Artists

Assistant Principal Oboe Philip Ross joined the St. Louis Symphony in 2005. He holds degrees from the Eastman School of Music and the Chicago College of Performing Arts where he studied with Richard Killmer and Alex Klein respectively.  Philip served as Acting Co-Principal Oboe with the St. Louis Symphony for two seasons, 2012-13 and 2013-14, and has appeared as soloist on several occasions, most recently in January of 2015 with Nicholas McGegan conducting. He has made appearances as guest principal oboe of the San Francisco Symphony, toured with the Chicago Symphony, and recorded with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. He also takes part in the St. Barts Music Festival. Philip is a native of Jonesboro Arkansas where his father, Dan Ross, has been the Professor of Oboe at Arkansas State University in Jonesboro since 1968. Philip enjoys performing with his wife and fellow oboist, Laura. For relaxation Philip enjoys fly-fishing and golfing. Philip and Laura have two daughters.  

David DeRiso joined the bass section of the St. Louis Symphony in 2005. Originally from New York City, David DeRiso received his Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degrees from Rice University where he studied with Timothy Pitts and Paul Ellison. After completing his education at Rice, David spent one year playing in the New World Symphony in Miami Beach, a training ground for young musicians.  

Soprano Miran Halen has garnered widespread praise as a versatile singer of opera, symphony, chamber and recital music. Ms. Halen has performed at The Grand Center Gala, St. Louis Symphony fund raising concerts, UMSL concert series, the Art and Education Gala, and the Sheldon Classical Series. She performs regularly with Chamber Music Society of St. Louis as well as the Innsbrook Institute Summer Music Academy and Festival and the Booneville Missouri River Music Festival. After receiving a Music Performance and Science degree from University of Houston, she won a position in the Houston Grand Opera performing in more than 30 productions. Distinguished performance occasions have included a concert gala for former Missouri Governor Matt Blunt and additional appearances at recitals for international diplomats and politicians at the Missouri State Capitol. Ms. Halen was often featured in the KFUO Classical Radio Broadcasting Series “From The Garden Live” and at the 2005 St. Andrew’s Gala. A passionate advocate for musical education, she has participated as a performer in benefit concerts for the world-renowned Aspen Music Festival and helped spearhead a benefit celebrating the 30thanniversary of the highly acclaimed St. Louis Children’s Choir. Ms. Halen serves on the advisory board of Chamber Music Society of St. Louis.  

Noted for performances that combine innate musicality with interpretive insight, David Loebel joined the faculty of New England Conservatory as Associate Director of Orchestras in 2010 following an eleven year tenure as Music Director and Conductor of the Memphis Symphony Orchestra. Prior to his appointment in Memphis, he enjoyed a decade-long association with the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra, serving as Associate and then Associate Principal Conductor, as well as Artistic Director of its summer festival, Classics in the Loop. He has also been Associate Conductor of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. As a guest conductor, David Loebel has appeared with the Philadelphia Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Seattle Symphony Orchestra, and Brooklyn Philharmonic Orchestra. He has also conducted the symphony orchestras of Baltimore, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, New Jersey, and Syracuse, the North Carolina Symphony, the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, the Kansas City Symphony, the Louisville Orchestra, Symphony Silicon Valley, the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra and the Calgary Philharmonic, among many others. Internationally, Maestro Loebel has conducted the Taipei Symphony Orchestra, the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra and toured Australia to great acclaim, leading the Sydney, Adelaide, Queensland, Western Australian, and Tasmanian Symphony Orchestras. He has led family and educational concerts at Carnegie Hall with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s, the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra and the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra. Operatic engagements include productions at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis and Opera Memphis and he has appeared at summer festivals including the Grant Park Music Festival, Eastern Music Festival, Sewanee Summer Music Festival and Woodstock Mozart Festival. Honored five times by ASCAP for his adventurous programming, David Loebel is a recipient of the prestigious Seaver/National Endowment for the Arts Conductors Award. An equally articulate communicator off the podium, he is a popular speaker and hosted The Memphis Symphony Radio Hour on public radio station WKNO-FM. His writings on music include program notes for Telarc recordings. With the Grant Park Symphony Orchestra and Chorus he recorded the critically acclaimed CD Independence Eve at Grant Park. Active throughout his career in the training of young musicians, Maestro Loebel has been Conductor-in-Residence of the New World Symphony and Music Director of the Saint Louis Symphony Youth Orchestra. He has also conducted the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, the National Repertory Orchestra, and at conservatories including The Juilliard School, Cleveland Institute of Music, San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and Indiana University. As a mentor to conductors, he has served on the faculties of the League of American Orchestras’ Conducting Workshop, the Kennedy Center’s National Conducting Institute, and the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. A native of Cleveland, David Loebel is a graduate of Northwestern University and a recipient of its Alumni Merit Award.

Megan Stout performs regularly with the St. Louis Symphony and served as Acting Principal Harp for the 2012-2013 season. She has been a frequent performer with other renowned ensembles such as the Philadelphia Orchestra and the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra. She began her studies at the age of nine in Philadelphia, where she studied with the principal harpist of the Philadelphia Orchestra, Elizabeth Hainen. Megan graduated from the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University where she holds both a Bachelor of Music and Master of Music in Harp Performance. While at Indiana University she won several competitions such as the American String Teacher’s Association’s National Competition (Harp), and was a prizewinner twice in the National Society of Arts and Letters. Megan enjoys chamber music and, in addition to performing with Chamber Music Society of St. Louis, has been involved with the St. Louis Symphony Concert Series at the Pulitzer Foundation for the Arts, Symphony Tuesdays at Tower Grove Park and Chamber Project St Louis.

Charles Metz studied piano at Penn State University, beginning his harpsichord studies through private lessons with the legendary Igor Kipnis. In the process of earning a Ph.D. in Historical Performance Practice at Washington University in Saint Louis Missouri, he studied with Trevor Pinnock. More recently, Charles has worked with Webb Wiggins and Lisa Crawford at the Oberlin Conservatory. In addition to performing with Chamber Music Society of St. Louis, he plays regularly in Saint Louis with ensembles including The Bach Society of Saint Louis, Collegium Vocale and the Saint Louis Baroque. Charles has performed across the country with recent concerts in Chicago IL, Saratoga NY, Bennington VT, Louisville, KY and Liberty Mo in their Baroque music JEMS Fest. In April 2010, he performed a solo recital at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C. and in October 2011 performed a solo recital and Masterclass on Elizabethan Virginal Music at Oberlin Conservatory. He also recorded the “Tisdale Virginal Book”, music of the Elizabethan period, on his 400 year old Italian Virginal which will be released as a CD in 2012. His international appearances include performances in The Netherlands, Germany and Costa Rica.

Alla Voskoboynikova has held the position of Director of Keyboard Studies at the University of Missouri-St. Louis since 2004. Before moving to the United States in 1996, Alla Voskoboynikova was a pianist and vocal coach at the Kiev Opera and Ballet Theater in Ukraine. She received her Bachelor’s Degree in Piano Performance from the Music College in Voronezh, Russia and her Master’s Degree in Piano Performance from the Gnessins Academy of Music in Moscow, Russia. Her teachers were Oleg Milman and Lina Bulatova (student of Elena Gnessina and Henry Neihaus). Alla was an accompanist in the Tchaikovsky Competition in 1994 and has performed numerous solo recitals along with chamber music concerts in several European countries. Since moving to the United States, Alla’s collaborations have included concerts with numerous members of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra including Concertmaster David Halen and cellist, Bjorn Ranheim as well as performances with the Arianna String Quartet, and soprano Miran Halen. She serves as a coach for the Union Avenue Opera Company as well as the Opera Theatre of St. Louis. In 1998, Alla performed at Carnegie Recital Hall with flutist Brenda Hagni and in 2002, she performed Rachmaninov’s Second Piano Concerto with the Webster University Symphony Orchestra. In February 2004, Alla was the Russian coach for the St. Louis Symphony performance of Sergei Prokofiev’s Alexander Nevsky and coached the St. Louis Symphony Chorus for the performance of Sergei Rachmaninov’s Vespers in November 2006. As a member of a duo, Alla performed John Adams’ Halleluiah Junction with pianist Orli Shaham in 2008. In the past several years, Alla has organized a series of thematic chamber music recitals, including a commemoration of Dmitri Shostakovich’s 100-year anniversary, a commemoration of Felix Mendelssohn’s 200-year anniversary, and a piano and winds recital, among others. Alla is a passionate teacher. Her students regularly perform at prestigious St. Louis venues such as The Sheldon Concert Hall, The Ethical Society of St. Louis, Powell Symphony Hall, Touhill Performing Arts Center, and others. They also participate in MMTA and MTNA auditions as well as regional concerto competitions. In 2012, Alla organized a concert tour of Russia which will include a series of piano recitals in St. Louis’s sister city of Samara. As part of a cultural exchange between the two cities, her students John Nuckols, Tom Winkler, Daniel Dickson and Daniel Kuehler performed at the Samara Philharmonic Hall and the Samara Social Humanitarian Academy. Alla resides in St. Louis with her husband Ilya Litvin, Russian-born trumpet player and teacher and their son, Boris.

Internationally acclaimed conductor Leonard Slatkin is Music Director Laureate of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra (DSO), Directeur Musical Honoraire of the Orchestre National de Lyon (ONL), Conductor Laureate of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra (SLSO), and Principal Guest Conductor of the Orquesta Filarmónica de Gran Canaria (OFGC). He maintains a rigorous schedule of guest conducting throughout the world and is active as a composer, author, and educator. Slatkin has received six Grammy awards and 35 nominations. His latest recordings are Jeff Beal’s The Paper Lined Shack on Supertrain Records and Slatkin Conducts Slatkin, a compilation of pieces written by generations of his musical family, including three of his own compositions, on Naxos Records. Naxos has also recently remastered and reissued audiophile editions of his recordings of Gershwin’s and Rachmaninov’s orchestral works (with the SLSO) for Vox. Other Naxos releases include works by Saint-Saëns, Ravel, and Berlioz (with the ONL) and music by Copland, Rachmaninov, Borzova, McTee, and John Williams (with the DSO). In addition, he has recorded the complete Brahms, Beethoven, and Tchaikovsky symphonies with the DSO (available online as digital downloads). The 2023-24 season includes engagements with the Oregon Symphony, Orquesta de València, Orquesta Sinfónica de Radio Televisión Española, Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra (Ireland), ONL, SLSO, Manhattan School of Music Symphony Orchestra, Carnegie Mellon University Philharmonic, Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, George Enescu Philharmonic Orchestra, OFGC, Prague Symphony Orchestra, and Bilbao Orkestra Sinfonikoa. A recipient of the prestigious National Medal of Arts, Slatkin also holds the rank of Chevalier in the French Legion of Honor. He has received the Prix Charbonnier from the Federation of Alliances Françaises, Austria’s Decoration of Honor in Silver, the League of American Orchestras’ Gold Baton Award, and the 2013 ASCAP Deems Taylor Special Recognition Award for his debut book, Conducting Business. His second book, Leading Tones: Reflections on Music, Musicians, and the Music Industry, was published by Amadeus Press in 2017, followed by Classical Crossroads: The Path Forward for Music in the 21st Century (2021). Two volumes of a new series comprising essays that supplement the score-study process are scheduled for release by Rowman & Littlefield in 2024. He is also working on several new compositions. Slatkin has held posts as Music Director of the New Orleans, St. Louis, and National symphony orchestras, and he was Chief Conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra. He has served as Principal Guest Conductor of London’s Philharmonia and Royal Philharmonic, the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, the Los Angeles Philharmonic at the Hollywood Bowl, and the Minnesota Orchestra. He has conducted virtually all the leading orchestras in the world, including: New York Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra, Boston Symphony Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, all five London orchestras, Berlin Philharmonic, Munich’s Bayerischer Rundfunk, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Orchestre de Paris, Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra, and Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. Slatkin’s opera conducting has taken him to the Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Washington National Opera, Opera Theatre of St. Louis, Santa Fe Opera, Vienna State Opera, Stuttgart Opera, and Opéra Bastille in Paris. Born in Los Angeles to a distinguished musical family, he began his musical training on the violin and first studied conducting with his father, followed by Walter Susskind at Aspen and Jean Morel at Juilliard. He makes his home in St. Louis with his wife, composer Cindy McTee. Visit Leonard on the WEB      

Since having been chosen at age nineteen as the youngest competitor of the 1985 Van Cliburn Competition, Patti Wolf has performed as a soloist, recitalist, and chamber musician. She has collaborated with distinguished artists, such as cellist Lynn Harrell, pianist Jon Kimura Parker, flutist Carol Wincenc, violinists Ilya Kaler, Glenn Dicterow, Andrés Cárdenas, David Halen, soprano Erin Wall, horn soloists Dale Clevenger and Hermann Baumann. Patti has been a regular performer with Chamber Music Society of S t. Louis since 2010. Previously Patti was a collaborative pianist at the Shepherd School of Music, Rice University and served on the faculties of Washington University and Maryville University in St. Louis. She has performed and given master classes at the University of Michigan, Northwestern University, Westminster College, Clemson University, Eastman School of Music, University of Iowa, University of Houston, University of Texas-Austin, the Chautauqua Piano Program and the Juilliard School of Music. In Chautauqua, New York, she played a duo recital with pianist Peter Frankl where she performs frequently with ensembles such as the Audubon Quartet, the Chautauqua Wind Quintet and the Chautauqua String Quartet. In 2017, Patti joined the faculty at the University of Texas, Austin, Butler School of Music, as Assistant Professor of Practice in collaborative piano performing regularly with faculty members. She was a guest recently with the Austin Symphony, San Antonio Symphony, Lyrica Baroque in New Orleans, and Heights Arts in Cleveland, OH, performing with musicians of the Cleveland Orchestra.  

Susan Slaughter joined the trumpet section of the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra in l969. Two years later she was appointed to the position of Principal Trumpet, becoming the first woman ever to be named Principal Trumpet of a major symphony orchestra. A graduate of Indiana University, she received the coveted performer’s certificate in recognition of outstanding musical performance. Her instructors include Herbert Mueller, Bernard Adelstein, Arnold Jacobs, Robert Nagel, Claude Gordon and Laurie Frink. Prior to accepting her position in St. Louis, Ms. Slaughter spent two years as Principal Trumpet of the Toledo Symphony. She appears regularly in area recitals and religious programs, and has been a frequent soloist with the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra. Ms. Slaughter has served on the faculty of the Grand Teton Orchestra Seminar and the National Orchestra Institute. She is presently on the faculty of The Texas Music Festival and Aspen Music Festival. Ms. Slaughter has received numerous awards and recognition over the years including nomination by Ladies Home Journal for its annual Woman of the Year award, a special Leadership Award in the Arts from the Young Women’s Christian Association, the American Federation of Musicians, Local 2-197 Owen Miller Award for loyalty, dedication and fairness in actions and deeds, the Arts and Education Council Award for Excellence in the Arts. In 1991 she performed the National Anthem for game three of the World Series at the invitation of then baseball commissioner Fay Vincent. In 1992 Ms. Slaughter founded the International Women’s Brass Conference, an organization dedicated to provide opportunities and recognition for women brass musicians. As a fund-raising effort to support that institution, she organized and produced the very popular Holiday Brass Concerts, performed each December, which are now in their second decade. In 1996, Ms. Slaughter founded Monarch Brass, an all-women’s brass ensemble, which has toured in the United States and Europe to critical acclaim and released its first CD titled Monarch Brass. Ms. Slaughter retired as Principal Trumpet from the Saint Louis Symphony in 2010.