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BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Click on a Name to View Board Member Bio
(Names are listed alphabetically by last or group name):






  • JackBowers_closeup JACK BOWERS (Board Member, Fiscal Consultant, Outreach Development Committee Member), is a performing musician, songwriter/composer and arts administrator. For twenty-five years he directed the Arts in Corrections program at Soledad State Prison, which involved hundreds of inmates in weekly fine arts activities, ranging from creative writing classes to luthiery. Currently, in addition to playing with multiple bands in the Santa Cruz, he manages the Community Youth Arts Project for the William James Association and serves on the board of the New Music Works.


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  • Barbara_BurkhartBARBARA BURKHART (Board Member), is a 4th generation native Californian born in the bay area. Since starting piano lessons at age 6 she has been a music lover! This “love" expanded into singing in choirs and musicals, performing in theater and presenting talks on women in history. Currently her love of music and drama is as an audience member and occasional costumer for Actors Theater.

    Barbara has been a member of NMW board since 2003.Barbara's love of pairing food, wine and music in what she refers to as “Artist Table Dinners” has been a regular auction item at the annual Avant Garden Party.

    Her various board roles have included: Secretary, Treasurer, Vice President and President. Barbara was instrumental in arranging for the measurement of concert audience satisfaction in-order to assist in planning future performances.


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  • CATHERINE BURKHART (Board Member), works as the Director of Election Services and Business Development UniLect, a recognized leader and provider of election management and survey services. Since becoming a board member, Catherine has assisted New Music Works with ad sales and on-site event survey management.


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  • PHIL COLLINS (ARTISTIC DIRECTOR), co-founded New Music Works and has served as the organization's Artistic Director and Conductor since 1982. Collins has guest-conducted numerous ensembles and has performed residencies at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music, and at Vassar College on a Martha Farmer Fellowship. His orchestral and chamber works have been played throughout the U.S. and Canada. He has also composed and conducted for numerous theatre companies and colleges including, Shakespeare Santa Cruz, Western Stage, Mount Madonna Players, UC Santa Cruz, and Cabrillo College.

    As a lecturer, Collins has been hosted by numerous schools and conferences, including the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music, the American Composers Forum, San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and in February 2007 he lectured in Wellington, New Zealand, for the ACL (Asian Composer League). Awards include: First Prize (Air), 1996 International Clarinet Society Composition Competition; First Prize (Sappho Songs), 1994 L'ARCIM Festival in Montreal; The Gail Rich Award; and Dramalogue Award for Best Musical Direction.

    Collins studied composition with Edwin Dugger, Lou Harrison, and Henry Onderdonk. He studied conducting under Nicole Paiement at UC Santa Cruz; classical guitar with Stanley Beutens; and jazz guitar with Jerry Hahn. He holds a Bachelors in Music Composition from San Francisco State University and a Masters in Music (conducting) from University of California Santa Cruz.


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  • ArthurCooley_cropped ARTHUR COOLEY (Board Member), (b. Palo Alto,1931) grew up on the San Francisco Peninsula-and the Monterey Peninsula. Cooley obtained his BA and MD at Stanford University in Oriental Philosophy and Psychology during the 1950s after which he ran a successful private practice in Saratoga, CA and taught for 43 years at Stanford University. Cooley moved to Aptos, CA in 2005, served as Mayor of Seascape for 5 yrs and is currently serving on the board of directors for New Music Works and Santa Cruz Symphony Board. Cooley studied music composition at Cabrillo College and is currently a student of Phillip Collins. He draws inspiration from the history of western music and all its associated forms of structure from Bach to Schoenberg. His compositions have been played at home recitals and at Cabrillo College student recitals. His “Latin American Dance Suite" was performed by the New Music Works Ensemble for Sound Horizons at the Kuumbwa Jazz Center in Santa Cruz.


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  • Dakota Head ShotDAKOTA DILLON (VICE-PRESIDENT) is a Northern California native. She first learned the piano at the age of five with her Grandmother as her piano teacher and inspiration from her Grandmother's colleague and family friend, jazz legend, Dave Brubeck. Later learning the clarinet and saxophone, in high school she was a member of the Wind Ensemble, Jazz Ensemble and organized a saxophone quintet group that performed locally. In college she interned at The Historic Lincoln Theatre in Washington, D.C. and was also a member of the UC Santa Cruz Wind Ensemble under the direction of Dr. Robert Klevan.

    Since graduating with a B.A. in Legal Studies from UCSC, Dakota has worked as a Legal Assistant for a Dental Malpractice Firm, Personal Injury Firm and Estate Planning Law Office. She later became a Paralegal for an Intellectual Property Law Firm and gained experience learning patents, trademarks and strategic legal writing. Dakota is a Certified Notary Public and currently works as the Paralegal and Corporate Office Manager for a Forensic Expert Witness and Medical Device Group. Future plans include law school and skydiving.


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  • RICHARD MARKELL (Board Member), enjoys serving on the board and volunteering for New Music Works. You can usually find him serving fine wine at our events.


    For more info, please visit: starstuffproductions.com


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  • CHRISTINE REYES (Tresaurer), brings professional non-profit organization experience to the board and volunteers frequently at New Music Works' concerts.


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  • Rico_SaarniRICO SAARNI (PRESIDENT), was born in Lone Pine, CA and graduated from UCSC in 1991 with a BA in Linguistics. Rico works as school bus driver in Santa Cruz, CA. His interests are Qigong, drinking tea, poetry and songwriting. Rico's a brand new NMW board member who's always happy to help out


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  • Sayaka_20100425-IMG_4415SAYAKA YABUKI (General Manager, Board Secretary, Outreach Development Committee Member), is an electronic sound artist from Japan, currently based in California, USA. Sayaka immigrated to the USA from Japan during the 1980s, at the same time beginning her classical violin studies. As a teenager, she began her studies in visual arts, experimenting with sound installations, sound collage and performance art. Her love for music has sent her far away places including Australia, where she studied with one of the country's most respected experimental electronic music composers, Steve Law. Sayaka is a graduate of Brown University where she obtained her B.A. in Visual Arts, studying interactive visual media with Rachel Stevens, then curator of Creative Time(NYC) and Max/MSP/Jitter with Todd Winkler, director of the MEME(Multimedia and Electronic Music Experiments) program.

    Since relocating to California, Sayaka has studied music composition with Philip Collins and Rick Walker, in addition to participating in the program of Music Technology and Recording Arts (MTRA) at Cabrllo College, where she became a recipient of the Sherman David Cowen Memorial Scholarship in 2009. Sayaka is the violinist and vocalist in the band Noise Clinic and also performs under the name Sayaka Starlite. She has been a New Music Works board member since 2008 and was a featured composer in New Music Works' 31st Season, with the premiere of her muti-media and live looping based work, “Water and Wine". In August 2011, Sayaka together with Tait Reed, wrote and performed a mini-operetta called "The Call of Cthulhu" based on the story by H.P. Lovecraft, in celebration of the India Joze Calamari Festival in Santa Cruz. Sayaka is also New Music Works' Publicist, Outreach Coordinator and performs in the Ensemble occasionally.


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