Spokane Symphony Names Associate Conductor Pacific Symphony Assistant Chosen; WSU Professor To Head Chorale

Thu., June 4, 1998

Travis Rivers Correspondent

An assistant conductor of the Pacific Symphony Orchestra in Santa Ana, Calif., has been named associate conductor of the Spokane Symphony.

Jonathan Martin, the Spokane Symphony’s executive director, announced Wednesday that Elizabeth Stoyanovich will begin her duties at the start of the orchestra’s 1998-99 season July 1.

Martin also announced that Lori Wiest, a Washington State University music professor, will join the symphony as director of the chorale. Wiest will succeed Paul Klemme, who resigned early this year to devote full time to his church and teaching duties in Salem, Ore.

Stoyanovich and Wiest, both in their mid-30s, were selected following auditions of finalists for the two positions in April. Martin declined to disclose salaries for either position.

Stoyanovich’s first Opera House appearance with the orchestra will be at a Symphony Superpops concert with singer Shirley Jones Oct. 3.

She also will conduct the performances of “The Nutcracker” ballet in December, the fall family concert with the Magic Circle Mime Co., a chamber orchestra concert at The Met next January and an Opera House classics program next March.

Stoyanovich succeeds Jung-Ho Pak, who resigned as associate conductor in May to accept the music directorship of the San Diego Symphony.

“Her deep understanding of the American orchestra and the challenges it faces over the next few years really came through in her interviews,” Martin says. “Naturally, you hire the best musician you can find for a position like this, but in Elizabeth we also have a wonderful communicator who can articulate a case for what we do in our community.”

Martin said Wiest has conducted choral groups and taught music education at WSU since 1991.

“In addition to preparing the chorale for performances with the Spokane Symphony and conducting some other performances with the orchestra and chorale,” Martin says, “we’re looking forward to have Lori help us do some serious recruiting to increase the size of the chorale.”

Stoyanovich also heads the Pacific Symphony Institute for young professional musicians and leads the Pacific Symphony Youth Orchestra. Stoyanovich teaches at California State University at Fullerton. She will maintain her California positions while assuming her conducting post in Spokane.

Before moving to California in 1996, Stoyanovich has also held conducting positions with the Cincinnati Symphony, the Central Kentucky Youth Orchestra in Lexington and the Champlain Valley Symphony in New York, where she also taught at the State University of New York at Plattsburgh.

She earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in conducting and oboe performance at the University of Michigan, where she studied conducting with Gustav Meier. Stoyanovich also studied with Leonard Bernstein in France at the American Conservatory in Fountainebleau. She was selected for American Symphony Orchestra League conducting workshops in Houston, Chicago and Philadelphia and has served as guest conductor of the Cincinnati Symphony, the Yale University Composers’ Orchestra and L’Orchestre des Jueunes du Quebec.

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