Music Director - Dr. TIFFANY LU

Conductor Tiffany Lu is Assistant Professor and Director of Orchestra at the University of Florida, has been appointed as Music Director of the Pierre Monteux School and Music Festival in Hancock, Maine. In the 2022-2023 concert season, she guest conducted with Symphony New Hampshire and Elgin Symphony Orchestra. From 2020-2022, she was Director of the Sewanee Symphony Orchestra and Assistant Professor of Orchestral Conducting at Sewanee University of the South. Prior to her current appointment, Lu served for five seasons as Associate Conductor of the Monteux School & Music Festival. 

Over seven years, Lu developed a diverse portfolio of work in the D.C.-Maryland-Virginia areas and Delaware. She held the position of Assistant Conductor with the Prince Georges’ Philharmonic (MD) from ‘19-’22, was Music Director of the Wilmington Community Orchestra for five seasons, and also Assistant and then Associate Conductor with Washington, D.C.’s Capital City Symphony from ‘15-’22, creating groundbreaking and creative programming. She was also selected as Conducting Fellow for the Allentown Symphony in 2019 and 2020. Other positions have included Music Director of the University of Maryland Repertoire Orchestra, cover conductor and principal librarian at the 2016 and 2017 National Orchestral Institute, and conductor with the DC Youth Orchestra Program and Annapolis Symphony Academy. Lu has guest-conducted the Symphony New Hampshire as well as the Millikin-Decatur Symphony Orchestra; and acted as cover conductor with the Elgin Symphony Orchestra, Symphony New Hampshire, Princeton Symphony Orchestra, Georgetown University Orchestra, and Cornell University Orchestra. Recently, she also served as lead producer on two recordings by the Virginia Symphony Orchestra as well as one with the Smithsonian Chamber Players. 

Lu maintains an active performing profile as an orchestral violinist, chamber music collaborator, and private violin teacher. Her doctoral research focused on new models in the orchestral education of undergraduate string players. Her primary conducting mentors have included Michael Jinbo, Jim Ross, and Jeffery Meyer.

Lu grew up in Tampa, FL and holds degrees from Princeton University, Ithaca College, and the University of Maryland.

Associate Conductor & Teaching Faculty - Kyle Ritenauer

New York City-based conductor Kyle Ritenauer is a rising presence in the classical music world. Kyle is on faculty at the Manhattan School of Music as a member of the conducting staff, Director of Orchestras at the John J. Cali School of Music at Montclair State University, and regularly serves as Cover Conductor for the National Symphony Orchestra (Washington, DC) and the New York Philharmonic.

Kyle’s 2023-24 season is headlined by a production of Francis Poulenc’s Dialogue des Carmélites with the Cali Opera Program at Montclair State University, where he serves as principal conductor. Also at the Cali School Kyle will lead a full season of concerts including Tchaikovsky’s Symphony no, 5, Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite (1919), Mahler’s Symphony no. 4, Bernstein’s Westside Story, Ravel’s Bolero, and will host guest artist Eric Whitacre. At the Manhattan School of Music, Kyle’s season is highlighted by a program featuring Copland’s Appalachian Spring alongside Wynton Marsalis’s A Fiddler’s Tale. Close to Kyle’s heart are the four world premiere commissions that will come to life with the MSM Percussion Ensemble programmed alongside Alberto Ginastera’s epic work for dramatic soprano and percussion orchestra, Cantata para America Magica.

Kyle is currently entering his second year as principal conductor of the Cali Opera Program and Director of the Cali Orchestra at Montclair State University. In his first season, Kyle led productions of Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi and Michael Ching’s Buoso’s Ghost. In the world of opera, Kyle has worked as associate conductor with organizations such as Opera de Montreal with Orchestre Mertopolitain, and the Des Moines Metro Opera with the Des Moines Symphony. Kyle has also premiered several productions of new operas and is very much at home with contemporary opera.

Throughout his career, Kyle has appeared as guest conductor with the Elgin Symphony, the Norwalk Symphony, the Hudson Valley Philharmonic, Symphony New Hampshire, and Carnegie Hall’s Ensemble Connect. In the role of cover conductor, Ritenauer has worked with the National Symphony Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic, the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre Métropolitain (Montreal), American Composers Orchestra, the Utah Symphony, the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, and the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. 

Well versed in the world of ballet, Kyle, while serving as assistant conductor of the Juilliard Orchestra, stepped in on a moment's notice to lead the orchestra and dancers through a successful performance of Stravinsky’s Le sacre du printemps at Lincoln Center. He has also led productions of Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker as guest conductor with the Norwalk Symphony Orchestra on numerous occasions (2018, 2019, and 2021). In the world of contemporary ballet Kyle served as principal conductor for productions of Richard Danielpour’s Cassandra’s Curse (world premiere) and Aaron J. Kernis’s On Distant Shores with RIOULT Dance NY at New York City’s Joyce Theater.

Ritenauer has led orchestras in a myriad of genres, including collaborations with Broadway superstars Kelli O’Hara and Matthew Morrison, and giants of contemporary music such as John Adams, Claire Chase and Richard Danielpour. He was particularly honored to conduct a Juilliard School workshop of American Symphony by Jon Batiste, former bandleader of the Stephen Colbert Late Show. Kyle recently worked with The Knights (New York City) to workshop ATTENTION! in collaboration with mandolinist and composer Chris Thile.

Kyle is a passionate teaching artist and holds a particular fondness for bringing classical music to underserved communities. Through the Bridge Arts Ensemble, an ensemble which he founded in 2015, Ritenauer curated interactive, grade-specific concerts and workshops for 50,000 students across the Adirondack region of New York State on a yearly basis.

Kyle has had the honor and priviledge to assist conductors such as Gustavo Dudamel, Gianandrea Noseda, David Robertson, Stanislav Kochanovsky, Carlos Miguel Prieto, Gemma New, Jader Bignamini, John Adams, and Marin Alsop among others. Kyle served for many year as the assistant conductor of New York City’s Camerata Notturna, a group that supported Kyle through a large part of his development as a young conductor.

Kyle is a student of David Robertson and a graduate of The Juilliard School’s Orchestral Conducting Program where, upon graduation, he received the Charles Schiff Conducting Prize for outstanding achievement. He also attended the Aspen Conducting Academy as a student of Robert Spano, and spent nine summers at The Pierre Monteux School studying with Michael Jinbo.

Guest Conducting Faculty - Dr. Chung Park

Chung Park is a nationally recognized conductor, music educator and editor. He was appointed conductor of the award-winning St. Olaf Orchestra starting in the fall of 2022 and St. Olaf College’s Philharmonia Orchestra for fall 2023. Dr. Park maintains an active schedule as a guest conductor on both the professional and educational levels, with engagements including the Sarasota Orchestra, Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra and student honor orchestras in Tennessee, North Dakota, North Carolina, Utah, Pennsylvania, Nevada, Washington State, Florida and Georgia. Dr. Park has given masterclasses at top institutions like the Gifted Music School in Salt Lake City and presents on string pedagogy and music education for teachers throughout the United States. Deeply engaged in the life of the American music education community, Dr. Park has given hundreds of clinics in schools throughout the United States for all levels and ensemble types. Internationally preeminent publisher Bärenreiter-Verlag released the Six Suites for Violoncello Solo by J.S. Bach transcribed for viola in a new edition prepared by Dr. Park in the spring of 2023.

Ensembles Dr. Park has led have received wide critical acclaim. Eminent composer Steve Reich described his conducting as “revelatory” and exclaimed after listening to a performance of his work Proverb – ”Now I know it can rock!” Critic Lawrence Johnson of the Miami Herald hailed his performance of Stravinsky’s Soldier’s Tale as “masterfully directed” and his conducting of Debussy’s Afternoon of a Faun as “lucid and refined.” The Frost Symphony Orchestra/Park recording of works by Alan Hovhaness on Centaur Records has received excellent reviews, most notably from Gramophone Magazine, who proclaimed that the disc provides “hours of listening enjoyment.” Classics Today gave the album “10/10” for both engineering and quality of performance. The Orlando Sentinel wrote that the UCF Symphony Orchestra produced “rich waves of sound” during their performance of Oklahoma! at the Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts.

Dr. Park comes to St. Olaf College most recently from the University of Central Florida, where he was Director of Orchestras and String Music Education. Prior appointments include positions at Appalachian State University, the Idaho State-Civic Symphony, Idaho State University, Frost School of Music at the University of Miami, as well as the faculties of the Universities of Chicago, North Dakota and Indiana University- South Bend. Park also served as conductor of the Western Michigan University Cham¬ber Orchestra and Opera Theater and as music director of youth orchestras in South Bend, IN; Grand Forks, ND; Orlando, FL and Miami, FL.

Dr. Park’s primary musical studies were completed at the Peabody Conservatory and the University of Miami, where he received a Doctor of Musical Arts Degree as a student of renowned conductor and composer Thomas Sleeper. Dr. Park was the recipient of the Presser Foundation Music Prize, the UM Alumni Association Student of Distinction Award and was inducted into the Pi Kappa Lambda music honors fraternity while at the University of Miami. Additionally, Park studied viola privately in Hannover, Germany with Hatto Beyerle of the Alban Berg Quartet. Dr. Park is an alumnus of the Monteux School & Music Festival ('99) where he studied with Michael Jinbo.

Further studies include the Robert Abramson Manhattan Dalcroze-Eurhythmics Institute, Aspen Music Festival, Pierre Monteux School, South Carolina Conductor’s Institute, Tafelmusik Institute in Toronto, Ontario, and the International Festival-Institute at Roundtop, Texas. Dr. Park has conducted in masterclasses for Marin Alsop, Andrey Boreyko, Per Brevig, Raymond Harvey, Catherine Comet, Pascal Verrot and Jorge Mester. 

A lifelong learner, Dr. Park works with Marianne Ploger (Associate Professor Emerita of Music Perception and Cognition, Vanderbilt University) on topics related to psycho-acoustics and Robert Gjerdingen (Professor Emeritus of Music Theory, Northwestern University) on the compositional techniques known as partimento to bolster his personal work and provide his students with the best possible pedagogies. Dr. Park strives to take full advantage of the opportunities afforded by his connection to a top liberal arts college, taking Latin I during his first year on faculty, with plans to take Latin II and many other courses in the years ahead. He is an ardent believer in the value of a liberal arts education, the breadth and depth it provides, and the possibilities inherent in this education to address the whole person. 

Dr. Park draws inspiration for his work from a wide variety of sources, including conductors such as Thomas Sleeper, John Eliot Gardiner and Simon Rattle. His favorite authors include His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Pema Chödrön, Thich Nhat Hanh and Wendell Berry. 

Artist-in-residence - eric kutz

Cellist Eric Kutz has captivated audiences across North America, Asia, and Europe. His diverse collaborations cut across musical styles, and have ranged from cellist Yo-Yo Ma to jazz great Ornette Coleman. He is active as a teacher, a chamber musician, an orchestral musician, and a concerto soloist. 

Mr. Kutz came to the University of Maryland School of Music in 2015, where he holds the Barbara K. Steppel Memorial Faculty Fellowship in cello, and performs as a member of the Left Bank Quartet. Previously he was a professor at Luther College, where he served on the faculty from 2002-2015, and prior to that, Mr. Kutz was the cellist of the Chester String Quartet for four years. The Quartet, called “one of the best and brightest of the country’s young string quartets” by the Boston Globe, was in residence at Indiana University South Bend. The Quartet gave two tours of Europe during Kutz’s tenure, and performed from coast to coast. 

Mr. Kutz is a founding member of the Murasaki Duo, a cello and piano ensemble formed at the Juilliard School in 1996. In 2017 the Duo gave its second tour to Europe and Asia. Advocates for new music, the Duo actively commissions new works, in addition to performing the classics. Hailed by New York Concert Review as having “an easy virtuosity, and an unusually high level of ensemble playing,” after its Carnegie Hall debut, the Duo regularly performs on chamber music series throughout the nation. 

The Duo’s second CD, “Duo Virtuoso,” was released on the Delos label in 2015, and was lauded by American Record Guide as “an interesting program, played to the hilt by both parties. These are two outstanding musicians.” The disc won the Violoncello Foundation’s 2016 Listeners’ Choice Award, chosen from among all cello CD’s released the previous year. The Duo’s debut compact disc appeared on the Centaur Records label; this disc was hailed by the Journal of the Atlanta Audio Society as “ebullient” and “brilliant throughout.” The Murasaki Duo’s most recent recording, released in 2017, features the complete cello/piano music of American composer Maria Newman. The Whole Note raved, “Kutz is simply outstanding in a quite dazzling and virtuosic work.”

As an orchestral musician, Mr. Kutz summers in Chicago as a member of the Grant Park Orchestra’s cello section. He has also appeared in the section of the National Symphony, the New York Philharmonic, the Minnesota Orchestra, and the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra. He has been principal cellist of the Houston Grand Opera Orchestra and the Juilliard Orchestra, and he has performed under the batons of Sir Georg Solti, Kurt Masur, and Seiji Ozawa, among many others. 

In 1997 Mr. Kutz traveled to the Tchaikovsky Conservatory in Moscow as a visiting artist, performing new chamber works by American composers. Other performance highlights include a tour of Germany and a concert in New York’s Avery Fisher Hall as part of Lincoln Center’s Mozart Bicentennial celebration. Mr. Kutz has premiered over two-dozen works, and has been broadcast live on WQXR and WNYC, both of New York City, WFMT Chicago, as well as nationally on PBS television’s Live from Lincoln Center. 

Mr. Kutz holds degrees from the Juilliard School and Rice University. He performs on a cello by Raffaele Fiorini (Bologna, 1877), and a bow by François Voirin (Paris, 1880).

Artist-in-residence - Alyssa Wang

Alyssa Wang is a passionate and versatile conductor, violinist, and composer. A recipient of the 2023 Solti Foundation Career Assistance Award and the 2022 St. Botolph Emerging Artist Award, Alyssa has enjoyed exploring diverse creative paths across several areas, with a focus on audience inclusivity and engagement. She is the Co-Founder, Artistic Director, and Principal Conductor of the Boston Festival Orchestra, which presents an annual summer festival, chamber music series, and opera project. In 2021, she joined the Boston Ballet as Assistant Conductor, conducting full ballet productions throughout the year and serving as Music Director for the annual Next Generation project with Boston Ballet School.

As a violinist, Alyssa has soloed with ensembles across the country and is the newest member musician of the Boston Chamber Music Society. She has been featured in numerous contemporary recording projects, such as Carlos Simon’s Grammy-nominated album, Requiem for the Enslaved (Decca), Nancy Galbraith’s Violin Concerto with Boston Modern Orchestra Project, and David Post’s Violin Sonata (Centaur). As a composer, she premiered her own violin concerto, Swept Away, with the Chamber Orchestra of Pittsburgh, who commissioned the work under the baton of Monteux Alumnus Eddie Leonard, in February 2023, and looks forward to future composition projects.

Alyssa earned her Bachelor’s Degree from Carnegie Mellon University under the tutelage of Andrés Cárdenes, and completed two Master’s Degrees in violin performance and conducting at the New England Conservatory where she studied with Malcolm Lowe. She is the winner of the Carnegie Mellon School of Music Concerto Competition and the Silbermann Chamber Music Competition, and is the recipient of the Pittsburgh Female College Association Prize, the Carnegie Mellon Women’s Award, the Senior Leadership Award, and the Presser Undergraduate Scholar Award. During her senior year at Carnegie Mellon she helped to run the Heritage Scholarship Campaign, which raised over $180,000 to start a substantial undergraduate merit scholarship for future School of Music students. Alyssa is also an Andrew Carnegie Scholar. Alyssa attended the Monteux School and Music Festival in 2016, where she studied with Michael Jinbo.

In addition to her life in music, Alyssa is an avid photographer, writer, and social dancer. 

Artist-in-residence - Kristen Sienkiewicz

Kristen Sienkiewicz is Professor of Horn and Chair of the Music Department at Austin Peay State University in Clarksville, TN. She is in frequent demand as a freelance and studio horn player in Nashville and the broader region, where she performs with orchestras from Alabama to Indiana and as co-principal horn in Middle Tennessee’s Gateway Chamber Orchestra. Prior to moving to Tennessee, Dr. Sienkiewicz taught and performed in Boston and throughout New England. She can be heard on recordings with the Bala Chamber Brass, a Boston-based brass quintet with international acclaim. Their three albums, Revealed, Deus Ex Machina, and Passports, feature premieres, commissions, and previously unrecorded works.

A devoted educator, Dr. Sienkiewicz has served on the faculties of Southern New Hampshire University and Gordon College, and has taught and conducted at Boston University. She has spent summers teaching at the Boston University Tanglewood Institute, the Sem Creative Arts Festival at Wyoming Seminary, and the Oklahoma Summer Arts Institute. She has provided masterclasses at the Tennessee Governor’s School for the Arts and has been a featured guest artist at the University of Vermont and the University of Evansville. At Austin Peay State University, Dr. Sienkiewicz instructs the horn studio and teaches in music theory and ear training realms.

Dr. Sienkiewicz earned her Doctor of Musical Arts in 2013 from Boston University under Eric Ruske, the first horn player in the school's history to have earned the degree. She completed her undergraduate work at the Eastman School of Music, where she received her Bachelor of Music in both Horn Performance and Music Theory and was awarded the school's prestigious Performer's Certificate. Dr. Sienkiewicz continued her studies in Boston at the New England Conservatory, earning both her Master of Music and a Graduate Diploma with a concentration in Music-in-Education. She attended the Pierre Monteux School for Conductors and Orchestra Musicians from 2005-2008. Dr. Sienkiewicz is a member of Pi Kappa Lambda, the National Music Honor Society.

Artist-in-residence - Fred Sienkiewicz

Trumpeter, pedagogue, and scholar Fred Sienkiewicz is Adjunct Assistant Professor of Musicianship at Vanderbilt University’s Blair School of Music and a performs as a regular member of both The Jackson Symphony and the Owensboro Symphony Orchestra. He has appeared with ensembles across the Mid-South, including the Nashville Symphony, Nashville Opera, Nashville Ballet, Knoxville Symphony, Gateway Chamber Orchestra, Orchestra Kentucky, Evansville Philharmonic, and INTERSECTION. As a soloist and recitalist, Sienkiewicz has appeared at colleges and universities throughout New England and the South, and has been featured at King’s Chapel in Boston, on Nashville Public Radio’s Live in Studio C, and at the International Trumpet Guild Conference.

A passionate exponent of musicianship training, Dr. Sienkiewicz teaches classroom ear training and solfège at Vanderbilt University, and is also among the first registered teachers of the Suzuki Method for trumpet. He has both in-person and online studios of Suzuki trumpet students and also helps students of all instruments on cultivating their musicianship skills through private solfège lessons. Sienkiewicz has previously coached chamber music and trumpet for the prestigious Boston University Tanglewood Institute, taught ear training and theory at Austin Peay State University, and served as trumpet faculty for Gordon College (MA), Keene State College (NH), and Plymouth State University (NH).

Sienkiewicz earned degrees at the University of Massachusetts (B.M.), the New England Conservatory of Music (M.M.), and Boston University (D.M.A.), studying trumpet in the studios of Eric Berlin, Charles Schlueter, Terry Everson, and Eric Ruske, interpretation with conductor Benjamin Zander, ear training and solfège with Dr. Gary Karpinski, Dr. Larry Scripp, and Marianne Ploger, and studied Suzuki pedagogy with Ann-Marie Sundberg. His doctoral dissertation from Boston University is the first English-language investigation of the life and music of Soviet Armenian composer Alexander Arutiunian.

Fred attended the Pierre Monteux School for Conductors and Orchestra Musicians from 2005-2008.