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Kids Zone
Staff


The Boychoir Academy's faculty is carefully selected to be supportive, creative, and enthusiastic individuals who work to pursue the mission of the Boychoir Academy.The academic faculty is selected to cultivate enthusiasm for learning and to develop critical thinkers who can feel well-prepared in the most demanding high schools. The Boychoir's Music Staff is composed of professional musicians from the San Francisco Bay Area. They use their experience in boychoir vocal technique, Kodaly and Orff methodology to develop exceptional musicians.


 

Kevin Fox

Founding Artistic Director
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Mr Fox has been involved with boys choirs since the age of eight. He holds degrees in Music (with Honors) and Economics from Wesleyan University, Connecticut, where he studied voice with tenor Wayne Rivera, conducting with Mel Strauss, composing with Neely Bruce, and received the Lipsky Prize for outstanding scholarship in choral studies. He studied music at Oxford University, England, with Edward Higginbottom, and choral conducting at Westminster Choir College in Princeton with Jim Jordan and Vincent Metallo. He has served as Proctor for the American Boychoir, working with Jim Litton and Craig Denison, and has sung with the choirs of Trinity Church in New Haven, Trinity Church in Princeton, American Bach Soloists, the Philharmonia Baroque Chorale, and the Grace Cathedral Choir of Men and Boys in San Francisco, where he also worked as Interim Assistant Choirmaster.
Under his direction, the Pacific Boychoir Academy has grown from six to 120 choristers in four treble choirs and one alumni choir. Working with the PBA staff, Mr. Fox has developed a proprietary music reading and music theory training program comparable to university-level music classes. In 2002, Mr. Fox developed a business plan for the choir school, a comprehensive document compiling the ideas of staff and board members in preparation for the opening of the school in the fall of 2004.
Mr. Fox has been on over 30 tours with boys choirs to almost all 50 states including Alaska and Hawai'i, as well as to Brasil, Argentina, Taiwan, China, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, France, England, Wales, Ireland, Italy, the Czech Republic, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Canada, and Spain.
Drawing on his experience as math teacher for Cathedral School for Boys in San Francisco, Mr. Fox teaches 7th nd 8th grade math to the PBA middle school students.

Marcia Ginsburg

Head of School
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For ten years, Mrs. Ginsburg worked as a language arts teacher and librarian and, later, as Lower Head of School at Grace Cathedral School for Boys (CSB) in San Francisco. During this time, she designed a new library from the ground up. In addition, she and her husband helped build Music@Menlo, a chamber festival in which children and pre-professional conservatory students work with world-class professional musicians. Currently, Mrs. Ginsburg is raising funds to start a preschool at the CSB for children of the Tenderloin district of San Fransciso. A Minneapolis, Minnesota, native, Mrs. Ginsburg was educated at Stanford University and the University of California, Berkeley. She has served on the Board of Directors for the CSB and the PBA.

Pamela Weimer

Academic Dean; Managing Director
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Mrs Weimer has been a teacher for over 15 years. In addition to teaching classes in psychology and child development at the junior college level, she has taught in the Oakland Unified School District, in private schools in Oakland, and most recently has been teaching fifth grade at Cathedral School for Boys in San Francisco. Mrs Weimer has served as interim Upper School Head for St Paul's School in Oakland. She has an MA in Psychology and Child Development from San Francisco State University, and a BA in Psychology from UCLA.
Mrs Weimer's business background is extensive, working the restaurant and building fields. This experience has contributed to her success as Managing Director of the after school program of the PBA, a position she has held for five years. Mrs. Weimer teachers science and math at the PBA middle school.

Christopher Kula

Associate Music Director, Latin
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Christopher Kula has been involved in the world of boychoirs and boychoir training since he was a boy himself at the age of seven. His association with the PBA is longstanding: each year he directs the camp Staff Choir, while presently directing the Cantori/Trouvere and Continuum groups and teaching foreign language to pupils of the PBA Day School program. He has served as music director of many professional, community, college and church choirs, including the Portland Symphonic BoyChoir, Portland Pro Musica, the Portland State University Women's Chorus, and the Choir of St. Mark's Parish, Portland. He has sung frequently as a choral professional, with Cantores in Ecclesia, Cappella Romana, Choral Cross-Ties and other ensembles. Mr. Kula received his Bachelors Degree in Philosophy from St. Mary's College, Moraga, and studied music at the undergraduate and graduate levels at the University of Southern California, San Jose State University and Portland State University. He is Artistic Director of the newly-formed Pacific Collegium.

Brenna MacIlvaine

Fourth Grade
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Ms. MacIlvaine grew up in Oakland and moved to Tacoma, Washington, where she graduated from Pacific Lutheran University with her bachelor's degree in education. Previous to taking on the PBA's new fourth grade class, she worked as a second grade teacher in Tacoma. She has a special interest in geological sciences and drama. Mrs. MacIlvaine grew up doing theater with the Lamplighters in San Francisco and has studied voice for ten years. Her favorite food is mint chocolate chip ice cream.

Mateal Lovaas

Humanities
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Ms. Mateal graduated from Middlebury College where she completed her bachelor's degree in International Studies with concentrations in Political Science, African Studies, and French. Her senior thesis pulled from her field work in Senegal, where she traveled on a fully funded research grant.
Ms. Mateal has traveled or lived in almost 40 countries in Africa, Europe, and the Americas, and speaks four languages. She has worked as a college writing tutor, professional editor, homeschool teacher, play therapist for children with cognitive disabilities, and in positions in the field of international development
and diplomacy. On a volunteer basis, Ms. Mateal has served a chapter president of the Student Global AIDS Campaign.
Her activism stems from the four years her parents lived in Cape Town, South Africa, working on income generation projects with HIV-positive women. Given her knowledge of this area of the world, Ms. Mateal hopes to integrate South African material into the PBA curriculum next year as the boys prepare for their trip there in the summer of 2009.

 

Brandon Adams

Associate Music Director
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Brandon Adams is a choral director, voice teacher, and piano accompanist with over seven years of experience with Elementary and Middle School choirs. A native Texan, he sang for three years with the Singing Boys of Houston, and he attended the Vocal Music Department of the Houston School of Performing and Visual Arts. Brandon received an A. B. from Dartmouth College and a Masters in Choral Conducting from Indiana University with a Minor in Vocal Pedagogy. He has been in the Bay Area for thirteen years. Currently, he sings with the San Francisco Symphony Chorus, and he has also sung with Volti, Pacific Collegeum, and the Oakland Symphony Chorus (for whom he served for two years as an assistant conductor). Brandon has also been a guest conductor for the Silicon Valley Symphony Chorus, the Vocal Director for San Francisco Opera Guild's Opera Day Camp, and the Choir Director at Montclair Presbyterian Church in Oakland. Brandon is also a frequent Musical Director at a number of Bay Area regional theatres, including 42nd St Moon, Marin Theatre Company, Center Rep and Woodminster Summer Musicals. Currently, he is the choral director at the Urban School of San Francisco, where he has been teaching for over six years. Mr. Adams directs the PBA's Intermezzi choir.

Stella Brown

Associate Music Director
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Mrs Brown is one of the founding music teachers of the PBA. She has a Masters in Early Childhood Music Education with an emphasis in Kodaly techniques from the Hartt School of Music, University of Hartford, Connecticut. For the past ten years, she has taught music to both adults and children in various settings, as well as piano pedagogy at the University of Montemorelos in Mexico. She currently teaches music in the Contra Costa Unified School District, conducts the Minstrel choir and directs the Orff training for the Boychoir.

Marcia Roy

Assistant Music Director
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Ms Roy is a founding member of the Pacific Boychoir staff. She has a Masters degree in Music from Cal State Hayward, and has been the organist at Montclair Presbyterian Church in Oakland for 15 years. Formerly, Ms Roy served as choral conductor at Holy Names High School in Oakland and at the San Francisco Girls Chorus. She has worked with professional boychoirs in the Bay Area for the past 20 years and has a large active studio for private piano students.
Ms. Roy serves as Music LIbrarian for the PBA's 400+ titles, as well as school music instructor, assistant director of the Intermezzi group, and accompanist.

Fernando Tarango

Consultant for Student Affairs; PE instructor
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After graduating from the American Boychoir School in Princeton, NJ, where Fernando first met Kevin Fox, he was soon asked to be a summer camp counselor for the legendary Camp Gualala of 1999. Fernando has been working with the PBA summer camps ever since and is now the Summer Camp Director. Fernando holds a Bachelors of Music in Vocal Performance from the University of Michigan School of Music, where he sang with the world renowned Michigan Men's Glee Club, and the a cappella subset, the Friars. Fernando currently resides in Oakland, where he continues to sing, write music, and play guitar in the Bay Area.

Joseph Lim

Assistant Director
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For the past four years, Mr. Lim has taught general music, chorus, and instrumental music at Tassajara Hills Elementary in Danville. Prior to joining the PBA, he accompanied for and toured with other well-known Bay Area children's choirs, including Contra Costa Children's Chorus in Walnut Creek and Danville Girls Chorus. He currently serves as Choirmaster and Organist at Grace Episcopal Church in Martinez. Mr. Lim is the choir manager and accompanist for the Cantori/Trouvere groups.

Kevin Ambrogi photo

Kevin Ambrogi

Marketing Coordinator & Concert Manager
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Kevin Ambrogi plans, promotes concerts and appearances and coordinates marketing and advertising for the Pacific Boychoir Academy. He also edits the monthly PBA e-newsletter and concerts programs. Kevin has more than five years of experience working in special event coordination, marketing and communications, plus a five-year early career as a professional jazz musician and music educator in Europe. Kevin has helped manage program and special events for the Cultural Services of the French Embassy in New York, where he administered the French American Cultural Exchange Programs. Before that he worked as a project coordinator for Lille 2004 European Capital of Culture in France. Kevin earned his bachelor's degree in Business administration and Applied Languages - French, English and German - and his master's degree in Multicultural Management and International Cooperation from the Charle-De-Gaulle University in Lille, France. He is also a certifed fundraising professional by the European Fundraising Association (EFA), a certifed associate in project management (CAPM) by the American Project Management Institute (PMI) and holds a master's degree in Jazz performance and composition from the National Conservatory of Lille, France. Contact Kevin if you would like to pitch concert venues, marketing ideas, or your own volunteer skills.

Jo Ford

Choir school Art
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Jo Ford is an award-winning art instructor who has taught all over the Bay Area. She received her master's degree from the University of California, Berkeley in 2002, and has been a fine arts professional since receiving her bachelor's degree from the San Francisco Art Institute in 1987. Mrs. Ford has served on the San Francisco Art Institute's Artists Committee as both curator and Master of Ceremonies and continues to be involved in supporting and promoting other artists of all ages. Most recently she has worked on a "California History" project at the Oakland Art Gallery. Mrs. Ford lives and works (primarily in oils) in Oakland with her husband, a musician/composer and producer, and two children. She is delighted to be a faculty member of the Pacific Boychoir Academy.

Daniel Chaffey

German
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Daniel Chaffey received a double BA in German Languages and Literature and Modern European and U.S. History as well as an MA in German Studies from California State University Long Beach. He has taught German at the elementary, middle/high school, university, and adult learner level. In 2000 he was awarded a Fulbright Teacher's Assistant Grant and taught English at the Herbartgymnasium in Oldenburg, Germany. Since returning from Germany, he has continued teaching German at various schools including CSULB, The Goethe Institute in San Francisco, and Diablo Valley College. Music and film play an important role in Mr. Chaffey's life, and he incorporates their use into his classroom whenever possible. Though not a singer himself, Mr. Chaffey has toured the U.S. and Europe with various bands, and passes time on the freeway singing along to his favorite songs.

 

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