“On July 5, after seven years at the artistic helm of Music in the Mountains, Pete Nowlen will retire from the position,” reads an unsigned Thursday (5/30) article in the Union (Nevada County, Calif.). “The organization announced that the Board of Directors has promoted Ryan Murray to artistic director and conductor. Murray has been MIM’s choral director since 2008, and also the resident conductor for the past few seasons. His new position will combine what he has done in the past with what Pete’s job encompassed…. Murray is currently the associate conductor of the Modesto Symphony Orchestra, music director of the Modesto Symphony Youth Orchestra, and also teaches opera and orchestra at Sacramento State University…. Murray … is currently the music director of Townsend Opera … the past music director of Fresno Grand Opera, and previously worked as a staff conductor for the Bay Area Summer Opera Theater Institute and The Opera Academy of California in San Francisco. Murray has been an integral member of Music in the Mountains since he began directing the chorus. Ryan has helped produce … works in Nevada County [including] Mozart’s Requiem, Gilbert and Sullivan’s HMS Pinafore, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9, and the Fauré Requiem.”
Posted June 5, 2019
