguished LACC alumna Caroline Park and commissioned by the choir. The chorus also performs in the LA Opera’s productions of La Boheme in November and December 2007 and Tosca in May and June 2008. In December 2007, LACC appears at the Walt Disney Concert Hall on the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Toyota Symphonies for Youth series and sings in four performances of Benjamin Britten’s War Requeim with the orchestra under the baton of Lorin Maazel. Other performances include Carmina Burana with the Long Beach Symphony conducted by Enrique Arturo Diemecke in April 2008, and a Chamber Singers appearance at the Los Angeles Bach Festival in October 2007. Capping the season, LACC tours to China in summer 2008 prior to the Beijing Olympics. LACC currently has 260 choristers from 60 communities across Los Angeles in five choirs: Concert, Chamber Singers, Intermediate, Apprentice and Preparatory. The intensive training program includes weekly or twice weekly rehearsals, and all children receive individual voice coaching and take comprehensive musicianship classes. LACC has toured Brazil, Great Britain, Italy, Australia, Germany, Austria, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Poland as well as many parts of the United States and Canada. It was featured in the Academy Award-nominated documentary film, “SING!,” which chronicles a year in the life of the choir and is shown periodically on PBS stations nationwide. Open auditions take place each June. For information on Los Angeles Children’s Chorus, call (626) 794231 or visit www.lachildrenschorus.org.
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