MR.
NESLUND
is a native of Southern California, born in Los Angeles, and raised
in Anaheim and Garden Grove. He began his formal music training at
age four in piano.Douglas
Neslund
Founder/Director
(retired)
California
Boys' Choir
Under-graduate education included one year at the Akademie der Musik und Darstellender Kunst in Vienna, Austria. Mr. Neslund graduated from Loma Linda University's College of Arts and Sciences in 1966. Since that time, he has studied choral and orchestral conducting at the University of Southern California under Dr. James Vail and Dr. Thomas Somerville, as well as the late Dr. Charles Hirt and Swiss composer-educator Ingolf Dahl. He spent one year of his military obligation in Vietnam.
In 1970, Mr. Neslund earned his Masters of Music degree from the University of Southern California in Choral Conducting. Before his retirement from day-to-day directing, he had conducted the CBC in concerts at the Music Center in Los Angeles, the Hollywood Bowl, and in 251 cities and towns across the United States and Canada under the auspices of Columbia Artists Management, Inc. in New York. The CBC recorded Mahler's Third Symphony with Zubin Mehta conducting the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra in 1978, and performed Handel's "Messiah" - complete - with Christopher Hogwood at the Hollywood Bowl in the summer of 1982. Virtually all operas employing boys' voices were the province of the CBC during its 11-year association with the New York City Opera in that prestigious organization's annual six-week season in Los Angeles.
Teachers are known and appreciated by the excellence of their students. Graduates of the California Boys' Choir include:
Darryl Archibald - Music Director and Conductor of the Utah Musical Theatre, the Utah Shakespeare Festival, and the Broadway Theatrical Company of Las Vegas
Alexander Britton - operatic bass with Pacific Opera Company
Mark Caldwell - owner of Rapid Eye Entertainment, Inc., and creator of online games
Andrew Cheeseman - film and television composer
Andrew Dwight - heading toward a career as choral conductor
Ariel (Ned) Espiritu - gospel singer
Jose Hernandez - director of a children's choir in Mexico
Kevin Jamerson - radio announcer
Edward Johnson - Las Vegas music shows sound engineer
Lenny Kravitz - Grammy Award-winning rock artist
John Kubelka - featured Christian night club singer in Hollywood
Christopher Lowell - daytime television home decorating guru on the Discovery Channel (we knew him as Richard Madden!)
Edward Ott - Christian rock artist
Raul (Bully) Pacheco - another Grammy-winner! and lead guitar and singer in the group OZOMATLI
Beau Palmer - tenor operatic soloist, singing worldwide, but most often to be heard at the New York Metropolitan Opera, the Zurich Opera and San Diego Opera.
Stephen Prutsman - concert pianist
Nino Rodriguez - film and television composer
David Sage - concert violist
Jason Snyder - countertenor soloist
Mako (John) Sujishi - rock artist and composer
Eli Villanueva - operatic baritone (brother of LeRoy)
LeRoy Villanueva - operatic baritone currently performing at Opera Bastille in Paris
Voldi Way - owner of Way Forward Technologies of Valencia, California
Anthony Wilson - fabulously gifted young jazz composer and guitar player, with a highly praised CD featuring the Anthony Wilson Nonet
And those are just the musicians! Dancers, attorneys, business men, cardiologists, dentists, teachers, school principals, policemen, and even a city attorney in San Francisco, all reflect the solid citizenship and positive civic contributions of former CBC choirboys.
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This page was last modified on25 June 2015.