Founding Artistic Director

Jeff von der Schmidt, conductor, is Founding Artistic Director of Southwest Chamber Music and the LA International New Music Festival. A two-time Grammy Award-winning conductor, he has led numerous performances of standard 20th century composers as well as world and local premieres of new work. Mr. von der Schmidt has received nine Grammy nominations, including consecutive 2003 and 2004 Grammy Awards as conductor for the Complete Chamber Music of Carlos Chávez Volumes 1 and 2. His performance was nominated for Best Classical Album in 2005 for the Complete Chamber Music of Carlos Chávez, Volume 3 by both Grammy and Latin Grammy. Past projects include leading the six-week 2010 Ascending Dragon Music Festival in Hanoi, Saigon, Pasadena and Los Angeles for the U.S. State Department. Ascending Dragon was the largest cultural exchange in the history of Vietnam and the United States. In 2009 he led Southwest Chamber Music at the Guadalajara FIL Festival alongside the largest Spanish language book festival in the world. Past international exchanges include a complete cycle of the chamber music of Carlos Chávez with Southwest Chamber Music and the Tambuco Percussion Ensemble at the UNAM Center in Mexico City in May 2007. In 2006, Mr. von der Schmidt conducted at the Hanoi Opera House, 2006 World Culture Expo at Angkor Wat, and the Royal University of Fine Arts in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, with Aura, a major new composition by Grawemeyer Award-winning composer Chinary Ung. His successful 2003 performance at the Library of Congress, with soprano Phyllis Bryn-Julson in Richard Felciano’s An American Decameron, was greeted with a standing ovation. He has led cycles of the Los Angeles works of Arnold Schoenberg at Cooper Union in New York City and at the Arnold Schoenberg Center in Vienna, where Southwest Chamber Music was the first American ensemble to perform at the Center since its relocation from the University of Southern California. Mr. von der Schmidt received the Henri M. Kohn Award as the outstanding student at the Tanglewood Music Festival in 1980 from Gunther Schuller and Seiji Ozawa, and studied French horn with Roland Berger of the Vienna Philharmonic, holding a certificate in German from the University of Vienna. He has lectured on music at the Getty Center, Los Angeles Philharmonic Green Umbrella Series, Arizona State University, University of Colorado, Ohio State University, Royal University of Fine Arts in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, the Vietnam National Academy of Music, and the Hochschule für Musik in Lübeck, Germany.

Founding Executive Director

Jan Karlin, violist, is the Founding Executive Director of Southwest Chamber Music and the LA International New Music Festival. She is a recipient of a James Irvine Foundation "Fund for Leadership Advancement" Award to outstanding Executive Directors in California. Ms. Karlin won a 2004 Grammy Award as producer for Southwest Chamber Music’s recording of the Complete Chamber Music of Carlos Chavez, Volume II and received two Latin Grammy nominations as producer for William Kraft's Encounters and Gabriela Ortiz' Energia. She also served on the inaugural Grammy Museum Education Advisory Committee. She produced Southwest Chamber Music's 2010 Ascending Dragon Music Festival and Cultural Exchange for the U.S. State Department, the largest cultural exchange in the history of the U.S. and Vietnam. Ms. Karlin has performed throughout the U. S., Mexico, Asia and Europe, including the Arnold Schoenberg Center in Vienna, Cooper Union in New York City, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, UNAM in Mexico, the Hanoi Opera House, Tanglewood, Schleswig-Holstein, Flanders, Brighton and the Vienna Festivals. Ms. Karlin received her Bachelor’s Degree from Tufts University in Drama and Music, and her Master’s Degree from Boston University as a student of Walter Trampler. She studied chamber music under such notable musicians as Eugene Lehner, Joseph Silverstein and Louis Krasner. A credentialed secondary education teacher, she was Instructor of Viola at the Claremont Colleges for 12 years. Ms. Karlin also performed with the Boston Pops, Opera Company of Boston, Pro Arte Chamber Orchestra in Boston, the Pacific and Long Beach Symphonies in California and the Wiener Akademie in Vienna. Her recordings are available on Cambria Master Recordings, ORFEO, (Munich) and Novalis, and she performed on Southwest Chamber Music’s Complete Chamber Works of Carlos Chávez, Volumes 1 and 2, which received consecutive 2003 and 2004 GRAMMY Awards. She has lectured at the University of Colorado, Cal State San Bernadino, the Claremont Colleges, Ohio State University, the Royal University of Fine Arts in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, the Vietnam National Academy of Music, and presented arts administration workshops at the U.S. Embassy in Hanoi and the U.S. Consulate in Saigon.

Executive Assistant

LINNET RICHARDSON, Ticket Manager, received a B.A. degree in Psychology from the California State University, Long Beach.  Although born and raised in Chicago, IL, she has made her home in Southern California since 1967.  She has also worked in both private and public sectors among which some have been Security Pacific Bank, the University of California, Irvine in the Department of Neurology; the City of Santa Ana, Department of Parks and Recreation with a one-year administrative cross training program in the City Manager’s Office, and last but not least, the University of Nevada, Las Vegas in the President’s Office. She deems working at Southwest Chamber Music an honor and privilege to be associated with its gifted composers/musicians and committed patrons who through the art of music make the world a better place. 

Production Manager

Joan Quinto graduated with a B.M. in percussion performance at California State University, Long Beach. Ms. Quinto is an active performer and private instructor, specializing in drum set and hand percussion. She has had the opportunities to perform with major artists in TV shows and venues in Los Angeles, Las Vegas, New York City, and Cannes, France. Ms. Quinto is currently involved in many local groups and ensembles of various genres in Southern California.

Jay Belloli, President

Sally Kaled, Vice President

Natalie Poole, Secretary

Peter Mandell, C.P.A., Treasurer

Louis Abel

Kenneth Blaydow, M.D.

Cary Huang

Michael Huynh

E. Randol Schoenberg, Esq.

Cory Takahashi

Susan Bienkowski, President 2001-2004

Anna Bresnahan, Secretary 1998-2003

Fritzie Culick, President 1988-1998

Ellen Knell, President 2004-2007

Mary Schander, President 1998-2001

Betsey Tyler, Vice-President 2004-2012

Joan Boyett

Alice Coulombe

Charles Dillingham

Oliver Knussen

Steven Lavine

Kent Nagano

Martin Perlich

Rick Wartzman