Paul Salamunovich was professor of music and director of choral activities at Loyola University and LMU from 1964 to 1991. He was recruited to Loyola in 1964 by Richard Trame, S.J., who wanted to improve the quality of the university’s choral music. He is credited with raising the level of music-making on campus to the highest form of academic excellence, bringing national renown to the Loyola and LMU Choruses. An expert in Gregorian chant and a master clinician, he has conducted or guest lectured at nearly 1,000 festivals, clinics, and workshops around the world. In 1969, Professor Salamunovich was recognized for his contributions in the field of sacred music, receiving a Papal Knighthood in the Order of St. Gregory the Great from Pope Paul VI. He also received the Distinguished Artist Award from the Music Center of Los Angeles County in 1995; the Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Choral Directors Association in 2000; and a Grammy nomination for recording “Lux Aeterna” and other choral works by Morten Lauridsen. 

Loren G. Wiebe was the Director of Choral Activities at Biola College in La Mirada, California. A Professor of Music there since 1965, he directed the Biola College Chorale and the College Singers, and taught courses related to conducting, choral arts, and led the Chorale on an annual tour that traveled to most of the states in the US. In addition to his responsibilities at the College, Wiebe adjudicated at choir festivals in California and Nevada, and served as the Minister of Music at the Plymouth Congregational Church in Whittier, CA.

After receiving the Bachelor of Music Education Degree from Willamette University, Wiebe studied at the University of California, Los Angeles, and also studied with Helmut Rilling, one of Europe’s foremost conductors.

Perla Warren was born Perla L. Zulueta in Quezon City, Philippines, and graduated from the University of the Philippines Conservatory of Music in 1957. She later came to the United States to continue her music education, receiving degrees at the Jordan Conservatory of Music, Butler University. Perla, was a choral teacher and conductor since 1960, and was frequently sought as a conductor, clinician and adjudicator in jazz and concert choir festivals, and music conferences throughout the US. In the three decades leading up to her death in 2012, she conducted all-state honor choirs and managed many music conferences. Her awards include “Instructor of the Year” at American River College in 1984, “American River College Patron’s Chair” in 1989, “Outstanding Choral Director of California” in 1991, and the California ACDA was honored to bestow upon her the Howard Swan Award in 2001.

During her years in Sacramento, Perla conducted the American River College Chamber Singers and Jazz Choir who received numerous awards under her direction. In addition to her college choirs, she also acted as the interim Chorus Master of the Sacramento Symphony Orchestra in 1992 – 1993 and conducted the Sacramento Master Singers during Ralph Hughes’ sabbatical in 2001. She is much beloved among countless singers and musicians in Northern California who have sung or studied with her.

William Hatcher retired from the University of Iowa in 1999 after 43 years of conducting and teaching choral music. Coming to UI in 1988, he was Director of Choral Activities, mentored Masters and Doctoral students in choral conducting, and conducted many opera productions. Prior to his position at UI, he directed choirs and taught at UCLA, California State University Los Angeles, the University of Washington, Pasadena City College, and Santa Barbara High School. He was born in Iowa and received bachelors and masters degrees in music from the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. 

He was the National President of the American Choral Directors Association from 1991 to 1993, and also served as Chair of the ACDA Endowment Trust. In 1996, he received the Outstanding Alumni Achievement Award from the University of Nebraska at Lincoln. In 2000, he was the recipient of the Howard Swan Award for lifetime achievement by the California ACDA, and in 2006 received the Weston Noble Award for Lifetime Achievement by the North Central ACDA. In 2010 he was the Convention Honoree of the ACDA Western Division.

Dean Semple taught music and was the choir director in Reedley before directing at Porterville High School for 11 years. He was also the choir director at Monache High School the first year the school opened, and taught music and directed for a combined 26 years at Porterville College and Bakersfield College.

Under his direction, the award-winning Chamber Singers of Porterville College and Bakersfield College performed at two ACDA western division and two national conventions.

“The teaching of choral music to high school and community college students has been a totally consuming occupation for me,” Semple said. “The communication of human emotion through music is the element that excites me as well as my students, who then convey the emotion to the audience. When the expression in music is added to beautiful sound, the feelings of mankind are able to transcend generations.”

Charles C. Hirt, was a pioneering USC educator in choral music who became something of a choir leader to the nation, directing thousand-voice ensembles to open and close the 1984 Olympics, inaugurate Disney World and rededicate the renovated Statue of Liberty. Hirt, who founded and chaired USC’s departments of church music and choral music and over 30 years, built the music program of the Hollywood Presbyterian Church from a quartet into eight choirs, died Feb. 3 in Los Angeles.

He was, in the words of William Dehnning, retired chairman of the two USC departments that Hirt founded, and a former student of Hirt’s, “quite possibly…the single greatest representative of all that was powerful and formative in choral music.”

Born in Los Angeles, reared in Glendale and educated at Occidental College and USC, Hirt achieved an international reach with his visionary baton. He was invited to direct festival choirs in Vienna, Belgium, France, England and Japan and to lecture around the world.
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He led the young people’s nationwide chorus, American Youth in Concert, through tours of Europe and led his own groups from USC through Western Europe, then-communist Eastern Europe and Israel.

​Richard Charles Hansen (b. March 5, 1923) was a genuine native of the San Francisco Bay Area, as were his parents before him. Born and raised in San Francisco, he started UC Berkeley, only to be interrupted by WW II. During his three years in the Army Air Corps he trained as an X-ray technician. Returning to UC Berkeley in 1946, now married, he decided teaching music would be right for him, and he completed his undergraduate degree and teaching credential in Music.

His teaching career spanned 35 years, beginning in 1948 in the gold country at Amador County High School in Sutter Creek, CA. “In those days we taught multiple assignments. I taught music, English, and P.E.; coached J.V. baseball and was junior-senior class advisor.”

​In 1951, Hansen was hired at Acalanes High School as the music teacher, starting with 13 members in the school band and 40 in the chorus. In 1952, under his direction, Acalanes was the first Contra Costa County school to present a musical. While teaching at Acalanes, he earned his MA in Education from UC Berkeley in 1958.

Musical opportunities have been plentiful for Marjorie Remington Richard from Kindergarten on where she directed the class playing their percussion instruments at Lafayette School in Salt Lake City. After moving to Berkeley in 1934, in two years she began to accompany her 5th-grade class at the piano daily as they sang. She sang in glee clubs in jr. high, then sang and accompanied glee and a cappella classes directed by Eunice “Mama” Skinner at Berkeley High. Also, at Berkeley High, Marjorie studied music history and theory with Dorah O’Neill. She did so well that when she entered Mills College in fall of 1943, she was able to pass Dr. Howard Brubeck’s Theory Class by exam and go on to study four part counterpoint and orchestration with Darius Milhaud her second year. 

After her junior year at Mills, Marjorie went off to serve a two-year mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Upon returning, she decided to attend U.C. Berkeley where she earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Music, with a minor in English. Soon after she was married, she taught fourth grade in Utah for one year, returned to Berkeley, and then took twelve years off to start raising her five children. During this time she was active teaching piano and playing organ in church, accompanying soloists and a male chorus in Hayward, CA, and joining the AGO (American Guild of Organists).

Robert Evans Holmes, founder and conductor of the Idyllwild Master Chorale and Orchestra, spent more than fifty years conducting, teaching, influencing and inspiring through his love and enthusiasm for quality music. After obtaining a Bachelor’s degree from Otterbein College in Westerville, Ohio, and a Master’s of Music degree from the University of Michigan, he began a long list of achievements in music education at three posts in Ohio – Cleveland, Chillicothe and Dayton; and Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana. Relocating to California in 1946, Bob became director of music at Hollywood High School. At the same time he supervised student teachers at the University Southern California where he became involved with the Idyllwild School of Music and the Arts (ISOMATA), founders Max and Bee Krone. 

Bob Holmes brought experience gained attending Interlochen Music Camp in Michigan and became a co-founder and conductor of the ISOMATA Festival Choirs and Orchestras in 1957.