Methow Valley Chamber Music Festival

Lee Duckles, cello

Lee Duckles, Principal Cello and soloist with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, received his early training in the San Francisco Bay Area. He received his degree in performance from the University of Illinois and participated in post - graduate masterclasses with cellists Mstislav Rostropovich, Janos Starker, and Harvey Shapiro.

Lee Duckles An active chamber music performer, he has appeared in music festivals in British Columbia, California, Colorado, Washington, Alaska, and South Korea. Since the 1980’s, he has been the Principal Cello at the Cabrillo Music Festival of Contemporary Music in California where he has premiered a number of works for cello and orchestra and worked with composers Aaron Copland, Hans Werner Henze, Lou Harrison, Phillip Glass, A.j. Kernis, and John Adams.

In Vancouver, Mr. Duckles was a founding member of the Vancouver New Music Society, the Masterpiece Music Series, and the contemporary music ensemble “Days, Months, & Years to Come”. He continues an association with the Vancouver Academy of Music, the University of British Columbia, the Encore Piano Trio, and the Vancouver Chamber Players. He is currently the President of the Vancouver Cello Club.

Mr. Duckles has recorded for the CBC, both as performer and arranger, the Musical Heritage Society of America, Heliodor Records, and Skylark Records with the salon music ensemble, Viveza.

Mr. Duckles owns a power drill and an Acer Beni Komachi,. In 2008, he had no cavities.

Mara Gearman, viola

While still early in her career, violist Mara Gearman is already an accomplished player with extensive experience in both orchestral and chamber music settings. She regularly performs with the chamber groups American String Project and Seattle Chamber Players, and has collaborated with such prestigious performers as Ani Kavafian, Peter Wiley, Vladimir Feltsman, and Dale Clevenger, the legendary principal horn of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. She is also a founding member of the Barston String Quartet as well as Trio Tara with pianist Oksana Ezhokina and Laurie DeLuca, clarinet.

Gearman has held or been awarded a number of orchestral appointments, including principal viola (at age twenty) under maestro Rossen Milanov, and principal viola at the Kansas City Symphony and at the Oregon Symphony under music director James DePriest. Currently she is the second desk violist for the Seattle Symphony Orchestra under maestro Gerard Schwarz.

As a solo performer Gearman has won solo awards at the Primrose and Tertis International Viola Competitions, performing viola solos ranging from American composers Alan Shulman and Derek Bermel to Hungarian composer Miklos Rozca.

A graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music, her primary teachers included Roberto Diaz, Pinchas Zukerman, and Karen Tuttle, as well as additional study in Canada, Germany, Holland, and Switzerland with Nobuko Imai, Barbara Westphal, and Gerard Causse.

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Daron Aric Hagen, Composer-In-Residence

The music of Daron Aric Hagen is notable for its warm lyricism, but his style defies easy categorization. While his works demonstrate fluency with a range of twentieth century compositional techniques, those procedures are secondary to his exploitation and expansion of the possibilities of tonal harmony, giving his music an immediacy that makes it appealing to a wide spectrum of audiences. His music is broadly eclectic, drawing on a Don Hagen variety of styles as diverse as jazz, Broadway, Latin music, Italian verismo, and soft rock. While Hagen works with consistent success in a number of genres, the foundation of his oeuvre is the art song, a form that highlights his melodic and dramatic talents, exemplified by "Dear Youth" (based on American Civil War stories) and "Songs of Madness and Sorrow." His teacher Ned Rorem famously stated of him, "Daron is music."

Born in Milwaukee in 1961, Hagen began his musical studies at the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music, continuing his education at the University of Wisconsin, the Curtis Institute of Music, and the Juilliard School. Hagen's teachers include such prominent composers as Ned Rorem, Joseph Schwantner, David Diamond, Witold Lutoslawski, and Leonard Bernstein. Already known for song cycles composed in the 1980s that demonstrated his gift for lyrical and dramatically astute text setting, Hagen turned to opera with "Shining Brow" (1990-1992), a musical evocation of the life of architect Frank Lloyd Wright, with a libretto by poet Paul Muldoon. Other stage works include "Vera of Las Vegas" (a "nightmare cabaret opera"), "Bandanna" (an opera scored for wind ensemble, loosely based on Othello), and he has received a commission from the Seattle Opera for a new work, "Amelia." Other commissions include pieces for the New York Philharmonic, the Curtis Institute of Music, the University of Wisconsin, the King's Singers, pianist Gary Graffman, violinist Jaime Laredo, and cellist Sharon Robinson.

In the late '80s and throughout the '90s, Hagen gained a reputation as an enthusiastic mentor, teaching at Princeton University, the Curtis Institute, Bard College, New York University, and the City College of New York. Hagen's numerous honors and awards include the Bearns Prize from Columbia University, the Charles Ives Fellowship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, Opera America's "Next Stage" Award, a Rockefeller Foundation Grant, and the Barlow International Composition Prize for Chamber Music.

Simon James, violin

Australian violinist Simon James performed around the world as a soloist and chamber musician. He has been a member of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, Mostly Mozart Orchestra, and is currently the Second Assistant Concertmaster of the Seattle Symphony Orchestra. In addition, he serves as concertmaster of the Seattle Chamber Orchestra and has performed as guest concertmaster of the Vancouver Symphony and the Bolshoi Theatre’s production of Swan Lake.

Mr James is a graduate of the Manhattan School of Music where his teachers include Erick Friedman and Syzmon Goldberg. While attending the Manhattan School he performed in the Master Classes of Henryk Szeryng, Joseph Gingold, the Tokyo Quartet, the American Quartet and members of the Beaux Arts Trio.

Mr James has performed as soloist with the Seattle Symphony on many occasions, and has acted as Concertmaster on many occasions. He has also lead the orchestra of the Seattle Opera in recent productions of “Der Rosenkavalier”, “La Boeheme”, “Julius Ceasar”, the “Flying Dutchman”, ‘Iphegenie en Tauride”, “I Paggliaci”, “I Puritani” and “Aida”

Mr James is an active teacher with a large studio of gifted students and is the newest addition to the highly regarded “Coleman Studio”.

Mr. James is an active recitalist, chamber musician, and recording artist. In addition to countless motion picture sound tracks, he has recorded concerti with the Seattle Symphony, the Premiere of the Richard Englefield violin concerto with the Bratislava Radio Symphony and several acclaimed chamber music albums with Harpist Juliet Stratton and clarinetist Sean Osborn. He is married to Flutist Erin James and is the proud father of Felicity and Bronwyn James. He performs on a violin made by J.B.Vuillaume made in Paris in 1860.

Kevin Krentz, Artistic, Director, Cello

Kevin is a native of Atlanta, Georgia. Although he began his musical life as a cellist at 12, he soon dropped the cello to sing for the rest of his youth. He only then decided to devote his energies to the cello at the age of 20 after finally seeing the instrument's potential.

Kevin Krentz He then studied with Gary Hardie at Baylor University where he was three quarters of the way through a pre-med program. Kevin made quick progress and thereafter studied with Florian Kitt of the Hochschule in Vienna, was assistant to Owen Carman, at Michigan State University and The Meadowmount School for Strings, and was assistant to Toby Saks at the University of Washington. Kevin has performed in Masterclass for Janos Starker, Matt Haimovitz, Paul Katz, and Timothy Eddy. From his late start, Kevin has gone on to perform throughout the U.S. as well as Austria, Italy, Canada and Great Britain as recitalist and soloist.

In 2000 Kevin was a winner at the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition, with his clarinet, piano, and cello trio, In Flight 3. With Finisterra, Kevin was a winner in the 2005 Greenlake National Chamber Music Competition where they also won the Audience Prize. In 2004 Finisterra won the Silver Medal at the Zinetti International Chamber Music Competition in Verona, Italy against ensembles from every continent and 20 countries. In 2006, Finisterra was invited to stay in London for extensive collaboration with the famed Florestan Trio. In addition to his chamber music credits Kevin has also won several concerto competitions and the Ladies Musical Club of Seattle Award/Tour Competition. He has been featured on NPR as well as KING FM's Live! By George program and has performed throughout the U.S. to critical acclaim.

Kevin was Assistant Principal Cellist for maestro Gustav Meijer in the Lansing Symphony Orchestra and has performed with the prestigious Chamber Music Ann Arbor Spring Festival as well as the Seattle Chamber Music Festival and the Methow Valley Music Festival among others. In 2008, he was substitute cellist for the reknown Seattle Chamber Players Icebreaker IV festival.

Kevin is very active as a recording studio session player in Seattle where he can be heard on many major films, as well as commercials, video games, and CD’s from Dave Matthews Band to Evanescence. Kevin can also be heard as the solo cellist on the upcoming movie, Bordertown, starring Antonio Banderas, Jennifer Lopez, and Martin Sheen. Sought after for his ability to improvise his own parts, Kevin can be heard on many different projects. Since 2007, Kevin has been Artistic Director of the Methow Valley Chamber Music Festival.

Neil Miskey, Viola

Currently Principal Violist with both the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra and the CBC Radio Orchestra, Neil began his career in Vancouver after winning first prize in the CBC National Competition. He has appeared as soloist with the VSO and the CBC Orchestra, and has been featured on CBC radio broadcasts. A native of Edmonton, he received music performance degrees from the University of Alberta and the University of Michigan, and also studied at the Banff Centre. He has appeared as a guest artist with the Ottawa Chamber Music Festival, Festival Vancouver, the San Juan Summer Music Festival, and also in various groups in Vancouver.

Yuri Namkung, violin

Violinist Yuri Namkung was born in Seattle, Washington. Her concert debut came at the age of nine with the Northwest Chamber Orchestra. In 1995, she was invited by Gerard Schwarz to perform with the Seattle Symphony and was immediately re-engaged for a second performance in 1996. Since then, she has been performing throughout the United States and in September of 2002, made her European debut with the Zürich-Tonhalle Orchestra in Switzerland under the direction and invitation of David Zinman.

In May of 2004 she joined violinist Cho-Liang Lin in a performance of the Bach Double Concerto with the Seattle Symphony and again in May of 2005 with the Orchestra of St.Luke’s at Alice Tully Hall under conductor Li Jian. This concert was presented by the Musicians Emergency Fund, of which Miss Namkung was awarded the MEF Junior Award. In September of 2007, she appeared in concert as an MEF award recipient with Li Jian and Kyoko Takezawa at Carnegie Hall’s Zankel Hall.

Festival appearances include La Jolla Chamber Music Society’s SummerFest (CA), Music@Menlo (CA), Ravinia Festival-Steans Institute (IL), Verbier (Switzerland), Mozarteum Academy (Salzburg), Music Mountain (VT), Perlman Music Program NY), Ottawa Chamber Music Festival, and the Virginia Arts Festival. Summer 2008 marks visits to Hong Kong as a member of the Matrix Music Collaborators in New York and to Venezuela as a representative of the New England Conservatory where she will work with members of the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra under the direction of incoming LA Philharmonic Music Director, Gustavo Dudamel. A member of the Moët Trio, the trio is in professional residency at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston.

Recent and upcoming performances include the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., Boston’s Jordan Hall, Old South Meeting House, and recitals throughout Boston and Philadelphia. The San Francisco ClassicalVoice had this to say of them: “Separately and together, these are musicians you will want to hear repeatedly in coming years.”

She received her B.A. at Columbia University in May of 2005. Being a participant of Columbia's Joint Program with the Juilliard School, she completed her graduate studies at Juilliard with Cho-Liang Lin and Donald Weilerstein in 2006. She currently studies with Donald Weilerstein and Miriam Fried in the Graduate Diploma Program at the New England Conservatory.

Ni Tao, cello

Ni Tao was born on October 13, 1984 in Beng Bu, AnHui Province, China. He began his cello studies with his father at the age of eight, and a year later, he was enrolled in the Shanghai Conservatory Preparatory Division, where he studied with Professor Liu Mei Juan.

Ni Tao made his first visit to North America in 1996 attending summer music workshops at Indiana University (Bloomington) and the Banff Centre in Alberta, Canada. He came as a student to the first Morningside Music Bridge in 1997, and stayed at Mount Royal College Conservatory studying with John Kadz. His other teachers include Laurence Lesser, Timothy Eddy, and most recent, Ronald Leonard at the Colburn School. Tao was also a participant in various festivals including Meadowmount, Ravinia Festival (Steans Institute for Young Artists), and the New York String Seminar in Carnegie Hall.

Tao had much success in competitions such as winning Johannsen String Competition, Pasadena Showcase Competition, Hudson Valley Competition, New England Conservatory Concerto Competition, as well as getting top prizes at Tchaikovsky Competition for young musicians, Kingsville Competition, Klein String Competition, Corpus Christi Concerto Competition and Hams Competition.

He has soloed with many orchestras including Boston Symphony Orchestra, Arlington Symphony, Brockton Symphony, Concord Orchestra, Calgary Philharmonic, Shanghai Philharmonic, Sendai Orchestra, Shanghai Opera, Colburn Orchestra, and Calgary Youth Orchestra, amount many others. As an experienced chamber musician, Tao has collaborated with such artists as Itzak Perlman, Josef Silverstein, Ani Kavafian, Anton Kuerti, Kim Kashkasian, James Dunham, Donald Weilerstein, Frank Cohen, Miriam Fried and Robert Chan.

Other performing highlights include: performing for Jiang Zemin, President of China in Calgary, in recital at The Corcoran Gallery in Washington, D.C., featured in a national CBC Radio Broadcast as part of the Mount Royal College 90th Anniversary Series, a hip hop transcription of Vivaldi a minor cello concerto with members of Boston University Orchestra, as well as featured in Canada’s National Post newspaper as a “Leader of Tomorrow”.

Tao is currently a section member of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra.

George Shangrow, Host

A musician with a broad range of skills, Conductor and Music Director George Shangrow founded the Seattle Chamber Singers in 1969 and Orchestra Seattle (formerly the Broadway Symphony) in 1979. Mr. Shangrow received his academic musical training at the University of Washington, where he studied conducting, baroque performance practice, harpsichord, and composition. He began his professional conducting career at age 18 and has concentrated his musical efforts these 37 years with Orchestra Seattle and the Seattle Chamber Singers. He has also appeared as guest conductor with the Seattle Symphony, Northwest Chamber Orchestra, Tacoma Opera, Rudolf Nureyev and Friends, East Texas University Opera, Oregon Symphony and the Sapporo (Japan) Symphony. Shangrow particularly relishes bringing newly composed works to the stage and has conducted world premieres of many operas, orchestral, and choral works.

As an educator, Mr. Shangrow has taught music history, theory, and composition at Seattle University, Seattle Community College, and Seattle Conservatory of Music. He enjoys lecturing on musical topics and can be frequently heard at musical events and gatherings throughout the Northwest.

Mr. Shangrow performs as pianist and harpsichordist in partnership with flutist Jeffrey Cohan as the Cohan-Shangrow Duo. He has toured Europe several times as keyboardist and conductor. Shangrow has appeared in concert on the piano and harpsichord with many noted soloists and ensembles such as El Trio Grande, the Kronos String Quartet, Northwest Chamber Orchestra, the Seattle Symphony, and enjoyed performing at the 2004 Orcas Island Chamber Music Festival in Mozart’s g minor Piano Quartet. He has recorded with London Records, Voyager Records, edel America, and Sonic Window Records. Seattle-area music lovers also recognize Mr. Shangrow as former announcer and host of the Live! ByGeorge radio program on Classical KING-FM.

Craig Sheppard, piano

The Donald E. Petersen Endowed Professor of Piano at the School of Music of the University of Washington in Seattle, pianist Craig Sheppard has maintained a strong and enduring presence in the classical music world for nearly forty years, with his unique combination of ebulliance and passionate energy, allied to a technical mastery and scholarly objectivity. In May, 2008, he gave solo recitals and master classes in four major cities in The Peoples' Craig Sheppard Republic of China - Beijing, Shanghai, Xiamen and Shenzhen. In March, 2008, Sheppard appeared once again in the Hunter Council Chambers of Victoria University in Wellington, New Zealand, performing Book II of Bach's Well Tempered Clavier, a work he recorded subsequently in Seattle's Meany Theater in April (for release on Romeo Records, November, 2008). Craig Sheppard has made seven trips to the Far East since June, 2002 - four to Japan, one to Taiwan, and one each to China and to Korea - giving lectures and concerts in major venues and universities in the region. On May 18th, 2004, he wound up a seven-concert series in Seattle's Meany Theater that was dedicated to the 32 Beethoven Piano Sonatas, a popular series that met with great critical acclaim. In April, 1999, he gave his long-awaited recital dbut at the Berlin Philharmonic, also to great critical acclaim. In 1999, he was presented by the Seattle Symphony in a highly acclaimed series of lecture/recitals at the Benaroya Hall. He appeared with the Seattle Symphony in 1998 in their inaugural season at Benaroya, and was also previously featured with the orchestra in the opening concerts of the 1996-97 season at the Opera House, along with the violinist Midori. Sheppard is invited frequently to perform at summer venues such as the Seattle Chamber Music Festival, and has taught and performed for a number of summers at the Heifetz International Music Institute in Wolfeboro, New Hampshire.

Craig Sheppard was born and raised in Philadelphia. Following initial studies with Dr. Lois Hedner and Susan Starr, he attended the Curtis Institute in Philadelphia as a student of Eleanor Sokoloff, and earned both his Bachelors and Masters degrees at the Juilliard School in New York, studying with Sascha Gorodnitzki. In addition to working privately with Claude Frank and Lillian Kallir during summers at Tanglewood, Sheppard studied subsequently with Ilona Kabos, Peter Feuchtwanger, and Sir Clifford Curzon in London, and also worked with Rudolf Serkin and Pablo Casals at the Marlboro Festival.

Following a highly successful New York dbut at the Metropolitan Museum in 1972, Sheppard won the silver medal that year at the Leeds International Pianoforte Competition in England. Moving to London the following year, he quickly established himself through recording and frequent appearances on BBC radio and television as one of the preeminent pianists of his generation, giving cycles of Bach's Klavierbung and the complete solo works of Brahms in London and other musical centers. During the twenty years he lived in England, he also taught at Lancaster University, the Yehudi Menuhin School, and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, in addition to giving master classes at both Oxford and Cambridge universities.

Sheppard has performed with all the major orchestras in Great Britain, as well as those of Philadelphia, Boston, Chicago, San Francisco, Atlanta, Dallas, Seattle, Buffalo and Rochester, among others in the United States, and with such conductors as Sir Georg Solti, James Levine, Leonard Slatkin, Michael Tilson Thomas, Sir Andrew Davis, Lord Yehudi Menuhin, Erich Leinsdorf, Kurt Sanderling, Neeme Jrvi, Hans Vonk, Aaron Copland, David Zinman, Gerard Schwarz and Peter Ers.

Sheppard's repertoire is extensive, encompassing over forty solo recital programs and sixty concerti. In the past several seasons, in addition to the both book of Bach's Well Tempered Clavier and the 32 Beethoven sonatas (in a series entitled Beethoven: A Journey, Sheppard's recital programs have included the complete Ėtudes of Chopin, Rachmaninoff, and Debussy, and such major works as the Goldberg and Diabelli Variations, the complete Schumann Novelettes, and Ravel's Miroirs and Gaspard de la Nuit. Over the years, his work with singers such as Victoria de los Angeles, Jos Carreras, and Irina Arkhipova; trumpeter Wynton Marsalis; and ensembles such as the Cleveland, Bartok, and Emerson string quartets, has also constituted an important and ongoing element in his musical life.

Sheppard has recorded on the EMI (Classics for Pleasure), Polygram (Philips), Sony, Chandos and Cirrus labels. Four CDs, all of live performances - including his Berlin performance of the Goldberg Variations, Beethoven's Diabelli Variations plus the Scriabin Fifth Sonata, Chopin and Scriabin Prludes, and Scarlatti Sonatas coupled with the Opus 39 Etudes Tableaux of Rachmaninoff - have recently been issued on the label AT (Annette Tangermann)/Berlin, at-label@gmx.de.

Sheppard has appeared on numerous national and international piano competition juries. He is well known for his broad academic interests, particularly foreign languages.

Tanya Stambuk, Piano

On the occasion of her debut at Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall, Ms. Stambuk was hailed as "a player with a powerful technique, ideas of her own, and considerable promise" by the New York Times. Since then, her concert career has taken her across the United States and throughout Western and Eastern Europe.

She has performed with the Orchestre de Toulouse in France, the Virginia Symphony, Chicago Civic Orchestra in Orchestra Hall, the Bergen Philharmonic, the Lake Charles Symphony and Rapides Symphony Orchestra in Louisiana, Washington's Olympia Symphony, Tacoma Symphony and Oregon's Rogue Valley Symphony.

Ms. Stambuk has been heard in recital at the Dubrovnik Summer Festival in Croatia, the Robert Schumann Summer Festival in Germany, and in the Auditorio Nacional Carlos Alberto in Portugal where she won the international piano competition.

Tanya Stambuk has made guest appearances on radio in New York City, Moscow, and in Croatia, and has appeared on a television program entitled IN PRAISE OF WOMEN PIANISTS. She has performed at the 92nd Street Y and Merkin Hall in New York City, the Music Academy in Philadelphia, the Phillips Collection in Washington DC, the Dame Myra Hess Series in Chicago, the Piano Series at the San Diego Art Museum, and at Brigham Young University, Texas A&M University, and the University of Hawaii. She premiered Norman Dello Joio’s newly revised Fantasy Variations for Piano and Orchestra in Florida and North Carolina which led to numerous performances of the music of Norman Dello Joio, and has unexpectedly led to her being considered an authority on and interpreter of the music of American composers.

Tanya Stambuk has recorded the piano works of Norman Dello Joio on the Centaur label. She is a graduate of the Juilliard School, (BM and MM in Piano Performance) and Rutgers University (DMA in Piano Performance). She credits Robert Turner, Sasha Gorodnitzki, and Ilana Vered as her major mentors in learning the art of piano performance. Interestingly, all of these instructors were themselves students of the great Russian pianist couple, Rosina and Josef Lhevinne. Ms. Stambuk is a Steinway Artist.

Jing Wang, violin

Twenty-four year-old violinist Jing Wang was born in China and began to study the violin at the age of three. He made his first public appearance at the age of six in Marseilles, France.

First Prize winner of the 2007 Irving M. Klein competition, Canadian Music Competition, the Montreal Symphony Orchestra Competition and the Concertino Praga, Jing was nominated as “Le Titre de Jeune Soliste” 2003 (Young Soloist Award) of French Public Radio.

Since 9 years old, Jing Wang has made several appearances with the Quebec Symphony Orchestra. He has performed with the Metropolitan Orchestra of Montreal and the Violons du Roy String Orchestra, Sherbrooke Symphony, and he made his debut with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra in 1999.

He also performed as soloist with I Musici Orchestra, the Lorraine Philharmonic Orchestra in France, l’Orchestre de Picardie and l’Orchestre de chambre de Wallonie. Jing Wang toured the Czech Republic in 2001 and played with the Czech Radio Philharmonic Orchestra in Dvorak Hall. In 2002 he performed with the Moscow State Symphony Orchestra in Tchaikovsky Hall. Wang has collaborated with conductors such as James DePreist, Claus Peter Flor and Yoav Talmi.

As result of the concerto competition First Prize winner, he performed with the Academy Orchestra of the Music Academy of the West in California and the San Angelo Symphony in Texas.

Jing Wang gave recitals for the International Festival of Domain Forget, Music Festival Italy & USA in Italy, Meadowmount Music Festival and Bowdoin Music Festival. Since 1995 Jing’s playing has been broadcasted by Radio-Canada.

For this upcoming season, Jing will have solo appearances with Peninsula Symphony, Santa Cruz Symphony as well a recital tour in California and Mexico.

Verne Windham, Host

Verne Windham came to Spokane in 1971to become principal hornist of the Spokane Symphony, having played in the orchestra while in high school in the 1960’s. At the same time he became French horn instructor at WSU.

While playing in the Symphony, he founded many music groups which played everything from baroque to modern music. Two highlights were RSVP, a trio which played classical music in Henny’s bar, and the Spokane Falls Brass Band, famous for ragtime and other American music.

In the 1980’s he began announcing for the fledgling public radio station KPBX, becoming its music director in the early 1990’s and program director recently.

In 1996 he found his dream job, as conductor of the freshest, most exciting and second best orchestra in the region, the Spokane Youth Orchestra. He had previously conducted the Spokane Symphony on educational tours and at the Festival at Sandpoint. He has also conducted for Spokane Opera and Spokane Ballet.

Verne is married to the soprano Susan Windham. Their children sing, and play drums and tuba.