Phone (925) 462-5400 Fax (925) 462-5402 Email info@asmusicacademy.com Address 1258-H Quarry Lane Pleasanton, CA 94566 Music is our life; let us share our passion!..

Teachers in the Anderson-Siprashvili Music Academy are experienced, degreed professionals who value a positive teaching and learning environment. Their background with children and music make them exceptionally qualified with high expectations for successful students. Generally, lessons at the academy are offered in small groups (four maximum). Students are grouped by age and level. In our piano classes students learn on full-sized, highly advanced, state-of-the-art digital pianos. Students participating in group lessons progress rapidly, are less likely to drop out, and are motivated by peer dynamics and enthusiasm.

We pride ourselves in teaching all learning styles through a variety of curriculum activities, hands-on theory, improvisation, learning games, technique, ear-training and repertoire development. Curriculum objectives are designed to develop a natural sequence of skills for success.

Groups also enjoy ensemble opportunities, computer and composing stations, and a loaning library.

We provide recital (semipublic) experiences three times a year (December, March and June) for all students at the academy. Furthermore, through the use of state-of-the-art technology, our students take home audio Compact Discs of their work at the end of the school year (June). This disc has become a treasure for many families and continues to be proof of our student's rapid and efficient progress.

Biographies

Mark Anderson (piano and music theory/musicianship) - Having begun piano studies at the age of 5, pianist Mark Anderson, a native of the San Francisco Bay Area, has become one of the world's outstanding pianists. In the United States, his formative teachers were Trula Whelan and Aiko Onishi while in the UK they were Ryszard Bakst and Benjamin Kaplan. He has performed in Japan, throughout Europe and the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada, and the United States. Mr. Anderson’s recordings on Nimbus Records have received numerous awards and distinctions worldwide.

Mr. Anderson holds a bachelor degree in piano performance from San Jose State University as well as postgraduate degrees from the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester, and the Royal Academy of Music in London. In June 2001, he was awarded the Master of Arts in Multimedia from California State University Hayward.

In 1993, Mark Anderson married Georgian pianist Tamriko Siprashvili. The couple now resides in Pleasanton, California where they teach privately and appear regularly as soloists, duo pianists, chamber musicians, teachers, clinicians/lecturers and competition adjudicators. Most recently, Mark and Tamriko released their first two-piano CD. Recorded in the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory, which includes a world premiere arrangement of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition and Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring. It has met with great critical acclaim worldwide.

Mark Anderson is a Steinway Artist.

Tamriko Siprashvili (piano) - Tamriko is from the former Soviet Republic of Georgia, now simply known as Georgia. She was born and raised in the capital Tbilisi and, at 17, moved to Moscow to study at the Moscow Conservatory of Music. She graduated from that great institution in 1989 with the equivalent of a DMA (Doctor of Musical Arts). In 1985, Ms. Siprashvili was awarded the Gold Medal at the Schumann International Piano Competition in Zwickau Germany, which provided her with performance opportunities throughout Italy, Germany and many eastern European countries. She has won other awards in competitions such as Leeds (UK), Montreal (Canada), and Casadesus (US) competitions. She has performed in the United States, Canada, Chile, the UK, Italy, Germany, France, Hungary, Ukraine, Russia and her native Georgia. Ms. Siprashvili’s recording of Rachmaninoff’s Chopin and Corelli Variations with arrangements of Kreisler’s Liebesfreud and Liebesleid on the French label XCP Records has been highly acclaimed worldwide.

Tamriko now lives with her husband, pianist Mark Anderson, in the San Francisco east bay city of Pleasanton where they teach privately while pursing individual and duo-piano concert and recording careers. Their first two-piano disc with Nimbus Records is just being released this summer, which includes Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition and Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring. Mark and Tamriko have one daughter, Nina, born in 1999 on Mark’s birthday.

Tamriko Siprashvili is a Steinway Artist

Debbie Boyden (piano) - Debbie has over a decade of teaching and performing experience and over thirty years experience with the piano. She studied under Vladimir Leyetchkiss in Chicago and studied piano at Valparaiso University. She has had her own private teaching practice in Danville since 1995 and is an active member of the teaching community, hosting and participating in teaching workshops to share methods and exchange successful techniques. Debbie has taught beginning and intermediate students in both individual and group settings.

Danielle Naler (Piano and AP Music Theory) - Danielle Naler, born in Santa Barbara, California, received her master's degree in Piano Performance from the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University, as a student of Yael Weiss. Danielle was awarded full-scholarship with a graduate assistantship and was responsible for coaching singers and accompanying rehearsals of operas including Carmen, Don Giovanni, and Arabella, with acclaimed conductors such as David Effron. She has been teaching for over a decade and interned under master-teacher Karen Taylor. In Santa Barbara, Danielle worked for UCSB's opera program and studied chamber music with Anne Epperson. She received her undergraduate degree in creative writing and studied language and literature in Rome, Italy. Danielle has been published and awarded for her poetry.

Danielle currently teaches and plays professionally with vocalists and instrumentalists, and as a duo with her husband, a violinist. She will be performing extensively as a member of the Music Academy of the West, under the direction of Jonathan Feldman, a professor from The Juilliard School. Danielle lives with her husband, Micah, in Dublin.

Katalin Kincses (piano) - Katalin studied piano from age 5 at the State Music Conservatory Schools in Budapest, Hungary. After completing school, she was accepted to continue her studies at the Franz Liszt Academy. However, political events in Hungary forced her into a career in jurisprudence. In later years, she worked as an attorney both in Hungary and the United States. However, desiring to return to music, she earned her Master of Arts degree in Piano Performance. Upon retirement from the legal profession she established her private teaching studio in Livermore. She incorporates the Kodaly method in her teaching and enjoys teaching all levels of piano performance, music history and theory. Katalin has varied experiences: performer, accompanist, music and choir teacher; and is an active member of the Music Teacher's Association of California. She is very enthusiastic about the new opportunities afforded by high-tech methods in music teaching.

Victoria Ball (piano) - Victoria began studying the piano over 50 years ago at the age of 6. She also studied the flute, piccolo, and guitar. She is dedicated to education in the arts and enjoys teaching music and seeing students grow and become proficient with their piano skills.
She encourages her students and helps them develop musical awareness, use imaginative thinking, and she nurtures them to bring their own unique experiences to their music. Victoria has taught private piano lessons in Livermore for over 15 years. Experienced with young children, she teaches the Little Mozarts and Primer levels of piano. In addition, Victoria studies piano with Tamriko Siprashvili.

Sarah Franklin (voice) - Sarah began her singing career at Chatham College in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. As well as receiving vocal scholarships, she sang at Carnegie Mellon’s Opera Workshop and won a competition, becoming a "Young Artist of Pittsburgh." She continued studies in New York, earning Bachelor of Music and Master of Science degrees from the renowned Juilliard School.

She received scholarships from Juilliard, the Chautauqua Music Festival and the Aspen Music Festival. She was also awarded a Ford Foundation fellowship to teach at the Aspen Festival and won a Liederkranz Foundation award in New York for "outstanding talent, excellent voice and great promise."

Ms. Franklin sang for five years with the Waverly Consort, specialists in early music. They toured the East Coast and the Midwest. She sang a world premiere at Dartmouth’s "Congregation of the Arts." She has sung at Lincoln Center, The Metropolitan Museum and the Juilliard Opera Theater, as well as performing many oratorios in the greater New York area. Other performances include the St. Louis Symphony, the Oakland Symphony, the Peninsula Symphony, the Carmel Bach Festival, Schola Cantorum in Palo Alto, the Santa Cruz Symphony, West Bay Opera, Valley Concert Chorale, I Cantori di Carmel, the Pleasanton Chamber Players and Pippin Pocket Opera.

Sarah Franklin has maintained a private voice studio in Pleasanton for over 30 years.

Paul Keyes (guitar) - Paul was born in the Philadelphia area and began his study of the guitar at the age of 11. During his High School years he was performing in various Rock and Blues bands in the area. He went on to study the classical guitar with Peter Segal at Temple University.

Paul operated a private teaching studio in Princeton, N.J. where he taught for 33 years. Many of the students have gone on to continue their study of music at some of the finest universities in the country. Some of his students have become performers in well known bands and tour internationally. He himself has performed in various festivals around the country such as Woodstock, Monterey and Ravinia outside Chicago.

Rodin Akerman (violin, viola, clarinet & saxophone) - Originally from Columbia, Rodin performed throughout his native country as a violinist as well as saxophonist and clarinetist before relocating to California at age 18. He attended universities in both Los Angeles and Puerto Rico studied privately with the two of the era's greatest violinists, Noumi Fischer and José Figueroa. After graduating with a Bachelor of Music degree, Mr. Akerman performed with a wide variety of orchestras in the Los Angeles and San Diego areas and started teaching privately in southern California before moving to the bay area in 1995. Since then, he has regularly performed as a violinist with Berkeley Opera, the San Francisco Symphonietta, Contra Costa Musical Theater, Livermore Opera, Diablo Light Opera and the Tassajara Symphony. Rodin has directed music programs in public schools in the eastbay teaching clarinet, saxophone, violin and viola. He brings a wealth of performing and teaching experience to the academy.

Pawel Walerowski (cello) - Originally from Poland, Pawel was formally trained in his native country and graduated from the Conservatory in Poznan in Cello Performance. During his formative training, he played in various ensembles and recorded for radio and television. He served as Principal Cellist and soloist in Jeunesse Musicales Youth String Orchestra in Slovenia and toured much of Europe with an original cast production with the Andrew Lloyd Weber Orchestra.

Pawel came to the United States on a scholarship to the University of Arizona and subsequently has performed throughout much of the western U.S. in various ensembles. He recently settled in the San Francisco Bay Area and quickly became part of the avant-garde Bay Area music scene developing a unique style of plucking the instrument and singing.

Recent credits live radio broadcasts and being a member of Rupa and the April Fishes group, which has a CD scheduled for international release in March 2008.

Melanie O'Reilly (Voice) - Considered internationally as a musical pioneer, singer Melanie O'Reilly is now firmly established in the great pantheon of creative Irish artists, with her own sound of Celtic-Jazz.
As a performer/singer-songwriter, her exhilarating and unique blend of Irish traditional music and jazz creates a powerful and haunting soundscape, exploring untouched frontiers, and which captivates audiences worldwide.
Born in Dublin, Melanie comes from a family of musicians. She has recorded 6 commercial albums for Mistletoe Music and performs regularly in Europe and throughout the US. "Downbeat" Magazine named her as one of the most important jazz representatives from Ireland and her music was recently featured in a PBS documentary.
She currently is Visiting Scholar of Celtic Studies at UC Berkeley, and she also teaches Vocals in the areas of jazz, Irish traditional and Musical Theatre.
Melanie is co-creator and presenter of her own radio series, "Jazz on the Bay", currently being broadcast on RTE Radio 1, Ireland's national broadcasting station.

Andy Strain (trumpet, trombone and horn) - Andy has taught brass instruments to students in Germany, Mexico, and now the Bay Area. With more than ten years experience playing in European Orchestras, Jazz Ensembles, and now cutting edge Modern Music at Mills College Andy has the broad background necessary to teach beginner and advanced students alike. He has written and performed didactic concerts in English, German, and Spanish for children of all ages. As a graduate student at Mills, Andy is turning heads with his trombone, and is ready to help your student musician do the same.