Pianist and composer Brandon Zhou is an LA-based soloist and chamber musician with a broad range of musical interests spanning from traditional classical repertoire to works by living composers and his own arrangements. As a pianist, he has performed with acclaimed musicians such as Hilá Plitmann and Tony Arnold and with organizations such as American Contemporary Ballet and Jacaranda Music. His playing can be heard in filmmaker Kerry Candaele’s recently released documentary, Love and Justice, a film exploring striking parallels between the tragic demise of composer Jorge Peña Hen during the 1973 Chilean coup d’état and the narrative of Beethoven’s opera Fidelio. As the winner of the 2020 Atwater Kent Concerto Competition, his performance of Beethoven’s First Piano Concerto with the UCLA Philharmonia in 2021 was met with an enthusiastic reception. Recent performances include a benefit concert with flutist Anastasia Petanova in Madison, WI in collaboration with Friends of Be an Angel, a charity dedicated to supporting Ukrainian refugees, and a program of chamber works by members of the 20th century St. Petersburg Society for Jewish Folk Music at Temple Beth Torah in Ventura, CA.

Additionally, Brandon’s solo and chamber compositions have been performed as part of events across the U.S. His arrangement of Saint-Saëns’ ‘Egyptian’ Concerto for piano and string quartet was premiered to great acclaim by Inna Faliks and the Lyris Quartet at Jacaranda Music in May 2023, and his often-performed duo Three Blues Miniatures was most recently performed at the Thurnauer Chamber Music Series and Moab Music Festival. He has also had works performed at various universities in the country such as Yale University, the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, and UCLA.

Brandon earned his Master’s and Bachelor’s degrees at the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music, where he studied with Inna Faliks. Additionally, he has been a longtime student of composer Richard Danielpour. He currently serves as a coach and collaborative pianist at Mount Saint Mary’s University, organist at Panorama Presbyterian Church, and collaborative pianist at UCLA

Julia Maria Johnson is a soprano hailing from Washington State. After earning her M.M. in Voice Performance from the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music in 2021, she has gone on to perform all over the West Coast and beyond. Ms. Johnson was most recently a Resident Artist at Opera Naples singing the roles of Phyllis in Gilbert & Sullivan’s Iolanthe and Kate Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly. At the 2024 Metropolitan Opera Laffont Competition, she was a Washington State District Winner and a Northwest Region Encouragement Winner. In the 2023/2024 season, Ms. Johnson has been so thrilled to be performing both new and standard works with companies including Pacific Opera Project, The Opera Buffs, New Opera West, and Lyric Opera of Orange County, as well as singing on many premiere recordings for composers in Los Angeles. Ms. Johnson is also currently on the Voice Faculty at California Lutheran University.

Victoria Kirsch is a Southern California-based collaborative pianist/vocal coach/recitalist who curates and performs programs based on museum exhibitions, literature, and other themes. She has curated and performed twelve music/spoken word programs linked to exhibitions at the USC Fisher Museum of Art, as part of the campus’ renowned Visions and Voices program, as well as creating exhibition–inspired programs for several other Southern California museums.

In 2008 Victoria received a Chairman’s Grant from then-NEA Chair Dana Gioia to support the co-creation of the musical-theatrical piece, Emily Dickinson: This, and My Heart, which premiered at Grand Performances in downtown Los Angeles with Twin Cities actress Linda Kelsey and soprano/stage director Anne Marie Ketchum.

She was the onstage pianist for many theatrical programs with soprano Julia Migenes (Carmen in the award-winning opera film directed by Francesco Rosi), touring the world for many years with the celebrated singing actress (Diva on the Verge, Schubert, Migenes Sings Bernstein, La Vie en Rose).

Since 2015 Victoria has been a faculty vocal and opera coach at The UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music, where she is now a continuing lecturer. In addition, in Fall 2024 she returned to the USC Thornton School of Music, this time as a Keyboard Collaborative Arts faculty member. She had previously been a member of the Thornton School vocal faculty.

She has worked with national and regional opera companies, including LA Opera, serving as a member of the music staff and as a teaching artist for LA Opera’s Community Programs Department, presenting over 35 programs to educators and students.

She has been an official pianist for the Operalia Competition and the Met’s National Council Auditions, among others.

Victoria was the music director of OperaArts, a Coachella Valley-based vocal performance organization, a faculty member at Angels Vocal Art and SongFest summer programs, and she was associated with the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara for many years, playing in the studio of renowned baritone and master teacher Martial Singher and serving as a member of the vocal faculty.