4020 East River Road
Tucson, AZ 85718
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(520) 577-6064
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About Us‎ > ‎

Staff

Artistic Staff                                             Administrative Staff
Marcela Molina, Director                                   Verneatte Poleyestewa, Administrative Executive
Chris Fresolone, Assistant Director                     Charlene Deal, Bookkeeper
Christi Amonson, Associate Conductor   
Anneka Bergstrand, Associate Conductor                  
Katherine Suescun, Accompanist
Jamee Haddorff, Accompanist

Artistic Staff 

Director

Ms. Marcela Molina (began as Artistic Director in the fall of 2006)


A native of Bogotá, Colombia, Marcela Molina is currently completing her doctoral studies in choral conducting at the University of Arizona. She holds a master’s degree in choral conducting and a bachelor’s degree in theory and composition from the University of Arizona and Westminster Choir College, respectively.

 

From 2003-2006, Ms. Molina was the assistant conductor of the prestigious Tucson Arizona Boys Chorus.  In addition, she has conducted numerous performances and rehearsals at The University of Arizona—including the University Community Chorus, the women’s choir of the Vocal Arts Festival and the Arizona Choir—as well as the Tucson Masterworks Chorale and the semi-professional choir, Tucson Chamber Artists, where she was guest conductor for the 2005 Holiday Season.  In 2002 Ms. Molina was on the theory faculty for the select Young Artist Certificate Program at the Westminster Conservatory, the community music school of Westminster Choir College.  

 

As a member of the Westminster Symphonic Choir, Ms. Molina sang under the batons of Joseph Flummerfelt, Kurt Masur, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Zdenek Macal, and Sir Colin Davis with such esteemed orchestras as the New York Philharmonic, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the New Jersey Symphony and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s.  Ms. Molina has studied under the tutelage of Drs. Bruce Chamberlain, Elizabeth Schauer, James Jordan, and Andrew Megill, and Professor Allan Crowell. In the fall of 2005, she contributed four articles to the book Teaching through Performance in Choir, Volume 2.


Ms Molina is currently the Artistic Director of The Tucson Girls Chorus, Tucson Masterworks Chorale and the music director at Christ Presbyterian Church.


Assistant Director


Chris Fresolone


Chris directs the Mariposa Singers and is the accompanist and assistant conductor for the Jubilate and Advanced Choirs. He coordinates the theory curriculum for the Tucson Girls Chorus and teaches theory to the Mariposa Singers and Advanced Choir.


Chris is currently completing his doctoral studies in organ performance with a minor in choral conducting from the University from Arizona. He is organist as Casas Adobes UCC Church in Tucson, and serves on the board of directors for the Southern Arizona Chapter of the American Guild of Organists.


Before arriving in Tucson in 2006, Chris lived in the Seattle area, where he was a church musician, music educator, and musical theatre director. Chris served as musical director for productions including Bye Bye Birdie, Footloose, Nunsense, and the Taxi Caberet, which Chris first directed for the Village Theatre's Festival of New Musicals in Issaquah, WA.


Chris received a bachelor's degree in music, a bachelor's degree in computer studies, and a master's degree in music technology, from Northwestern University in Evanston, IL.  While a student at Northwestern, Chris worked for Harmonic Vision, where he helped develop and support music educational software from the award winning Music Ace series. Several of Chris's original compositions appear within the software! Chris also served as organ scholar and assistant conductor for the Northwestern University Chapel Choir.


Chris is originally from New Jersey; during his high school years he performed (and was president of) in his high school choir and the Buttondowns, the school's select men's vocal ensemble. He played in the pit bands for the musicals at his school and at local colleges (including Godspell, Into the Woods, and Pippen), and he played the French Horn in the New Jersey Youth Symphony.


Chris fancies himself as a composer and arranger; he will actually call himself a composer once he is published! He has composed or arranged a few works for the Tucson Girls Chorus, and several small works for the organ.


Associate Conductor


Christi Amonson

Soprano Christi Amonson is thrilled to join the Tucson Girls Chorus organization as the director of the Ladybugs and the Hummingbirds. Ms. Amonson is a classical singer, a voice teacher, the founder of the Southern Arizona Opera Company and she is the music director for the Church of the Painted Hills. Recent concert engagements include touring China and Mexico as a soloist with Southern Arizona Symphony Orchestra, a Cole Porter concert with the Sacramento Choral Society & Orchestra as well as singing Amy in Little Women with Opera Delaware and Hannah in The Merry Widow. Opera News described her sound as “liquid silver” after singing Nannetta with Chautauqua Opera. Ms. Amonson was a winner of the Classical Singer Competition in Philadelphia, the Liederkranz Competition in NYC and she was a Metropolitan Opera finalist in Seattle. Locally, she sang as the winner of the UA President’s concert, she was the soprano soloist for SASO’s Carmina Burana and she has been a concert soloist with Tucson Chamber Artists, The Wieck Chamber Singers & Orchestra, The Sons of Orpheus,Reveille, Arizona Opera Guild, and the UA Community Chorus.


Christi is finishing her DMA in voice and theatre at the University of Arizona. She earned her BM in Music Education at the University of Idaho and her MM in voice at the Manhattan School of Music. In New York City she directed choirs for the Metropolitan Opera Guild’s Urban Voices Program, the Elaine Kauffman Foundation and the Manhattan Girl Scouts. She taught Kindermusik at the Diller-Quaile School of Music, she taught voice at Concordia College and several studios in Manhattan and New Jersey. She secretly loves Broadway music, acting and directing, but her favorite thing to do is finger paint with her three daughters: Ginger, Daisy, & Violet.


Associate Conductor


Anneka Bergstrand


Anneka Bergstrand is the director of the newest group to the Tucson Girls Chorus, the Bumblebee Choir.  The general music teacher at Homer Davis Elementary School, Ms. Bergstrand has also directed children’s and middle school church choirs, praise bands, and co-directed a satellite choir of the Tucson Arizona Boys Chorus.  While studying for her Bachelor’s Degree in Music Education, Anneka took private voice lessons and sang with the University of Arizona’s Symphonic Choir.  Anneka serves on the board of the Arizona Society of General Music, and is an active member of the Arizona Music Educators Association and the American Choral Director’s Association.  Giving private voice and piano lessons, cooking, and hanging out with her cat, Laverne, are just some of the things that occupy her free time!