Executive Board of Director Biographies

President, Kirk D. Moss
In fall 2010, Dr. Kirk D. Moss joined the faculty of the Lawrence University Conservatory of Music in Appleton, WI, where he serves as an Associate Professor of Music and Chair of the Music Education Department. Prior to his Lawrence appointment, he led orchestral activities and string education at Minnesota State University Moorhead. Under his baton, the MSU-Moorhead Symphony Orchestra tripled in size, and it performed for the 2009 Minnesota Music Educators Association Conference and 2007 North Dakota MEA Conference. He conducts on the summer faculties of the Lamar Stringfield Music Camp (NC) and Interlochen Music Camp (MI).He previously worked as Area Chair in Music Education at Valdosta State University and led the South Georgia String Project.

Moss has appeared as a guest conductor, clinician, or adjudicator in over twenty-five states. He serves as President of the 10,000-member American String Teachers Association and has received three ASTA National Citation for Leadership & Merit awards. He has written for Teaching Music Through Performance in Orchestra––Volumes 2 and 3, Journal of String Research, American String Teacher, Music Educators Journal, andThe Instrumentalist. He also completed a four-year term on the Music Educators Journal Editorial Committee for MENC.

He has twelve years of experience teaching elementary, middle, and high school orchestras. One of his former schools honors him by annually awarding a college string scholarship in his name. School orchestras under his direction performed for The Midwest Clinic (Chicago), Jubilee 2000 (Italy), earned the Gold Award at The San Francisco International Music Festival, the Grand Champion Award at The Orlando Festival of Music, and played three times for the Georgia MEA Conference (including a performance/clinic by the school’s thirty member viola choir).

Moss holds a PhD in Music Education, conducting emphasis, from the University of Florida (Gainesville). In 2008, the UF School of Music awarded him their Alumni Outstanding Achievement Award.He received a Master of Music degree, with a cognate in string pedagogy, from the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music as a graduate teaching assistant for Gerald Doan and a Bachelor of Music degree, with high distinction, from the University of Michigan under the guidance of Robert Culver. Dr. Moss and his wife, Deb, celebrate over twenty years of marriage. They have three children: Bethany, Luke, and Lydia.

President-Elect, Bob Phillips
Bob Phillips, pedagogue, composer, and teacher trainer, is known as an innovator in string education. During his 27 years of teaching in Saline, Michigan, Bob built a string program of more than 700 students that was a national model of excellence in both classical and alternative music. He is an expert in the use of large group pedagogy and in the development of alternative styles for strings. One of today’s leading educational authors and composers, his books and pieces are performed by thousands of string students each year. Phillips is a prolific writer authoring many book series including the ground breaking Philharmonic series and String Explorer. His conducting resume includes professional, all-state, and youth orchestras. Currently he serves as string editor for Alfred Music Publishing. He and his wife, Pam, continue their music education outreach via their clinics at national and state music conferences as well as their leadership roles in ASTA. Within ASTA he has chaired the Alternative Styles competition, served on the advocacy committee and as a clinician for the NOF.

Past President, Jeffrey Solow
Cellist Jeffrey Solow‘s impassioned and compelling cello playing has enthralled audiences throughout the United States and Canada, Europe, Latin America, and the Far East in performances as recitalist, soloist, and chamber musician. Born and raised in Los Angeles, he studied with the distinguished cellist Gabor Rejto and earned a degree in Philosophy magna cum laude from UCLA while studying with and then assisting the legendary Gregor Piatigorsky at USC. His concerto appearances include performances of more than forty different works with orchestras including the Los Angeles Philharmonic (also at the Hollywood Bowl), Japan Philharmonic, Seattle Symphony, Milwaukee Symphony, Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, and the American Symphony (with whom he also recorded) and he has presented recitals throughout the US and in Europe, Japan, Korea, China, and Central and South America. For ten years he toured as a member of The Amadeus Trio and he has been guest artist at many national and international chamber music festivals. His recordings appear on the Columbia, New World, ABC, Centaur, Delos, Kleos, Laurel, Everest and Telefunken labels and he has received two Grammy Award nominations. Jeffrey is active in other areas of music besides performing. Strad, Strings, and American String Teacher magazines have published his articles and reviews and he is president of the Violoncello Society, Inc. (NY) and editor of their newsletter. Recognized as an authority on healthy and efficient cello playing, he is professor of cello and chair of the Department of Instrumental Studies at Temple University in Philadelphia. Before becoming ASTA’s president, he served as president-elect and he twice chaired the National Solo Competition and served on the Executive Board.

Secretary, Benjamin Whitcomb
Benjamin Whitcomb is an associate professor of cello at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater. He is a frequent guest clinician and performer at high schools and summer camps, including the National String Workshop, and universities throughout the country. An expert in the area of string pedagogy, Whitcomb is known for his work in teaching both technique and musicianship. He has published articles in the journals Theoria, Strings, Stringendo, and American String Teacher. He has been a member of ASTA since his college days 20 years ago and has been very active in the organization over the past decade. Within Wisconsin, he has been state president and solo competition chair. He advises an active student chapter at UW-Whitewater. For the AST journal, he is the editor of the Cello Forum, a book reviewer, and an articles editor. He helped revise the current edition of the ASTA Syllabus. He has presented 10 papers at the last seven national conventions. He was on the committee for Special Projects Grants, and is currently chair of the Student Chapters Committee.

Publications Chair, Marilyn Seelman 
Marilyn Seelman is assistant professor of string education at Georgia State University in Atlanta. Prior to this appointment, she served for 12 years as an orchestra teacher in Atlanta public schools and Dekalb county schools. She is past president of Georgia ASTA and has served on a number of ASTA national committees. Seelman conducts the Metropolitan Youth Symphony Orchestra of Atlanta which in 2006 was invited to perform in Beijing, Nanjing and Shanghai by the U.S.-China Cultural and Educational Foundation. MYSO-Atlanta has also performed at the Mid-West Band and Orchestra Clinic in Chicago, Piccolo Spoleto in Charleston, South Carolina, Carnegie Hall and the Georgia Music Educators' Conference in Savannah. Her private viola studio has produced prize-winning students, most notably the 2005 first-prize winner of the Primrose Competition. Many of her students have gone on to win admission to major conservatories such as Curtis, Juilliard and the New England Conservatory. She has presented viola master classes at Vanderbilt University, East China Normal University and presented a session on viola pedagogy at the 2004 ASTA National Conference. Her Member-2-Member article, From Technique-Driven Sound to Sound-Driven Technique was included in the February 2005 issue of the American String Teacher journal.  In addition she has presented string pedagogy sessions at the 2005 Georgia Music Educators' Association entitled, "From Alpha Beta Alpha to Serenade for Strings: A Sequential Approach to Conducting Public School Orchestra Works" and in 2006 presented "Choosing Music for your First School Orchestra." She was a clinician at the 2008 Music Educators' National Conference in Milwaukee. She has conducted the Georgia All-State Orchestra along with East-Tennessee and Alaska All-State Orchestras. Seelman has served on the faculties of Trinity University in San Antonio and the University of New Mexico – Albuquerque as director of orchestra and violist. She received her doctorate of musical arts in conducting from the University of Miami, Coral Gables, Florida, her master of music in viola from Boston University, and her bachelor of arts in music from Humboldt State University in Arcata, California. She is a frequent guest conductor and clinician and continues to perform in Atlanta area orchestras and chamber ensembles.

Member-at-Large, Gail Barnes
Dr. Gail V. Barnes teaches University of South Carolina. She also serves as director of the internationally recognized USC String Project. Her public school teaching experience includes all levels of school orchestra.

She has published articles in American String Teacher, The Journal of String Research, Update, Music Educators Journal and the Journal of Research in Music Education. She edited Applying Research to Teaching and Playing Stringed Instruments, a book that includes work by eighteen leaders in string education and is published by ASTA.

She is currently serving a two-year term as member-at-large on the national board of the American String Teachers Association. 

Member-at-Large, Gerald Klickstein
Gerald Klickstein is professor of music at the University of North Carolina School of Fine Arts and an active classical guitarist. He performs, teaches, and lectures throughout the U.S. and internationally.

Member-at-Large, Andrea L. Meyers
Andrea L. Meyers is currently the director of orchestras at Rock Canyon High School, Rocky Heights Middle School, Buffalo Ridge, Redstone, Timber Trail, and Wildcat Elementary Schools in Douglas County School District RE-1, a south Metro school district of Denver, Colorado. Meyers received a bachelor of music education from the University of Northern Colorado in 1976, and in 1992 received her master of arts from the University of Colorado at Denver. 

A Colorado native, Meyers has enjoyed a professional music career as a cellist, conductor, performer, clinician, adjudicator and music education advocate.  She is currently the immediate past-president (detailed professional biography at www.colo-asta.org) of the Colorado Chapter of the American String Teachers Association, Inc. She has served on numerous committees including the Colorado All-State Orchestra Advisory Board, Continental League Honor Music Festival, Colorado Music Educators Association, and has worked with the Colorado High School Activities Association. She has attended several National ASTA Leadership Summits, all our National ASTA Conferences (except Reno).

Meyers’ professional involvement is significant, performing with numerous orchestras throughout Colorado and currently in her 15th season with the Arapahoe Philharmonic Orchestra. She enjoys a career that combines both performing and teaching strings and plays on a 130-year-old Neuner-Hornsteiner cello. She is listed in Who’s Who Among America’s Teachers, was one of seven teachers selected in Douglas County for the 2004 Thank a Teacher Award, and has received the Outstanding Teacher Award numerous times in Douglas County. In 2005, the Colorado Chapter of the American String Teachers Association, Inc. selected Meyers as the Colorado ASTA Outstanding String Teacher of the Year.  At the Albuquerque, New Mexico National ASTA Conference, Meyers was presented the National 2008 ASTA Outstanding State Leadership Award.

Member-at-Large, Martin Norgaard
Martin Norgaard is the author of the groundbreaking methods Jazz Fiddle Wizard, Getting Into Gypsy Jazz Violin, Jazz Fiddle Wizard Junior, Jazz Viola Wizard Junior and Jazz Cello Wizard Junior Volumes 1 and 2 for Mel Bay Publications. He has composed several orchestra pieces for FJH Music and is the co-author of the Modern Violin Method and the Modern Viola Method with Dr. Laurie Scott. His most recent composition for string orchestra, Molecules and Stars, will be published by Alfred in 2010.

The American String Teachers Association presented Norgaard with a citation for Leadership & Merit for his work as chair of the Alternative Styles Competition committee. His service to ASTA includes co-authoring the Alternative Styles portion of the new ASTA syllabus, serving as committee member for the Alternative Styles conference planning committee and currently serving on the editorial committee for American String Teacher.

Norgaard has more than 20 years of teaching experience and is a registered Suzuki teacher. Norgaard taught jazz and commercial strings at Belmont University and Vanderbilt University in Nashville for six years, and was director of the Belmont Jazz String Quartet and Jazz String Septet, which were featured at the International Association for Jazz Education 2001 conference, MENC 2002 and ASTA 2003. As the current orchestra director at St. Andrew’s Episcopal School in Austin, Texas, Norgaard has seen participation in the string program more than double. Norgaard has presented internationally and nationally in more than