Daniel Baldwin
In addition to his position as music department head, Daniel Baldwin is director of orchestras at Luther College (Decorah, Iowa), where he has taught since 1997. Baldwin earned the bachelor of music (cello) from Furman University and master of music (cello) and doctor of musical arts (orchestral conducting) from the University of Texas at Austin. Prior to his arrival at Luther, Baldwin served as director of orchestras at Central Washington University (Ellensburg).
Baldwin received his formal training in string pedagogy as a teacher in the University of Texas String Project, perhaps the most comprehensive program of its kind in North America. Phyllis Young, director of the String Project for 35 years, was Baldwin's cello teacher during his studies at the University of Texas. He studied conducting with Henry Charles Smith, Cornelius Eberhardt, Sung Kwak, Walter Ducloux, and Fiora Contino. As a young man Baldwin performed in conducting master classes led by Elizabeth Green, Daniel Lewis, Gustav Meier, and Harold Farberman.
Baldwin has served as music director of the Central Kentucky Youth Orchestra and the Transylvania Youth Orchestra of the Brevard (North Carolina) Music Center, the largest summer music festival in the South. A 1991 conducting fellow of the Conductor's Institute of the University of South Carolina and formerly a cellist with the Brevard Music Center Orchestra, Baldwin maintains an active schedule as a clinician, adjudicator, and guest conductor. Since 2007 he has served as musical and artistic director for the Lake Chelan Bachfest.
Since 1997 Baldwin has taken the Luther College Symphony Orchestra six times to Europe, enjoying month-long residencies in Vienna, Austria, performing in venues such as the Bruckner Conservatory in Linz and the Wiener Konzerthaus. Most recently the orchestra returned to Europe in January 2019, performing at the Slovak National Theatre in Bratislava, Slovakia, the Kultur Kongress Zentrum in Eisenstadt, and on February 2, 2019 at the Wiener Musikverein. Baldwin and the Luther Orchestra will return to Vienna in January 2023. The Luther College Symphony Orchestra tours annually in the United States. Since 1997, Baldwin and the Luther Symphony have completed sixteen major American tours, performing in at least twenty states.
Julie Cross - Choral Director
Julie Cross (mezzo-soprano) is a singer and music director in the Vancouver Washington area. She serves as Music Director at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church and also teaches voice and serves as Principal Accompanist at Linfield University in McMinnville, OR.
Dr. Cross lived in the Seattle area from 2013-2016, where she was music director and organist at St. Hilda & St. Patrick Episcopal Parish and taught at Seattle Conservatory of Music. She has been a private voice teacher during her entire career, and was formerly a tenured voice professor at University of Wisconsin-Whitewater. A past two-term Treasurer for the International Alliance for Women in Music (IAWM), she has sung at national and international IAWM events and the Festival of Women Composers International. Julie and pianist Susan McDaniel recorded a CD entitled Songs of Forgotten Women with Madison, WI organization Audio for the Arts. She has performed solo and chamber recitals throughout the United States and has taught master classes nationally as well.
Julie’s performance of Aunt Hannah in William Mayer’s A Death in the Family was recorded on the Albany Records label and received a positive review in the New York Times. She performed with Pauline Oliveros in her production Lunar Opera at Lincoln Center Out-of-Doors Festival in New York City; the production also received acclaim in the New York Times. She has degrees from Oberlin Conservatory, Manhattan School of Music, and the University of Michigan, and has studied additionally at the Centro Studi Italiani in Italy. Her primary teachers were Daune Mahy, Marlena Malas, and Shirley Verrett. This is her second year as Choir Director for the Lake Chelan Bach Festival and her sixth year as alto soloist.