The following are the 2011 All-State Conductors. They are sure to inspire and educate our All-State students and all who observe them in rehearsal and performance.

All-State Band Conductors

All-State Orchestra Conductors

All-State Choir Conductors

All-State Band Conductors

5A Symphonic Band Conductor:

Gary Green

Gary Green is Professor of Music and Director of Bands in the Frost School of Music at the University of Miami. In addition to supervising all band activities, he is the conductor of the Frost Wind Ensemble and chair of instrumental performance. He supervises all graduate conducting students in the wind and percussion area.

Prior to coming to Miami, Green served ten years as the University of Connecticut Director of Bands, where he was influential in commissioning and recording new works for winds and percussion, including Symphony No. 3 by David Maslanka and A Cornfield in July and the River by William Penn.

Since his arrival at the University of Miami, Green has continued the commissioning and performance of important new repertoire for the wind ensemble. Green received the Phillip Frost Award for Excellence in Teaching and Scholarship in the Frost School of Music in 2002, and in 2007 he joined the ranks of Frederick Fennell, William Revelli, and John Paynter in the Bands of America Hall of Fame. Green is an active conductor and clinician and has appeared with international, national, and regional bands and intercollegiate bands in most of the fifty states. He has also recently conducted in Taiwan where he appeared with the Republic of China Army Band and the Taiwan National Wind Ensemble as part of the 2005 International Band Association Festival.

5A Concert Band Conductor: 

Kevin Sedatole

Kevin Sedatole serves as Director of Bands, Professor of Music, and Chair of the conducting area at the Michigan State University College of Music. At MSU, Sedatole serves as administrator of the band program totaling over 700 students. He also guides the graduate wind conducting program in addition to conducting the MSU Wind Symphony. Prior to joining MSU, he was Baylor University Director of Bands and Associate Professor of Conducting. Before that, Sedatole was University of Texas Associate Director of Bands, Longhorn Band Director, and Associate Director of Bands at University of Michigan and Stephen F. Austin State University.

Sedatole has conducted performances for the College Band Directors National Association, American Bandmasters Association, Texas Music Educators Association, Michigan School Band and Orchestra Association, and the World Association of Symphonic Bands and Ensembles, as well as performances in Carnegie Hall. He has conducted across the United States and Europe. Most recently the MSU Wind Symphony, under Sedatole’s direction, has given featured performances at the Midwest International Band and Orchestra Clinic and at the convention of the College Band Directors National Association.

Sedatole holds both the doctor of musical arts degree and master of music degree from the University of Texas at Austin. He earned his bachelor of music education degree from Baylor University.

4A Symphonic Band Conductor:

Abel Ramirez

In 2008, Abel Ramirez was appointed Acting Director of Bands at the University Of Illinois School of Music where he presently serves as the Assistant Director of Bands. He has conducted the UI Wind Symphony, Wind Orchestra, and the Harding Symphonic Band. In addition, Ramirez serves as an assistant director for the UI Marching Illini, one of our nation’s premier marching bands. He also teaches courses in advanced instrumental conducting and literature, advanced rehearsal techniques, and score study.

Prior to accepting an invitation to begin graduate study at UCLA in 2000, Ramirez enjoyed a successful career as a Texas 5A high school music educator. In 2003, Ramirez was appointed Director of Bands, Head of the Conducting Division, and Chair of the Instrumental Area at California State University, Los Angeles. As the conductor of the CSULA bands, Ramirez raised the wind ensemble to a level of national prominence, receiving numerous invitations to perform at state and national conferences.

In addition to his academic contributions, Ramirez maintains a highly active schedule as a guest conductor, guest lecturer, music consultant, clinician, and adjudicator for wind bands, orchestras, and marching and jazz bands from across the U.S. and abroad. Ramirez holds a doctor of musical arts degree in conducting from the University of California, Los Angeles.

Jazz Ensemble Conductor:

Shelton Berg

Shelton G. Berg is Dean and Patricia L. Frost Professor of Music at the University of Miami Frost School of Music. A Steinway piano artist who performs in both classical and jazz styles, he was previously the McCoy/Sample Professor of Jazz Studies at USC Thornton School of Music and a past-president of the International Association for Jazz Education (IAJE). In 2000, the Los Angeles Times named him one of three "Educators for the Millennium." In 2003 he was honored as Educator of the Year by the Los Angeles Jazz Society and in 2002 was the recipient of the IAJE Lawrence Berk Leadership Award.

Berg has appeared as a performer and lecturer throughout the U.S., Canada, China, Mexico, Europe, Israel, Japan, Romania and Venezuela. The All Music Guide said, "Shelly Berg is one of the finest pianists around in the early 21st century playing modern mainstream jazz."

Berg has performed, recorded, and arranged with such jazz luminaries as Patti Austin, Nancy Wilson, Bobby McFerrin, Ray Brown, Eddie Daniels, Arturo Sandoval, Clark Terry, and Bill Watrous. He has orchestrated for Chicago, Kiss, Richard Marx, Joe Cocker, Elliott Smith, Lou Rawls, Steve Miller, and most recently for Ray Sings, Basie Swings (Ray Charles/Count Basie Orchestra) and Arturo Sandoval’s A Time for Love (Concord). He has written for television, film, and for orchestras, including the Royal Philharmonic and the American Symphony.

All-State Orchestra Conductors

Symphony Orchestra Conductor 

Guillermo Figueroa

Guillermo Figueroa is the Music Director of the New Mexico Symphony and the Music in the Mountains Festival in Colorado as well as Principal Guest Conductor of the Puerto Rico Symphony. As a guest conductor in the U.S., he has appeared with the orchestras of New Jersey, Memphis, Phoenix, Colorado, Berkeley, Tucson, Toledo, Fairfax, San Jose, New York City Ballet, and the Juilliard Orchestra. International appearances include the National Symphony of Mexico, Iceland Symphony, Baltic Philharmonic (Poland), and the Orquesta de Córdoba in Spain, and will make his debut with the Toronto Symphony in April. Figueroa has collaborated with many leading artists, including Itzhak Perlman, YoYo Ma, Hilary Hahn, Placido Domingo, Joshua Bell, Olga Kern, Janos Starker, James Galway, Midori, the Emerson String Quartet, Pepe Romero, and Elmar Oliveira.

A renowned violinist, he was Concertmaster of the New York City Ballet and is a Founding Member of the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra. Figueroa has given the world premieres of four violin concertos written for him: Concertino for Violin and Orchestra by Mario Davidovsky, at Carnegie Hall with Orpheus; Double Concerto by Harold Farberman with the American Symphony at Lincoln Center; Violin Concerto by Miguel del Aguila with the New Mexico Symphony; and Insula, Suite Concertante for Violin and Strings, by Ernesto Cordero with the Solisti di Zagreb. He appears regularly at the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Music in the Vineyards in California, and Music from Angel Fire.

Philharmonic Orchestra Conductor 

Anthony Maiello

Anthony J. Maiello received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in music from Ithaca College. He also studied at the National Conducting Institute in Washington, D.C. under the direction of Leonard Slatkin, former Musical Director of the National Symphony Orchestra. Maiello also serves as a Cover Conductor for the National Symphony Orchestra at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

Maiello’s many professional credits include clinician, adjudicator, and guest conductor of all-state, all-state sectional, regional, district, all-county, and all-city ensembles, with appearances throughout the U.S., Canada, Mexico, England, Europe, The Netherlands, and The Bahamas. He conducted musical activities for the Gold Medal Ceremonies at the 1980 Olympics in Lake Placid, New York.

Maiello’s academic experience includes extensive teaching in the public schools. He served as Professor of Music and Chairman of Performance at the Crane School of Music, Potsdam College of SUNY in New York, where his duties included advanced instrumental conducting, applied clarinet, woodwind and percussion techniques, and conductor of the Crane Wind Ensemble. He is the author of Conducting: A Hands-On Approach, Conducting Nuances: Little Things Mean A Lot, and co-author of The 21st Century Band Method.

Maiello travels widely presenting clinics, lectures, and workshops, and guest conducting and adjudicating numerous music festivals. He is presently Professor of Music and Director of Instrumental Studies at George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia where he teaches several conducting courses.

String Orchestra Conductor

Philip Mann

Hailed by the BBC as a "talent to watch out for who conveys a mature command of his forces," American conductor Philip Mann is quickly gaining a reputation as an "expressively graceful yet passionate" artist on three continents. Newly appointed as the Arkansas Symphony Orchestra Music Director, he also serves as the San Diego Symphony’s Assistant Conductor and formerly an American Conducting Fellow, where he conducted over 150 performances.

The winner of the Vienna Philharmonic’s Karajan Fellowship at the Salzburg Festival, he has served as cover conductor for the Cleveland Orchestra and as the Schmidt Conducting Fellow of the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra. Mann has worked with leading artists such as Joshua Bell and given world premieres of major composers, including John Corigliano. He maintains a lively schedule as a guest conductor, having ­conducted at New York’s Avery Fischer Hall and London’s Barbican Center. Active in symphonic, operatic, and new music repertories, he has served as Music Director of the Oxford City Opera and Oxford Pro Musica Chamber Orchestra.

Trained as a violinist, Mann has appeared as a soloist, concertmaster, and chamber player in the U.S. and abroad. He is the recipient of numerous awards and commendations from several cities and the state of California.

All-State Choir Conductors

Mixed Choir Conductor:

Brady Allred

Artistic Director and Conductor of the Salt Lake Choral Artists in Salt Lake City, Utah, Brady R. Allred has developed an international reputation for excellence. Under his direction the Salt Lake Choral Artists, a community choir of 200 singers, has achieved critical acclaim for their innovative concerts and Summer Choral Institute program. Allred was formerly Professor of Music and Director of Choral Studies at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City and the first recipient of the Ellen Neilson Barnes Presidential Endowed Chair for Choral Studies at the University of Utah.

Known worldwide for their exquisite choral singing, Allred’s ensembles have been invited to participate in major festivals and have received honors including the grand prize at the Florilège Vocal de Tours International Choir Competition, grand prize at the European Grand Prix International Choir Competition, and first prize at the Marktoberdorf International Chamber Choir Competition. In 2011, he will appear at the ACDA national convention in Chicago and the World Choral Symposium in Argentina with the University of Utah Singers.

Allred has been a guest conductor for the Schumann Chamber Orchestra in Italy, the Wroclaw Philharmonic in Poland, the Symphonic Orchestra of the Russian Ministry of Defense, and the Salt Lake Mormon Tabernacle Choir. He has also performed with the Robert Shaw Festival Singers and the Oregon Bach Festival Chorus. He has given conducting workshops and adjudicated in Spain, Germany, Slovenia, Ireland, Indonesia, and the Philippines.

Allred earned his master of music and doctor of musical arts in conducting degrees from the Eastman School of Music, and his bachelor of music degree in theory/composition and flute performance from Brigham Young University.

Women's Choir Conductor:

Joshua Habermann

A native of California, Joshua Habermann is a graduate of the University of Texas at Austin, where he completed doctoral studies in conducting with Craig Hella Johnson. As professor of music at San Francisco State University from 1996 to 2008, he coordinated the choral program and led the SFSU Chamber Singers to international engagements in France, Germany, the Czech Republic, Cuba, and China. National invitations include multiple concerts for the California Music Educators Convention and a performance for the American Choral Directors Association in 2008.

Habermann’s long association with the San Francisco Symphony Chorus began in 1991, when he joined the chorus as a singer. From 1996 to 2006 he was assistant to Vance George, and in 2006–2007 he prepared the chorus for concerts with Michael Tilson Thomas and Charles Dutoit.

In fall 2008, Habermann was named Director of the Choral Studies Program at the University of Miami Frost School of Music, where he directs the Frost Chorale. He is also director of the Master Chorale of South Florida, a community-based chorus dedicated to the performance of choral-orchestral masterworks.

In 2009, he was appointed Music Director of the Santa Fe Desert Chorale, a 24-voice professional chamber choir that annually presents a five-week summer festival and a two-week winter season. As a singer (tenor) he has performed regularly with the Oregon Bach Festival Chorus, and Conspirare, a professional chorus based in Austin.

Men's Choir Conductor:

Paul Rardin

University of Michigan Associate Director of Choirs Paul Rardin teaches undergraduate conducting and conducts the Men’s Glee Club, University Choir, and Michigan Youth Chamber Singers. He previously taught at Towson University in Maryland where, for twelve years, he served as Director of Choirs. Rardin’s choirs have performed in such venues as Boston Symphony Hall, Meyerhoff Symphony Hall, The Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts, and Washington National Cathedral, and have appeared with the Kirov Orchestra of the Mariinsky Theatre, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, and Baltimore Choral Arts Society. Rardin is a graduate of Williams College and the University of Michigan, where he received his master’s degree in composition and doctoral degree in conducting. He has served as guest conductor for state and regional high school choral festivals in ten states and has presented clinics for state, regional, and national conferences of ACDA. In 2009 he conducted the MENC All-Eastern HS Choir in Providence, R.I. His settings of spirituals and folk songs are published by Santa Barbara Music Publishing, and his articles, many on the topic of contemporary music, have appeared in the ACDA publications Choral Journal, Troubadour, and Bel Canto.