SUSAN BRANDT-FERGUSON - BARITONE SAXOPHONElives and teaches music in her home town of Sitka, Alaska. Although baritone saxophone is her primary instrument, she began her musical studies on piano, and continued them on the clarinet. However, it was her introduction to the baritone saxophone at the age of twelve that gave her love for music a voice. In college she also studied the bassoon. Susan has a music education degree from Pacific Lutheran University where she studied saxophone with Roger Stemen and Bruce Wilson, and bassoon with Francine Peterson. Following college, Ms. Brandt-Ferguson taught music in Washington state before making Sitka her home once again. Susan has been teaching general music and band at Verstovia Elementary School since 1996. She has recently become certified in the Kodály philosophy of music education. She is also a member of the Sitka Sound Saxophone Quartet.
P A U L C O X - MARIMBA, native to Sitka, received a bachelor of music degree in percussion performance from the Oberlin College Conservatory of Music, where he studied with Michael Rosen. He pursued additional study at London's Royal College of Music, Rice University, the Aspen School of Music, and Yale's Norfolk Chamber Music Festival. In addition, he holds a Certificate in Non-Profit Management from Case Western Reserve University. An avid composer, his Percussion Quartet No. 1 was premiered by the Oberlin Percussion Group in 1996. Two new works, Totems I (a trio for three, five octave marimbas) and Manhatta for solo percussion and film (using an instrument built by metal artist David Balog and Paul Strand's landmark film Manhatta of 1928), will be premiered in 2000. Since 1996, he has been the assistant curator of musical arts of the Cleveland Museum of Art, where he produces some 70 concerts a year. Among his many pastimes are sea kayaking, hiking, chess, gardening, and traveling. He is married to Kirsten Docter, violist of the Cavani String Quartet.

R O G E R S C H M I D T - TROMBONE grew up in his present home, Sitka. As a musician he has studied music at the Bruckner Konservatorium in Linz, Austria, at Oberlin Conservatory and at the Aspen Music Festival. His principal teachers have been Raymond Premru of the Philharmonia Orchestra and Paul Welcomer of the San Francisco Symphony. He has worked as a free lance musician in the San Francisco Bay area playing with various groups in a wide range of musical styles.
J O C E L Y N C L A R K - KAYAGUM attended grades K-12 in Juneau where she participated in various musical activities including the Juneau Symphony. From 1992 to 1994 she received a scholarship to study traditional Korean music majoring in kayagûm performance at the National Classical Music Institute in Seoul, Korea. She returned in 1995 to study kayagûm with a grant from the Harvard Korea Institute. During the 1999-2000 academic year, she recieved a Fulbright Fellowship to study Korean traditional music in Seoul with National living treasure Kang Jeongsuk, and Ji Aeri. Most recently she has been in Korea on a Seonam Foundation Fellowship finishing her dissertation on Korean traditional music.










































L I U X I A N G Y U N - PIPA - a member of Musician Association of Jiangsu Province, and first chair pipa of the Traditional Orchestra of the Jiangsu Dance and Opera Theatre, was born in Nanjing, Jiangsu Province in 1973. At the age of seven, she began studying pipa under her father and entered Nanjing Primary School of Arts at age ten, joining a tour to Japan during the following year. In 1987, as a delegate of Nanjing Middle School Art Group, she toured Japan again.

In 1991, Ms. Liu entered Nanjing College of Art where she studied under master pipa player Liu Shi. After graduating with honors, she joined Traditional Orchestra of the Jiangsu Dance and Opera Theatre. The following year, Ms Liu took part in a highly successful tour of Taiwan and recorded two CDs. In 1997, she placed third in the Jiangsu Traditional Instrument Competition. In the year 2000, she participated in a large-scale recording of Chinese folk songs and dances. The result, What Nice Jasmine, won the gold award at the Sixth China Art Festival.

In addition to regular performance, she devotes herself to teaching and promoting Chinese music, performing at number of different university campuses and student orchestras. Invited by the International Student Education Center of Nanjing University as a guest lecturer in 1999, she began to introduce the students from all over world to Chinese traditional music and instruments. In addition to the pipa she also plays two other traditional instruments, the zhong ruan and the liu qin.