The Amherst College Orchestra Online: Our Director

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Mark Lane Swanson - Orchestra Director

California conductor MARK LANE SWANSON enters his fifth season with the AMHERST COLLEGE ORCHESTRA during the academic year 2005-2006. A native of the San Francisco Bay Area, with a concurrent residence in Santa Monica, Mr. Swanson is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Stanford University (History & Economics), a former attorney holding the J.D. from the UCLA School of Law, and has previously taught at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, San Francisco State University, and the Indiana University School of Music in Bloomington. His undergraduate studies in music were pursued at the University of Southern California and the University of California at Berkeley, with an emphasis in composition, and his master’s degree and doctoral coursework in instrumental conducting were completed at IU Bloomington. In addition to the Conservatory, SFSU and IU, Mr. Swanson has directed orchestras at UC Berkeley, Stanford, and UC San Francisco, and served as vocal coach/accompanist/assistant conductor at Utah Festival Opera in Logan and at the IU Opera Theater. At IU he also taught undergraduate opera workshop, the graduate elective course in instrumental conducting, and conducted the New Music Ensemble. He has served as assistant to conductors Jung-Ho Pak, Thomas Baldner, Imre Pallo, David Effron, Michael Morgan, Patrick Summers, Joseph Silverstein, Sergiu Commissiona and many others.

Past Directors

Robert Lane - Assistant Director

Robert Lane graduated magna cum laude with bachelor's degrees in Music and Philosophy from Amherst College in May of 2005. While at Amherst he studied composition with both Lewis Spratlan, and Eric Sawyer. In his senior year he scored two short silent films, "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" and "Their One Love", for small chamber orchestra. As part of this project he studied conducting under Mark Lane Swanson for two semesters and conducted a live performance with the films. He was awarded the "Eric Edward Sundquist Prize" for excellence in musical composition and performance as a result of this work. Robert was involved in choral performance at Amherst , singing in the Amherst College Concert Choir during all four years. He was also a member of the Amherst College DQ, a co-ed a cappella group, for four years and was director during his junior year. Robert hopes to eventually become a teacher and plans to pursue degrees possibly in both music and education.

Past Assistant Directors