Registration is now open for the 2025 MTACSD Spring Recitals! We invite you to enter your students in our brand-new recital event, which will be held at the Serra Mesa-Kearny Mesa Library Community Room on March 9, 2025. For more information and to access the registration form, please visit the Spring Recitals page. The registration deadline is February 22. Teachers must login to access the registration form.
Congratulations to all participating students who shared their music with us, and a big thank-you to all the teachers, families and friends who came to support these young performers at the 2024 Popular Music Festival, which was held at the beautiful Cuyamaca College Theatre on Saturday, December 14.
Judges Yuko Maruyama and Taylor Smith wrote comments and suggestions which will be sent by email to the students’ teachers. The students were rewarded with individual certificates and a medal at the end of each recital.
Event co-chairs Chutaphin Yeager and Miriam Cole would like to extend their gratitude to the volunteers who helped out: Irina Bessonova, Kate Iwanami, Valeria Kravchenko, Lea Schmidt-Rogers and Naomi Teran. Your help was very valuable.
The 2024 Popular Music Festival Participating Studios were: Irina Bessonova, Paul Burd, Kate Iwanami, Valeria Kravchenko, Jiwon Lee, Philip Lim, Yu Carole Liu, Yuko Maruyama, Lea Schmidt-Rogers, Anna Stal, and Chutaphin Yeager.
We hope to see you again next year!
Registration for the 2025 Concerto Competition is now open! Teachers must register their students online. Please visit the Concerto Competition page for more details and to access the registration form. Login is required to access the registration form.
Registration for the 2024 Popular Music Festival is now open! Teachers must register their students online. Please visit the Popular Music Festival page for more details and to access the registration form. Login is required to access the registration form.
October 19, 2024, was a gorgeous day at Point Loma Nazarene University where the Sonata Contest in Memory of Jane Smisor Bastien, was held. It was a joy to hear and see so many of our students! We had 237 entrants this year.
I want to thank our incredible team of volunteers! First and foremost, thank you to MTAC member, Dr. Victor Labenske for co-sponsoring our event and helping us to secure Point Loma Nazarene University as our facility. Thank you to Brian Goral and Chutaphin Yeager for organizing our lovely and delicious breakfast and lunch. Thank you to our branch president Yuko Maruyama for helping us communicate with our teachers and student families. To our other MTAC member volunteers: Lisa Bastien Hanss, Sarah Giles, Karlin Labenske, Isabelle Roux, Lea Schmidt-Rogers, Jamie Lin, Hua Wang, April Lin, Dan Yu, and Carole Liu Yu, thank you so much for your time.
Other volunteers: Riley Vickers, Leslie Lucas, Chelsea Clements, Ezra Mizrachi, Elian Mizrachi, Ari Mizrachi, Emily Trinh, Irune Payas Gomez-Arrue, Miyana Luedke, Liyana Luedke and to the several Point Loma Nazarene music students who volunteered: we thank you so much for your time.
To my husband, Eric, thank you for your time, patience, and technical expertise to help organize the event.
We are very grateful to our highly esteemed judges for the day: Joanne Stohs, (Northern San Diego) Mark Mendez, (Montebello)Teri Watson, (Fullerton) Dr. Rob Watson, (Fullerton) Ellen Kim, (Fullerton) Madeline Miller (Valencia) Erika Ramos, (Redlands) Dr. Jane Park (Inland Empire) and Dr. Andres Jaramillo (Riverside) We thank them for their time, dedication, and musical expertise.
Results are posted below. We hope to see everyone again next year!
Sincerely,
Lori Bastien Vickers, Chairperson
| Student Name | Student Name | ||
| Group 1A | Group 5A | ||
| 1st Place | Hana Yee | 1st Place | Alexis Xia |
| 2nd Place | Yen-Jung Chang | 2nd Place | Yeema Liu |
| 3rd Place | Allison Chung | 3rd Place | Vanessa Chen |
| Group 1B | Group 5B | ||
| 1st Place | Yinuo Wang/Danielle Yu | 1st Place | Clara Stone |
| 2nd Place | Madelyn Kim | 2nd Place | Angela Cai |
| 3rd Place | Cheng-Chieh Chang/Clair Jang | 3rd Place | Enyo Martchev |
| Group 2A | Group 6A | ||
| 1st Place | Mananya Debnath | 1st Place | Matthew Chao |
| 2nd Place | Aaron Deng | 2nd Place | Kayla Tsubokawa |
| 3rd Place | Elena Song | 3rd Place | Carter Hoang |
| Group 2B | Group 6B | ||
| 1st Place | Allison Cai | 1st Place | Clarie Chen |
| 2nd Place | Mikaela Lin | 2nd Place | Jack Y Park |
| 3rd Place | Ray Sun | 3rd Place | Jovan Lim |
| Group 3A | Group 7 | ||
| 1st Place | Aden Jung | 1st Place | Henry Sun |
| 2nd Place | George Chang | 2nd Place | Beron Eliezer |
| 3rd Place | Claire Yang | 3rd Place | Euan Lee |
| Group 3B | Group 8 | ||
| 1st Place | Ivy Zhang | 1st Place | Cody Land |
| 2nd Place | Abigail Shen | 2nd Place | Kayla Hanoch/Terrence Zhou |
| 3rd Place | Kye Urgolites | 3rd Place | Michael Zhang |
| Group 4A | Group 9 | ||
| 1st Place | Jovanny Fernandez | 1st Place | Yvonne Gao/Ashley Li |
| 2nd Place | Alina Ruitong Xia | 2nd Place | Nuri Jang/Grace Xu |
| 3rd Place | Olivia Chen | 3rd Place | Nathan Teng |
| Group 4B | Group 10 | ||
| 1st Place | Victor Shen | 1st Place | Luna Lee |
| 2nd Place | Janelle Chen/Lucas Zhang | 2nd Place | Izel Garcia-Hale |
| 3rd Place | Ayla Ma | 3rd Place | Ryan Shi |
| Group 11 | |||
| 1st Place | Eric Feng | ||
| 2nd Place | Emily Chen | ||
| 3rd Place | Darren Hack |
The event day information has been posted on the Sonata Contest page. Please follow the link to view the information.
Registration for the 2024 Sonata Contest is now open! Teachers must register their students online. Please visit the Sonata Contest page for more details and to access the registration form. Login is required to access the registration form.
Thank you for participating in the 2024 H. B. Goodlin Scholarship Competition! We had 114 students from 49 teaching studios competing in five divisions. The auditions were adjudicated by 9 Preliminary Round judges and 6 Finals judges. After the Preliminary Round Audition in a video submission format, 34 Finalists participated in the in-person Finals Audition at Cuyamaca College Theatre and at the Foothills United Methodist Church on Saturday, May 18.
The Instrumental Division Finals auditions were held at the Cuyamaca College Theatre and the Keyboard Division Finals auditions were held at two locations throughout the day. Afterwards, the students and teachers were treated to the piano master class given by Dr. Dmitry Rachmanov, where two selected finalists received instruction on their Goodlin competition pieces.
Thank you to the San Diego Foundation, the William E. Schmidt Foundation and other generous donors for their continued support for this event. Thank you to Cuyamaca College and the Foothills United Methodist Church for hosting the Saturday Finals Competition in their beautiful buildings.
I would like to acknowledge the participating studios for their work in educating our music students in San Diego County: Rowena Asuncion, Yulia Atoyan, Ruslan Biryukov, Dana Burnett, Jessie Chang, Chiyuan Chen, Chia-Ling Chien, Anna Cho, Sun Yung Cho, Emi Clements, Hernan Constantino, Maria Crystalia, Zishan Ding, Karen Follingstad, David Garrett, Eleanor Hum, Emily Hung, Ji-Won Lee, Sunny Lee, Shanshan Li, Shuang Li, April Lin, Inessa Litvin, Yu Carole Liu, Rinna Livshin, Pamela Martchev, Alex Mirolyan, Anders Nelson, Brendan Nguyen, Thuy Nguyen, Alexander Palamidis, Cho-Hyun Park, Wesley Precourt, Frank Renk, Sean Reusch, Leslie Robb, Anna Savvas, Yvonne Shanks, Ory Shihor, Gill Tsai, Irina Tseitlin, Michael Tseitlin, Pasha Tseitlin, Anna Vasilyeva, Sophie Webber, Angela Wu, Elena Yarritu, Dan Yu, and Jia Sheng Zhou.
I would like to thank the current and the past members of the MTAC San Diego Board of Directors, and the members of the H. B. Goodlin Foundation Board. Special thanks to Dr. J. Mitzi Kolar, Jaclyn Summers and Lea Schmidt-Rogers for their perpetual support and guidance for the Goodlin Competition.
Thank you to the 2024 Goodlin Competition Finals Volunteers: Sun Yung Cho, Brian Goral, Ashten Jensen, Ed Litvin, Yu Carole Liu, Marj Osgood, Michele Resnick, Leslie Robb, Larry Rogers, Lea Schmidt-Rogers, Anna Savvas, Risa Schapiro, Xiao-yan Sui, Jaclyn Summers, Elena Yarritu, Chutaphin Yeager, and Dan Yu.
We were privileged to have these distinguished judges for this year’s competition: Isaac Allen, Dr. Wan-Chin Chang, Dr. Ching-Ming Cheng, Dr. Tina Chong, Dr. Andrea Gareffa, Dr. Eloise Kim, Dr. Michael Krikorian, Gail Lew, Pam Monroe, Keith Popejoy, Dr. Dmitry Rachmanov, Dr. Taylor Smith, Mark Teplitsky, Philip Tyler, and Teri Watson.
The results are posted below. We hope to see you again next year!
| Division | Ranking | ID | Name | Award | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Division I Keyboard | 1st Place | 12 | Chloe K. Wang | $500 | |
| 2nd Place | 15 | Angela Cai | $200 | ||
| 3rd Place | 18 | Elena Chen | $100 | ||
| HM | 17 | Chloe Chen | $50 | Masterclass Participant | |
| HM | 16 | Nathan Teng | $50 | ||
| HM | 14 | Jack Y Park | $50 | ||
| HM | 13 | Iris Huiyan Li | $50 | ||
| HM | 11 | Yuhan Jackson | $50 | ||
| Division II Keyboard | 1st Place | 21 | Chloe Li | $1,000 | |
| 2nd Place | 23 | Amy Zhang | $500 | ||
| 3rd Place | 24 | Steven Chen | $200 | ||
| HM | 22 | Lucas Chen | $75 | ||
| HM | 27 | Isabella Yang | $75 | ||
| HM | 26 | William Cheng | $75 | ||
| HM | 28 | Rien Chen | $75 | ||
| HM | 25 | James Rong | $75 | ||
| HM | 19 | Aska Enomoto | $75 | ||
| HM | 20 | Terrence Zhou | $75 | ||
| Division III Keyboard | 1st Place | 30 | Bradley Carpiuc | $3,000 | Chet & June Schmidt Award |
| 2nd Place | 29 | Adora Xiao | $1,000 | ||
| 3rd Place | 34 | Ye-Eun Hong | $500 | ||
| HM | 33 | Sara Sariowan | $100 | ||
| HM | 31 | Huizi Zhong | $100 | Masterclass Participant | |
| HM | 32 | Joanna Xu | $100 | ||
| Junior Instrumental | 1st Place | 1 | Beichen Li | $1,000 | |
| 2nd Place | 3 | Donghyuk Heo | $500 | ||
| 3rd Place | 2 | Tracie Liu | $200 | ||
| Senior Instrumental | 1st Place | 7 | Brianna Baek | $3,000 | Chet & June Schmidt Award |
| 2nd Place | 8 | Saejoon Hong | $1,000 | ||
| 3rd Place | 9 | Carmela Harkins | $500 | ||
| HM | 10 | Caitlin Wang | $100 | ||
| HM | 6 | Julian Wu | $100 | ||
| HM | 5 | Ethan Zhou | $100 | ||
| HM | 4 | Benjamin Luo | $100 |
We had 83 pianists who performed beautifully at the 6th Annual Chopin Festival on April 27, 2024.
Here are the winners:
Division I
Emily Chen, 1st Place
Kai Yi, 2nd Place
Landon Han, 3rd Place
Darren Hack, Honorable Mention
Jayden Wang, Honorable Mention
Euan Lee, Honorable Mention
Daren Ren, Honorable Mention
Division II
Emma Ericson, 1st Place
Astrea Archibald, 2nd Place
Ray Fu, 3rd Place
Aaron Ye, Honorable Mention
Nuri Jang, Honorable Mention
Division III
Khai West, 1st Place
Saya Schmitigal, 2nd Place
Clarie Chen, 3rd Place
Cody Land, Honorable Mention
Sarah Deng, Honorable Mention
Nathan Teng, Honorable Mention
Seoyeon Lee, Honorable Mention
Division IV
Amy Zhang, 1st Place
Henry Sun, 2nd Place
Eric Feng, 3rd Place
Terrence Zhou, Honorable Mention
Division V
Caleb Tang, 1st Place
Ye Eun Hong, 2nd Place
Victoria Chen, 3rd Place
Hayden Crocker, Honorable Mention
Melinda Wang, Honorable Mention
Congratulations to all the winners and their teachers: Irina Bendetsky, Jessie Chang, Sun Yung Cho, Karen Follingstad, Berta Godkin, Mitzi Kolar, Inessa Litvin, Yu Carole Liu, Rinna Livshin, Cho-Hyun Park, Anna Savvas, Viktor Shekhtman, Chetan Tierra, Anna Stal, Gill Tsai, Ting Ting Zhang, Jia Sheng Zhou
We look forward to seeing you next year!
Jessie Chang
MTACSD Chopin Festival Chair
The 2024 MTAC State VOCE Competition was held online via video submission on March 15th. Students became eligible to participate in State VOCE by being selected as “finalists” at the Southern or Northern California Regional VOCE. Congratulations to all our branch students who competed!
Representing seven (7) teachers, a special congratulations goes to these San Diego Branch students who received awards at the 2024 State VOCE Competition!
Intermediate Solo Strings
Alvin Wang, viola – 3rd Place
Ethan Zhou, violin – Honorable Mention
Senior Solo Strings
Brianna Baek, violin – 1st Place Alternate
Intermediate Solo Winds
Rashmi Chelliserry, flute – 3rd Place
Senior Solo Winds
Daniel Torrero, bassoon – 1st Place Alternate
Intermediate Solo Voice
Evonne Fangao, soprano –1st Place
Intermediate Instrumental Ensemble
“California Institute of Music Trio” – 2nd Place
Caitlin Wang, violin; Alvin Wang, viola; Huizi Zhong, piano
“Trio Calzino” – Honorable Mention
Mila Keres, violin; Sophia Slott, cello; Bradley Carpiuc, piano
There are 11 VOCE divisions. VOCE stands for “Voice, Orchestral Instruments, and Chamber Ensembles.”
