Val Underwood, Artistic Director / Vocal Faculty
Mr. Underwood is distinctive for his equal skill in the vocal arts and as a pianist. A renowned vocal instructor, he maintains a busy teaching and master class schedule in New York, London and California. His students continually take top honors in major vocal competitions and can be heard in opera houses worldwide. He has been artistic director of the Hawaii Performing Arts Festival since its inception in 2005. He was a full four-year scholarship student at the Manhattan School of Music, where he studied piano with Dora Zaslavsky. He continued piano studies in Argentina with Arminda Canteros. He studied voice with William Horner, Ernest St. John (Jack) Metz, and with the legendary French baritone Martial Singher and served as accompanist in the studios of some of the great singers of our time, including Rose Bampton, Martial Singher, George London and Lotte Lehman. He recorded the classical piano music for and appeared in the Exxon/Mobil Masterpiece Theatre production of Willa Cather’s Song of the Lark on PBS and recently recorded the songs of Ricky Ian Gordon with soprano Jennifer McGregor.Juliana Gondek, Associate Artistic Director / Vocal Faculty
Juliana Gondek has sung with such giants of the music world as Herbert von Karajan, Leonard Bernstein, Luciano Pavarotti, and James Levine, in the world's most famous opera houses, concert and recital halls, and music festivals. Her performances at Carnegie Hall, the Kennedy Center, the Metropolitan Opera, San Francisco Opera, Houston Grand Opera, La Scala, the Edinburgh Festival, with the New York Philharmonic, and with over 100 symphony orchestras worldwide have won her international acclaim. She is renowned for her many prize-winning recordings on major labels, including full recordings of Handel operas with conductor Nicholas McGegan.Professor of Voice and Opera at UCLA since 1997, her students are performing in major opera houses worldwide, and on Broadway. She is in great demand as an international competition judge and as a master teacher throughout the U.S. and in Frankfurt, Hong Kong, Japan, Amsterdam, and at the Geneva Conservatory, Florence's Cherubini Conservatory, and the Shanghai Opera School.
Dr. William Nield Christensen, Vocal Faculty
Dr. Christensen holds the B.A., M.A., M.M. and the D.M.A. from the University of California at Santa Barbara with additional vocal training at the School of Music at Indiana University, the Hochschule für Musik und darstellende Kunst Stuttgart, the Opernschule Stuttgart, and the Chor und Konzertverein International Operastudio Meran. Dr. Christensen has studied voice with Donna Roll, Elizabeth Mannion, Carlos Montané, Luisa Bosabalian, and Elizabeth Mosher. He has worked with Master Teachers James King , David L. Jones, Virginia Zeani, Warren Jones, Anne Epperson, Klaus Nagora, and Martial Singher. Currently a member of the voice faculty at Oklahoma City University, Dr. Christensen has taught voice at the University of California at Santa Barbara, the University of California at Santa Barbara Summer Sessions Young Artist Vocal Institute, Westmont College, the School of Music at Indiana University, the Cate Preparatory School, the Key West Symphony Young Artist Program and happy to return to the faculty of the Hawaii Performing Arts Festival after an absence of four years.A frequent soloist, Dr. Christensen has performed with the Oklahoma City Philharmonic, the Fort Smith Symphony, Rose State Live, Brightmusic Society of Oklahoma, the Key West Symphony Young Artist Program, the Distinguished Artist Series at Oklahoma City University, the Hawaii Performing Arts Festival, the Santa Barbara Chamber Orchestra, the Santa Barbara Choral Society, Grand Opera Santa Barbara, Opera Santa Barbara, the Adriatic Music Festival, and the Würtembergishe Philharmonie Reutlingen. He has sung many leading roles including the Tenor Soloist from Verdi’s Requiem, Siegmund from Die Walküre, Don Josè from Carmen, Max from Der Freischütz, and Cavaradossi from Tosca.
Jennifer McGregor, Vocal Faculty / Stage Director / Coach
Jennifer McGregor began her career in her native city, Sydney, performing leading roles in musical theatre. She joined Opera Australia and performed Adele in Die Fledermaus with Dame Joan Sutherland. She has also performed with Sherrill Milnes and was the first soprano to appear as Lucia in Lucia di Lammermoor following Dame Joan Sutherland. She currently resides in London with her husband and daughter.Aurelien Eulert, Coach
Hailing from Alsace, France, Aurelien Eulert regularly performs throughout Europe and the United States. Aurelien has studied with pianists Jean-Louis Hauenauer, Amy Lin, Fred Karpoff, Peter Serkin and Earl Wild. He has worked for five years as staff pianist for the French Flute festival Flutissimo held every summer since 2005. He performs regularly with opera star Rod Gilfrey, and has been musical director of the Chamber Opera of USC since 2008 and coach / rehearsal pianist with the USC Thornton School of Music Opera program since 2009. Aurelien also performs in professional and university orchestras, under conductors such as James Conlon, Robert Spano, Carl St.-Clair and John Williams. Aurilien holds degrees form the Conservatoire National de Strasbourg, Syracuse University and the University of Southern California, and attended the Tanglewood Music Center in the summer of 2010. He is currently pursuing his DMA degree in Keyboard Collaborative Arts at USC with Kevin Fitzgerald.James Lent, Coach
Pianist and Vocal Coach James Lent received the Doctor of Musical Arts Degree from Yale University, and is currently on the staff at UCLA as a collaborative pianist and vocal coach for the instrumental and vocal music departments. He frequently performs throughout Southern California in venues including the House of Blues, LA Live, the Ritz Carlton Hotel, the Studio City Hilton Hotel, and Hollywood's Boulevard 3. On Friday nights he regularly performs at the oldest piano bar and cabaret in Los Angeles which is located just off Sunset Blvd. at 2538 Hyperion Ave, 90027, where he has performed for 10 years. He has also served on the summer faculty at the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, CA and as last summer at the Hawaii Performing Arts Festival.As a musical director he has directed and played for productions of Edges, Grease, Seussical, Sweet Charity, Willy Wonka, West Side Story, Sondheim Unscripted, for the LA Stage Star Competition and for numerous headlining shows at Sterling's Upstairs at Vitello's in Studio City. As a pianist he has performed for productions of Cabaret, Chess, A Chorus Line, The Fantasticks, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, Little Shop of Horrors, Oklahoma, The Boyfriend, Lady in the Dark, Merrily We Roll Along, and in 2011 for the world premeire of the chamber version of Jonathan Sheffer's Blood on the Dining Room Floor for the National Classical Singers Convention.
As a concerto soloist, Mr. Lent made his Alabama Symphony debut performing Rachmaninoff's Concerto No. 2 to critical acclaim on 24 hours' notice to replace Andre Watts. James' numerous piano awards include prizes in the New York Concert Artists Guild International Competition, the National Chopin Competition, the Washington International Piano Competition at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., the Olga Koussevitsky Piano Competition in New York, the Salon de Virtuosi Awards in New York, the Houston Symphony Ima Hogg National Young Artist Competition, and the title of Top Instrumentalist in the World Championships for the Performing Arts in Burbank, CA. Mr. Lent's other orchestral appearances include the Vancouver Symphony, the Houston Symphony, the Shanghai Philharmonic, the Indianapolis Chamber Orchestra, the Torrence Symphony, Orchestra X, the Ocean City Pops, the Utah Symphony and the Florida West Coast Symphony. His solo recital appearances include performances at Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival in Lubeck, Germany; for the National Chopin Foundation in Miami, a Boston recital debut at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, and at the Cleveland Museum of Art, where he gave the world premiere of a new work written for him by noted contemporary American composer Frederic Rzewski. His performances have been heard on New York's WQXR and National Public Radio's Performance Today. Mr. Lent was invited to participate in the Pierre Boulez Workshop for Instrumentalists and Conductors at Carnegie Hall where he performed with the renowned Ensemble Intercontemporain under the direction of Maestro Boulez in a sold-out concert at Weill Recital Hall. Mr. Lent was a fellowship recipient at the Aspen Music Festival, the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, the Sarasota Music Festival, and the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, where he studied with Jerome Lowenthal.
Mr. Lent is a native of Houston where he attended the Houston High School for the Performing and Visual Arts and the University of Houston. Since completing his Doctor of Musical Arts from Yale in 2001, Mr. Lent has been based in Los Angeles.
Beth Dunnington, Stage Director/Acting for Singers
Beth Dunnington is a singer/actor/director (AEA, SAG, AFTRA) who moved to the Big Island from New York in August of 2007. After graduating with a BFA in Acting from Emerson College, she landed in NYC, performing in musicals, plays, concerts, operas and TV/Radio commercials. She also toured, and performed in numerous regional theater productions. In NYC she studied acting with Uta Hagen, voice with opera singer Gwynne Geyer, and song performance (acting the song) with Larry Moss. HPAF reunites Beth with co-faculty member Robin Buck, with whom she performed in acclaimed Broadway director Tom O’Horgan’s production of “The Magic Flute” at Connecticut Grand Opera. Beth played Papagena to Robin’s Papageno.For six years, Beth was Co-Artistic Director/Co-Founder of “Two Island Productions,” a theater company dually based on the islands of Manhattan and Bermuda, dedicated to creating, nurturing and performing new plays and musicals. The shows were developed in Bermuda and culminated with productions in NY. She also performed in and co-produced Two Island’s four annual “Broadway In Bermuda” concerts at Bermuda’s City Hall Theater, in Hamilton, which combined top Broadway performers with the best of local Bermudian talent.
In Hawaii, Beth directs concerts and musicals, performs, teaches acting, coaches singers, and writes. A favorite project: "Que Suenes Con Las Angelitas," a multi-media theater/dance performance piece that she wrote and starred in at the Kahilu Theatre, in collaboration with dancer Angel Prince. Que Suenes was the debut production of Prince Dance’s professional dance company in Hawaii. Beth and Angel are planning to take Que Suenes to Buenos Aires next season. Beth has also been invited to be a vocal soloist with the Kamuela Philharmonic, a night of Gershwin. She recently directed the "Sondheim and Friends" concert for the Teen Theatre Troupe at the Kahilu, and had the pleasure of working with both HPAF Artistic Director Val Underwood as musical director, and opera singer Jennifer McGregor as vocal coach on that project. Beth is thrilled to join the HPAF faculty.
