Long Beach Chorale and Chamber Orchestra

Lisa in a recent production of The King and I.

Lisa, an alto, is the musical theater aficionado in the chorale! She has 35 years of musical theater and opera performance under her belt, and she studied piano for eight years and took voice lessons for 10. An attorney by day, she’s been singing with the Long Beach Chorale for two years, and her favorite performance has been the Dona Nobis Pacem by Ralph Vaughan Williams. As for her favorite movement of that piece?

“It’s a tie between the Reconciliation movement and the Dirge for Two Veterans,” she says.

She’s not all Sondheim and Gershwin, though. “I have an uncanny knack for being in foreign countries at the time of civil unrest or other major political events,” Lisa says. “In the past I was suspected to work for the CIA but if I told you whether or not it was true, I’d have to kill you.” Very mysterious, indeed!

One of Lisa's pet squirrels.

Lisa appreciates the musical challenges and the excellent level of musicality of the director, musicians, and singers she finds in the chorale. She spends her free time traveling, cooking, and feeding her squirrels.

To “adopt” Lisa as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:

To read more singer profiles in our Adopt a Singer campaign, click here.

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John Breihan, a retired community college administrator, has been singing with the Long Beach Chorale for five years. His favorite performance with us so far was the Brahms Requiem in the 2009-2010 season. “I enjoy the quality and variety of the music the group performs. I am also impressed with the musicality of the singers,” John says.

Before he retired, the last position he held was the vice chancellor of educational services for the Coast Community College District.

John has an extensive background in choral music at Southern California’s educational institutions. He graduated from Chapman University with a minor in music and sang in the Chapman Choir and Chamber Singers under the direction of William Hall. More recently he has sung with the Orange Coast College Chamber Singers under Richard Raub and the Golden West College Chamber under Bruce Bales. Currently, he sings with the Mesa Verde Methodist Church Chancel and Rejoice Choirs, where Long Beach Chorale’s Artistic Director Eliza Rubenstein has previously served as the minister of music.

John and he wife Carolyn enjoying a cruise to Alaska in 2010.

But John’s talents lie beyond singing – he’s also a golfer with a single digit handicap. When he’s not at a choir rehearsal or on the links, he enjoys spending time with his grandkids, traveling, and listening to Broadway musicals.

To “adopt” John as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:

To read more singer profiles in our Adopt a Singer campaign, click here.

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Jackie is the chorale’s own Nurse Jackie. A nurse practitioner, she provides health advice, flu season updates, and pharmaceuticals to singers as needed. She’s also known to wake up at 4:00 and 5:00 in the morning to bake so she can supply us with brownies and other baked treats at rehearsals. She’s notorious for her outspoken sense of humor and can get the entire chorale belly-laughing with a well-timed quip.

Jackie, an alto, has been a member of the chorale for six years, and although she has a hard time choosing among her favorite pieces we’ve performed, Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Dona Nobis Pacem stands out. She took voice lessons and performed with a madrigal singers group in college. She says singing with the chorale and learning new and exciting music stimulates her brain. “I love it, it wraps me in happiness,” she adds. She’ll listen to any type of music BUT country western, she says. “The twang gets me.”

While she has made her career in the healthcare field, Jackie says she would also love to raise dogs for a living. “That might be my next career–raising dogs for patient care,” she says. In addition, she loves traveling and says her all-time favorite pastime is making memories with her family.

To “adopt” Jackie as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:

To read more singer profiles in our Adopt a Singer campaign, click here.

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Bill Eldon, one of our low, low basses, has been singing with the Long Beach Chorale for at least eight years. He can’t remember exactly. Probably because the time he’s spent diligently and strenuously hauling our risers and music stands all over creation has all blurred together. Bill is the head of our Performance Venue Realization team, and at times, has been its only laboring member. He’s a champ, through and through.

By day, Bill is a field development specialist with Farmers Insurance Group. In his off hours, he’s an avid rower and competes in many local and not-so-local rowing events. “I came to rowing late in life as a parent volunteer for my son’s high school rowing program,” he explains. “The high point of my rowing career was competing in several events in the World Masters Rowing Championships in St. Catherines, Ontario in 2010 and coming away with a medal in one of my team boats, a mixed masters’ quad with two men and two women.” That’s good, Bill. You need those muscles to lug the risers, right? Wink, wink! Poor Bill. We’re looking for minions for him.

Bill rowing in the Masters competition.

Vocally, Bill has come a long way since his youth, as he sang with the sopranos in fifth grade. He didn’t sing in a choir again until college, where he sang in the chorale as well as a sixteen-voice chapel choir that performed Bach cantatas every semester. Later, he joined his church choir. It was in a church choir that he met fellow Long Beach Chorale member Alan Caddick, who encouraged him to join us. “Before I joined the Chorale, I was asked to be part of a pick-up choir to help audition candidates for a new director and was thrilled both that they chose Eliza from the group and that she then accepted me into the Chorale, the first group I ever auditioned for,” Bill says. Sounds like it was all meant to be!

Bill’s favorite Long Beach Chorale performances have been the Brahms Requiem and the Bach Christmas Oratorio. “I love being in a choir and making music with others. I am not a soloist or even a performer by nature, so the Chorale lets me be a part of great music. Singing with the Chorale has also greatly improved my sight reading and my vocal skills in general,” Bill says. His favorite music to listen to is that of the Baroque period, especially Bach. He also enjoys Renaissance madrigals, They Might Be Giants, The Real McKenzies and anything in between, he says.

Bill spends his free time listening to NPR news, coping with a four-cat household, rowing, singing in his church choir, and working on cars.

To “adopt” Bill as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:

To read more singer profiles in our Adopt a Singer campaign, click here.

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Peter Woodruff is a retired university professor who has been singing with the basses in the Long Beach Chorale for two years. His favorite piece we’ve performed was the Brahms Ein Deutsches Requiem in the 2009-2010 season.

Now gather round to hear of Peter’s delightful life story:

“I grew up in Europe after the war and absorbed the musical culture early,” he begins. “I saw my first musical, The White Horse Inn, in Heidelberg at age six, my first opera, Hansel and Gretel, at the Vienna Volksoper at age eight. My parents were not musicians but they loved music, and it was always around us. I was always a singer and have dabbled in piano and recorder. I missed the chance to develop my singing while at Oberlin, but later took private lessons and sang for eight years with the Pacific Chorale, including taking the Brahms Requiem on a European tour. My special love is German lieder. I thought my singing career was over, and am overjoyed to have the opportunity to continue it in such a superlative organization. Our concerts have given me more pleasure and excitement than singing in larger and more ‘professional’ groups ever did.”

Our wily Artistic Director Eliza snapped this shot of Peter taking a breather during one of our marathon dress rehearsals for Vaughn Williams' Dona Nobis Pacem last season.

Outside the musical sphere, Peter ran triathlons for several years after retiring and only stopped when he had a heart attack during a competition. That sounds like a wise decision, Pete. He still runs and lifts weights. He also plays strategy games on the computer (“to excess, I regret to say”), and enjoys cooking, reading (mostly sci-fi), movies (a passion he says he shares with mhis wife) and walking their dogs Rosie and Max. He also tutors for Operation Jump Start once a week.

As he mentioned above, Peter enjoys art songs, especially German and British ones. He also listens to opera (Rosenkavalier is a favorite) and the American Songbook repertoire, and Mahler, R. Strauss, and Copland are among his favorite composers.

To “adopt” Peter as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:

To read more singer profiles in our Adopt a Singer campaign, click here.

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Connie Ordway is a fifth grade teacher who just joined the Long Beach Chorale this year, and we’re so pleased to have her! She sang for nine years in the South Bay Master Chorale, “under the direction of the incomparable Iris Levine,” she says. “If I don’t sing, I will die! The beauty of music sustains me on a daily basis; to be a part of producing that beauty nourishes my soul,” Connie says. We couldn’t have said it better!

Connie spends her time outside of work taking care of her three children. She has a fifteen-year-old son, Isaac, who is a sophomore at South Torrance High School. She also has two adopted children, six-year-old Robbie and three-year-old Lila. “They are biological siblings that we adopted from foster care, and we couldn’t be happier now that our family is complete!” Connie says. What a wonderful story!

Connie’s favorite musical genres are classical, country, and musical theater. Welcome to the club. my dear.

To “adopt” Connie as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:

To read more singer profiles in our Adopt a Singer campaign, click here.

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Dale Hutchinson is a redevelopment administrator and just joined the Long Beach Chorale this year, adding another lovely voice to our tenor section. He’s not new to choral singing though, having sung second tenor with the Gay Men’s Chorus of Long Beach in the early 1990s and with the South Coast Chorale from 1993 to 2011.

Singing with the Long Beach Chorale is important to Dale because it provides him an artistic outlet and an opportunity to build camaraderie within the choral community, he says. He tends to gravitate toward both contemporary and classical music when he’s looking for something to listen to. A man for the ages is Dale.

Besides working his day job and rehearsing with the chorale, Dale spends his time with his partner enjoying the sights and sounds of Long Beach. “I always look forward to attending live music events,” he says.

To “adopt” Dale as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:

To read more singer profiles in our Adopt a Singer campaign, click here.

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Doesn't Kathy have a lovely professional headshot?

Katherine McKalip, or Kathy to us, is a retired elementary school music teacher who has been singing with the Long Beach Chorale for four years. Like many of us, her favorite performance was the Brahms Requiem in the 2009-2010 season.

In retirement, Kathy has gone back to her second love: acting. She regularly treks to Los Angeles to perform in commercials, independent and short films, and plays. She’s currently appearing in Talking With… at the Long Beach Playhouse as part of the Long Beach Repertory Theater. The play is on stage there through December 4, so catch her there while you can!

Kathy earned a bachelor’s degree in music from San Jose State University and has sung with the Carmel Bach Festival, the William Hall Master Chorale, and the Western Stage Musical Theater. She also served as the chancel choir conductor at First United Methodist Church in Salinas, Califorina, for eight years. “A strong need to make beautiful, stirring music has been a driving force for most of my life,” Kathy says.

Kathy on stage at the Long Beach Playhouse.

What would we be surprised to know about her? “I used to do singing telegrams,” Kathy says. “The hardest assignment was for a soldier stationed at Fort Ord while dressed as a bunch of grapes. The guard at the entrance had a hard time trying to stop his laughter!” Kathy recalls. Wow. Now picturing Kathy dressed as a bunch of grapes…she’s a lovely, tall woman–it’s quite an image!

Kathy enjoys listening to all kinds of music. “My second husband was a country western radio DJ, and he taught me that there is good in all genres: Choose an artist or individual song and take it from there,” she says. Couldn’t agree with you more, Kathy.

To “adopt” Kathy as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:

To read more singer profiles in our Adopt a Singer campaign, click here.

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Pat Sort de Sanz, with one of the cooler surnames in the chorale, has been singing with us for three years. A soprano, she finds it impossible to choose a favorite piece we’ve performed. By day, Pat is a technical enablement architect. Sounds like somebody I could use around the house! (I think.)

Pat has always loved to sing and remembers her earliest choral experiences singing in church growing up. She also joined the choir at her junior high school and later, in high school, too. She also took private vocal lessons for several years and performed in musicals. She sang with the California Master Chorale under Dr. Larry Ball and the William Hall Master Chorale. And now, we’ve got her, we hope, for good!

“Music is my passion, but not just any music. I like to be challenged and I love singing with a group of people that also like that, too,” Pat says. “I love singing for Eliza because she will not let us get away with just ‘OK;’ she makes us be the best that we can be. As a result, it is lots of fun, even though it is hard work at times.” Don’t you love someone who loves a challenge? Me too.

Pat is also a super skiier, preferring the black diamond downhill slopes and skiing in the trees. We had no idea you were such a snow monster, Pat!

When she’s not singing with us, Pat enjoys listening to mariachis, big band, classic rock, and world music.

To “adopt” Pat as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:

To read more singer profiles in our Adopt a Singer campaign, click here.

Thanks for supporting the Long Beach Chorale!