AVAS Music Staff
JoAnn Kulesza, Conductor, Music Director
Ms. Kulesza is the Music Director of Opera Programs at the Peabody Conservatory and began her career at the Hochschule Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria, as coach/accompanist in opera and Lied. Professionally, she has worked as rehearsal accompanist, chorus master and assistant conductor for the Washington National Opera, Wolf Trap Opera Company, Baltimore Opera Young Artist Program, Chicago Symphony Chorus, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Compania Lirica Nacional (Costa Rica), and the Lyric Opera Center for American Artists. She has also assisted Maestro Loren Maazel for two of his Chateauville Chamber Opera Projects.
While much of her work inevitably takes place in the background, coaching singers and preparing productions for other conductors, she made her Peabody opera conducting debut in 2003. She continues in that capacity today, and has many productions and several world premieres to her credit; recent productions include Peabody's Turn of the Screw and The Yellow Wallpaper and Opera Vivente's Orpheus in the Underworld. She conducts Baldwin-Wallace Conservatory’s production of Orpheus and returns to Opera Vivente in May, conducting Albert Herring.
A recipient of the Johns Hopkins University Excellence in Teaching award, Ms. Kulesza has conducted master classes and guest residencies at various institutions around the country and is much in demand as a clinician and educator. She has served as guest faculty at the Pittsburgh Opera Center, vocal coach at the University of Connecticut, as well as the Baltimore Opera Young Artist Program.
As a collaborative pianist, Ms. Kulesza has played chamber music and vocal recitals throughout Europe and the United States, as well as accompanying master classes for such artists as Walter Berry, Edda Moser, Renata Scotto, and Placido Domingo.
She presently serves as Music Director of the Opera/Musical Theatre section of the two-week Fairbanks Summer Arts Festival (AK). Ms. Kulesza has also been Chorus Master for the Washington National Opera, Wolf Trap Opera Company, as well as assistant for the Lyric Opera Chorus (Chicago). She will conduct DON GIOVANNI for Opera Omaha and LE VILLI for Opera Vivente in 2011.
A choral music enthusiast, she feeds her love of choral music as director of two choirs at Eastport United Methodist Church in Annapolis, MD, and as director of the Arundel Vocal Arts Society.
Dana Nichole Scott, Pianist, Accompanist
A talented musician, Dana Nichole Scott is a collaborative pianist and conductor in the Washington, DC and Baltimore area. She recently conducted the premier of Momia in el Closet at the Gala Theatre in DC and was host and accompanist for Washington National Opera’s High School Institute at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.
Ms. Scott has worked as an accompanist for many theatrical productions. She performed Suor Angelica with Little Patuxent Opera Institute (Columbia, MD), Magic Flute with Opera AACC (Severna Park), Gallentry with Harbor Opera at the Walters Art Museum, and was rehearsal pianist for The Boys from Syracuse with Center Stage (Baltimore, MD). At the Kennedy Center, Ms. Scott worked as a rehearsal pianist with Jerry Herman, Christine Baranski, and Jeff McCarthy in Mame. She served two seasons as the Music Director for FBN Production’s The Three Little Pigs, an opera outreach program (Columbia, SC). Ms. Scott also performs with Annapolis Children’s Choral, Arundel Vocal Arts Society, Bach in Baltimore, and Opera AAACC. She can also be heard at Germano’s Trattoria with Ms. Branda Lock, and Emmanuel United Methodist Church where she works as pianist and organist.
Ms. Scott received high collaborative marks in the Vocal Arts Society Competition (D.C.), and was a semi-finalist in the 2007 William Garrison Piano Competition. As a soloist Ms. Scott is a winner of the Sidney DeKnight Piano Competition (PA), a national competition committed to promoting aspiring ethnic musicians. She frequently appeared as a soloist with the Imperial Symphony Orchestra in Lakeland, Florida and was a recitalist on the Mary Baker Eddy Library Millenium Series, and the James George Charitable Trust Series in Boston, MA.
Ms. Scott serves as piano instructor, jazz ensemble director, and staff accompanist for the Saint James School in Hagerstown, MD. She also maintains a small private studio in the Laurel area.
Ms. Scott received her Master of Music degree in Ensemble Arts: Vocal Accompanying from Peabody with Eileen Cornett. She completed her Bachelor of Music in Piano Performance from New England Conservatory of Music.