A magical blend of fine music by outstanding performers in one of the most enchanting sites in Northern California. Evenings include orchestra concerts, Big Band, chamber music ensembles, dance, blues, jazz, world, folk, bluegrass and popular contemporary music. Daytime concerts include lecture/recitals at the Piano Series, a performance by participants in the Emerging Artists Program, and small concerts in intimate venues throughout the historic town of Mendocino.
Established in 1986, the Mendocino Music Festival was the dream of Allan Pollack, Susan Waterfall and former principal bassoonist of the San Francisco Symphony, the late Walter Green.
ALLAN POLLACK
Artistic Director and Conductor
Festival Co-Founder
Maestro Allan Pollack has guided the Mendocino Music Festival as Artistic Director and Conductor since the first note was played in 1987. Over the years, memorable performances have taken shape under his baton including Verdi’s Requiem, Brahms’ Requiem, Beethoven’s 9th Symphony, Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde, and Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring. In addition to leading The Festival Orchestra in the classics, Mr. Pollack has conducted many fully staged operas.
With a Ph.D. in composition from UC Berkeley, Maestro Pollack has composed a variety of pieces especially for the Festival Orchestra and musicians: The Spiral Dance for chorus and orchestra; Two Movements in Time for orchestra; From the Song of Songs for soprano and orchestra; A Summer Evening at the Boonville Fair for orchestra; Albion Song: Jazz Concerto for Saxophone; a Vibraphone Concerto; and a String Quartet. As a jazz musician, he leads the fabulous Festival Big Band and sometimes takes a solo on saxophone.
SUSAN WATERFALL, Pianist
Associate Artistic Director
Festival Co-Founder
Pianist Susan Waterfall creates yearly multi-media, narrated settings for chamber music for the Festival. These have included: Voyage a Paris (2001); Argentina: Gauchos and Tangos (2002); Bartok’s Women (2003); Tales of a Parisian Salon: Winnaretta Singer, Princesse de Polignac (2004); Young Brahms (2005); Scandalous Music! Satie, Ravel, Debussy, and Stravinsky (2006); Leos Janacek: A Solitary Genius (2007); Degenerate Music! Kurt Weill, Schoenberg, and Hanns Eisler in Weimar Berlin (2008); They Left A Light, Masterpieces from Nazi Prison Camps (2009); Hallelujah America (2010); Irresistible Grooves (2011), Music for a Teahouse (2012), with Wu Man, compositions of Bright Sheng, Tan Dun, and traditional Chinese music; and Umi no Hi (2013), an entire day of events celebrating Japan’s contemporary and historic music and culture, featuring the compositions of Toru Takemitsu. In 2014, she designed and performed in the four-day Bach Fest, featuring lectures and concerts. Mozart in Mendocino (2015), the Beethoven Tribute (2016), Understanding Schubert (2017), and Chopin: Dreams and Memories of a Lost Homeland (2018), and Brahms (2019) continued the chronological presentations. During the Covid Pandemic, Waterfall began making films to develop the biographical potential for her featured composers: four short films explored Debussy’s Preludes, Books One and Two (2020); The Life and Music of Kurt Weill, including the art and culture of Weimar Germany (2021); Understanding Schubert (2021); The Life and Art of Claude Debussy (2022); and Maurizio! The Life and Times of Maurice Ravel (2023). In 2022, Waterfall’s Festival programs on Debussy were “Breakfast with ChouChou” and “Sounds and Perfumes of Evening.” In 2023 her Ravel Festival programs were “Lure of the Exotic” and “The Attraction of Modernism.” Waterfall’s films and writings can be viewed on her website susanwaterfall.com.
Waterfall studied piano with Ivan Moravec and Karl Ulrich Schnabel and musicology with Roland Jackson and Glenn Watkins. In the 1970s Susan lived, studied, and performed South Indian Classical Music with the legendary Dhanammal family in Madras (Chennai) India. Susan brings an enhanced sensibility of the role of music in culture to all of her concerts. Susan and Allan are the parents of acclaimed jazz pianist Julian Waterfall Pollack.
TERRY BEAUNE
Concertmaster, 2025
In addition to being co-concertmaster of the Oakland Symphony, Terrie Baune is concertmaster of the North State Symphony and the Eureka Symphony, a member of the Earplay Ensemble, Music Director of the TBAM Festival in Trinidad, and Associate Director of the Humboldt Chamber Music Workshop. Her professional credits include four years as a member of the National Symphony Orchestra of Washington, DC, two years as a member of the Auckland Philharmonia of New Zealand, concertmaster positions with the Fresno Philharmonic and the Rohnert Park Symphony, and over 20 years as concertmaster of the Women’s Philharmonic, with whom she participated in several recordings including as soloist in the Maddalena Lombardini Violin Concerto No. 5.
BRUCE KOLIHA
2025 Chorus Master
Bruce Koliha taught choral music for 37 years, 32 of which were at Monte Vista High School (MVHS) in Danville, California. Under his direction, the Monte Vista High School Chamber Singers, Concert Choir and Trebleaires each placed first numerous times in the prestigious Golden State Choral Competition. Bruce led 11 international concert tours with his singers, performing several times in virtually every Western European country, as well as in Central Europe, Australia, New Zealand, China, Greece, Turkey and Russia. In 1989 and 1990 respectively, the MVHS Concert Choir sang back-up in local concerts to international recording stars Andy Williams and Rosemary Clooney. The MVHS Concert Choir also performed the Mozart Requiem, directed by John Rutter, at Carnegie Hall in 2009.
In 2004, Bruce was the first ever recipient of the California Music Educator’s Association (CMEA) Bay Section Outstanding Choral Educator Award. He also received the 2008 CMEA Pearson-Silver Burdett Choral Educator Award for “Honoring Excellence in Choral Education and Performance.” In 2010, he won the Educator of the Year award from the Danville Area Chamber of Commerce.
In addition to his high school teaching, Bruce directed the choir at St. Mary’s College in Moraga, California for 6 years; taught choral music, ear training and music theory classes for several years at Los Medanos College in Pittsburg, California; and instructed voice and music theory at Laney College in Oakland. He also recently taught Choral Methods in the Public Schools at California State University East Bay. Bruce has also been active in directing church choirs, leading choirs in Methodist, Congregational and Lutheran churches, as well as 3 years conducting the Post Chapel Choir at the Presidio of San Francisco. He most recently was the Music Director at the San Ramon Valley United Methodist Church in Alamo.
JENNY MATTEUCCI
Chorus Master
Known for her flexibility of style, Jenny Matteucci performs, directs and conducts in many different venues all over the San Francisco Bay Area. For the past 25 years, she has conducted choirs for the Diocese of Oakland and for the Tri-Valley Repertory Theatre’s Broadway Chorus, a group of 100+ singers of all ages, singing the music of Broadway. She and her husband, Daniel Lockert, team up for master classes for such organizations as the National Association of the Teachers of Singing (NATS) and Lamplighters.
As an educator, Jenny is part of the voice faculty of Notre Dame de Namur University and also runs a busy private voice studio in her home. She holds a BFA and MFA in Vocal Performance from Notre Dame de Namur University. For NDNU, she recently directed The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee (Broadway World nominee for best director), was assistant director for Lettice and Lovage at Hillbarn Theater, and was co-director for De España Vengo at NDNU. Her passion for vocal and choral repertoire has inspired her to create many cabaret-style and small venue shows.
“I have known Jenny personally and professionally for many years. She is conversant with a variety of music styles-–everything from Baroque to Verdi, Rogers & Hammerstein, Sondheim, to contemporary works. Of equal importance, she has extensive training in all areas of diction. Her greatest skill might be the way she interacts with her colleagues, students and choristers. Knowing the Mendocino coast area as I do, I can think of no one better suited to prepare the Festival Chorus. She is utterly professional, and will demand attention to detail from each singer, but she is also incredibly warm, generous, humorous and FUN to work with.” — Julie Kierstine, Soprano
Singers and theater-goers might recall Julie’s master classes and workshops with the Mendocino Music Festival, Gloriana Theater Company, and the Mendocino Women’s Choir, as well as her role as Maria Callas in Master Class. Her past appearances with the Festival include Mimi (La Boheme), Donna Anna (Don Giovanni), Nedda (I Pagliacci), and the title roles in Tosca and La Fanciulla del West.
Her greatest passion is to perform her cabaret show, For the Love of…, along with her husband. Recently, Jenny played herself in the Craig Bohmler/Marc Jacobs musical All the More to Love, which was based on the real-life, plus-size consignment store of the same name that Jenny owned with her mother, Erna.
Jenny lives in Oakland with her husband, Daniel, and is the proud mother of two adult children, Will and Beth.