Hochstein Assistant Director and Dean Gary Palmer shared with us some behind-the-scenes highlights about the 16 members of the faculty and staff who celebrate milestone anniversaries with the School this year.
Read on to find out which faculty member just loves the winter, despite coming from a warmer climate; which one is a Hochstein alum who has returned to teach here; who is known for baking delectable treats; and most importantly, learn more about all of their contributions to Hochstein – including two faculty members who have been here 45 years!
Milestone Anniversaries
5 years
John Delmonico
John has been a valued member of the Hochstein cello faculty for the past 5 years. In addition to his work with individual-lesson students, he has ably led Hochstein's Adult Cello Choir since the fall of 2019. John's expertise as a master luthier is highly valued, and when he made the decision to step back from most of his lesson teaching to focus on his business, Delmonico & Dugdale Strings, we were thrilled that he was willing to continue working with the adult cello choir. It is a testament to his commitment to the Hochstein mission and his heart for working with adults. We are grateful for his continued involvement at Hochstein.
Hannah Gieseke
Hannah is a talented public music school educator, currently serving as an elementary band teacher through the Penfield School District. Hannah's first foray into Hochstein was in the summer of 2014 when she joined the Arts in Action Summer Camp as the Creative Movement Teacher. Three years later, she became the director of the camp. Since then, she has managed the many moving parts of the three weeks of Arts in Action summer camps each year with professionalism, creativity, and passion. In addition to Arts in Action, Hannah spearheaded the creation of a new Highland Bagpipes class in 2019, and the class has been a popular offering since. She was also one of the lead teachers/organizers for Hochstein's new Elementary Wind Band Camp in Summer 2023, which had a very successful first year. We appreciate Hannah's excellence as a musician/educator as well as her superlative organizational skills. We are also thrilled to now have her as a Hochstein parent (with her son taking FUNdamentals here)!
Alex Huedepohl-Wolf
Alex is one of the busiest members of Hochstein's Expressive Arts program onsite, working with a wide variety of student ages and types of learners. Alex's Hochstein journey started as an Expressive Arts intern in 2017, and we were happy to engage him as a Hochstein faculty member shortly thereafter. It is not unusual to hear his cheerful voice coming out of Orff 2 or Room 3 as you walk by. His laid-back and friendly nature endears him to both students and colleagues alike, and his visionary approach to working with nontraditional learners has helped Hochstein become a more inclusive place for all. Examples of his expertise include his classes with partner organization LEAP for Kids and our more recent Inclusive Music & Movement classes just added in 2023.
Aika Ito
Aika is a superlative violinist who was a member of the First Violin section of the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra for the past 9 years before recently joining the Buffalo Philharmonic starting with their upcoming 2023-2024 season. Even though her professional activities have turned toward Buffalo, her commitment to Hochstein is so strong that she is commuting one day a week back to Rochester to teach a full Monday schedule at Hochstein every week – we are thankful to continue having her a part of the Hochstein community. A dedicated violin and viola teacher at Hochstein, she has further distinguished herself as an excellent coach in Hochstein's Chamber Music Connections Program and coach/organizer for our summer String Music Connections Camps, in which she has led her students to the highest levels of musicianship and artistry. After the onset of COVID, Aika did her best to keep her chamber groups running virtually for the end of 2020, and singlehandedly kept chamber groups going in 2021 to resurrect Hochstein's chamber program post-pandemic. Without her efforts, our chamber program may have come to a complete stop. Her dedication and spirit are the bedrock upon which our current successful chamber program has been rebuilt.
Erica Meister
Erica is a valued member of our Business Office team. She worked as a part-time payroll clerk for us for about 4 years, and then after a 5-year gap, we were thrilled to have her back in a more full-time role in the Business Office, ensuring timely processing of our paychecks as well as a myriad of other activities to keep Hochstein running smoothly! Those of you who know Erica know that she is a vibrant personality who always has a smile on her face. She has contributed to many of our staff bonding events (holiday meals, birthdays) by utilizing her considerable baking skills to make delectable treats for all to enjoy. We are truly happy to have Erica back at Hochstein, and appreciate her dedication and willingness to take on extra duties as we look to fill the Business Manager position.
Shiuen-Huang Suen
Shiuen's first experience with Hochstein was when she taught at our Hochstein at Canandaigua program in 2007-2008, and we were thrilled to have her rejoin the Hochstein faculty in 2020. Shiuen has considerable gifts as a teacher and master guitarist and she has a successful background as a competition winner and recitalist. Along with these successes, she possesses a kind and gentle spirit that makes her a caring, thoughtful teacher who is well-loved by her students. She is also a delightful colleague and musical collaborator with her fellow faculty members, and a good role model for students and teachers alike.
Michelle Walker
Michelle is an alum of the Hochstein Youth Symphony Orchestra, so we were happy to welcome her back to Hochstein. She hit the ground running when she joined our faculty in 2018, and she has quickly established herself as one of our busiest teachers in Hochstein's Suzuki program, where she teaches both individual lessons and group classes. Michelle has made it one of her personal missions to nurture young viola students and to grow the viola program at Hochstein. To that end, she added a Suzuki Viola group class to our program offerings and has shepherded a number of violinists in the transition to viola. Michelle is constantly working to improve her skills as a teacher, and is always actively pursuing new training; her dedication to her students and to her own self-improvement as a teacher are remarkable. We greatly appreciate the fact that she is always brainstorming new ideas and collaborating with her colleagues to help take Hochstein's Suzuki program to the next level. Like others, we have welcomed her to the ranks as a Hochstein parent, with her son as an oboe student.
10 years
Dave Chisholm
Dave is probably one of the most creative people you will ever meet! A fabulous jazz trumpeter, award-winning graphic novelist, songwriter, bandleader, talented music educator, and director of Hochstein's Creativity Lab – the list is endless! At Hochstein, Dave has mentored countless students in both trumpet and the many creative ways to make music with technology in our Lab. His popular Comics & Music and Composer's Club/Writing Songs, Making Beats classes have been student favorites, and he also ran Hochstein's successful Rock Camp for many years. He can be seen bringing our Rock Band students out into the community at various coffee shops and venues throughout the Rochester area, and as a multi-instrumentalist, he's always ready and willing to fill in as guitarist, drummer, or lead singer when needed. As an illustrator and graphic novelist, he has had so many successes – from his comic-and-music combining Instrumental to his Chasin' the Bird graphic novel on the life of Charlie "Bird" Parker and the upcoming November release of Miles Davis and the Search for Sound, just to name a few. We are truly fortunate to have such a creative, talented spirit as part of our program at Hochstein.
Roz Cassano
Roz has been a vital member of our Hochstein front office team for 10 years, and it is hard to remember a time without her on the front lines! Roz is a super advocate for Hochstein and our programs, and she can speak from first-hand experience, with her two children and her husband all active participants over the years. As such, she connects easily with potential students both over the phone and in person, all displaying a helpful, friendly attitude. When Hochstein closed in March 2020, it was she and Ruth Gates who kept the front office activities going remotely, and when we returned in September 2020, she and Ruth staffed the office and worked onsite with the dean staff to keep Hochstein going while much of the rest of the staff and faculty were remote. Roz's dedication to Hochstein is an inspiration!
15 years
Marcos Kreutzer
Marcos joined the Hochstein faculty in 2008 as a result of a national search we conducted for a full-time Suzuki violin teacher, and he has been an integral member of the Hochstein faculty ever since. As Co-Chair of the String Department and Chair of the Suzuki Strings Department, he is constantly helping us assess and reevaluate how best to grow our string program. He is one of those teachers who always has a full schedule and other waiting in line to study with him. Along with his busy individual-lesson schedule, he teaches Suzuki group classes and is the conductor for Hochstein Concertino Strings, the first ensemble in Hochstein's orchestral program. Marcos is well-loved by students, parents, and his faculty colleagues alike, and he lives out the Hochstein mission every day. It is not surprising that he was selected for the 2023 Hochstein Faculty Service Award. A related fun fact about Marcos is that while he is a native of Brazil, he LOVES the cold weather and the snow that we get here in Rochester – he is often cheering the cold weather while his colleagues are complaining about the same!
20 years
Tim Shannon
Tim has been an integral member of the Hochstein guitar department since 2003. During that time, he has established himself as a gifted lesson teacher, committed group class teacher in the Early Start Guitar program, and facile and sought-after performer/collaborator who has given a number of programs on our Spotlight on Faculty Series. His students have consistently won Hochstein's Merit Scholarship Competitions and he has had students excel in Hochstein's Honors Certificate Program. Tim is one of those teachers who embodies the Hochstein values of excellence and community – he teaches to each student's individual strengths while seeing every individual as unique. These are some of the many reasons that Tim was awarded Hochstein's 2022 Faculty Service Award.
Casey Springstead
Casey began his career at Hochstein as the conductor of Hochstein's Junior Wind and Youth Wind Symphonies, along with his role as Assistant Conductor of Philharmonia. His conducting, organizational, and people skills made him the obvious choice to take over the reigns as Director of the Hochstein Youth Symphony Orchestra in 2012. He has led the HYSO on tours of France, Austria, Spain, Portugal, Germany, and the Czech Republic; Italy is the destination for Spring 2024. In 2014, the orchestra participated in a live-via-satellite exchange concert with a youth orchestra from one of Rochester’s sister cities in Lithuania. Casey's awesome achievements with the Hochstein Youth Symphony Orchestra are on display for our school and the community at large multiple times a year in packed house concerts. Independent of his conducting skills, Casey is a wonderful, thoughtful human being with a calm, engaging demeanor that serves him well in his HYSO leadership role. It is for this and for many other reasons why he was selected for Hochstein's 2017 Faculty Service Award. We are also fortunate that Casey is a conduit for Hochstein to many public school educators through his teaching activities in the West Irondequoit School District and various leadership roles in the Monroe County Music Teachers Association over the years.
25 years
Riki Connaughton
Riki has been a valued member of the Hochstein voice department since 1998. For many years, she has been an integral member of the Jury Panel for Hochstein's Honors Certificate Program, the School's pre-collegiate program for advancing musicians. She has most recently assumed the position of Chair of Hochstein's Voice Department, and in that role is creating new opportunities for both our voice students and her departmental colleagues to take the department to new heights. As a mezzo-soprano, Riki has performed extensively in opera and oratorio, and was a soloist/choral scholar in sacred music for more than 30 years. She has performance credits in several operatic roles – including world premieres – and numerous oratorios, music festivals, and recitals across the US. She has performed in the great cathedrals of England and Scotland. Her experience as a performer has informed her teaching of a variety of styles and she has been a role model for decades of students. We appreciate her heart for working with teens and adults of all levels, as well as her continued leadership of the Voice Department.
30 years
Nancy Boone-Bahr
Nancy has been on the faculty since 1993 – one of those unsung heroes who works with a wide variety of students and consistently produces excellent students. Whether working with a summer scholarship student taking lessons for the first time or an advanced high school student working on college-entrance auditions, she gives each student her best. Despite a relatively small teaching schedule at Hochstein, her impact is much larger – she has consistently had Merit Scholarship winners and Honors Certificate Program graduates. Looking at her list of students over the years, it is obvious that she has been a particular role model to young women on the saxophone; she has broken barriers as a female saxophonist and is an active example of professionalism for her students. Nancy is also a superlative musician – she is an active performer with the RPO, Buffalo Philharmonic, and Syracuse Symphoria, and with various traveling Broadway tours and other special events throughout Western New York.
45 years
_SQ.jpg?w=1080&quality=50)
Nate Rawls
Nate is a jazz legend in the Rochester community and we've been fortunate to have him a member of the Hochstein community since the late 1970s. Nate is one of those individuals who always has a smile on his face and is ready to welcome a student of any age or level to his studio. He lives out the Hochstein mission every day in his teaching, as well as through his many contacts and performances out in the community. He is best known for his Nate Rawls Big Band, which he established back in 1982. Under his leadership, his band has developed a unique style and euphonic sound of jazz and blues reminiscent of the days of the famous Duke Elllington and Count Basie Bands. His work in the community includes work with the S.W.A.N Community Band and many other organizations. We appreciate his more than 4 decades of commitment to Hochstein!
Joe Werner
Joe Werner has been the bedrock of the Hochstein Piano Department since 1978. Joe's involvement at Hochstein cannot be underestimated – he gave the first performance on Hochstein's Noontime Series (now LIVE at Hochstein), was on the ground floor for the rebirth of Hochstein's chamber program in the 1980s, and has influenced generations of pianists and chamber players in his 45 years at Hochstein. In recognition of his many achievements, Joe was the recipient of the first-ever Hochstein Faculty Service Award back in 1991, and he has been Co-Chair of the Piano Department for many years. Some of Joe's students have been with him for decades and his former students have gone onto wonderful careers as solo pianists, conductors, collaborative pianists, performers, and music directors in opera and the Broadway stage, as well as collegiate teachers. Joe's equally long career as Principal Keyboard with the RPO (recently retired in 2022 after 50 years) and RPO Personnel Manager (24 years) has seen him active as one of the most visible and busy collaborative pianists in the Rochester area with RPO, Hochstein, and musical colleagues from all of the performing organizations in town. Not one to slow down, Joe has most recently been teaching collegiate students at Roberts Wesleyan University, and we look forward to his continued involvement at Hochstein for more decades to come. :)