Josephine Liu Moerschel, DMA
Executive and Artistic Director
Director of Chamber Orchestra, Viola Coach
Dr. Josephine Liu Moerschel is the Executive and Artistic Director of Elemental Strings, a youth orchestra of elementary school-aged string students in the Santa Monica community. Dr. Moerschel is on the faculty of the Bob Cole Conservatory of Music at California State University, Long Beach, and the Long Beach City College. Recently, she served as co-director of the Los Angeles branch of Junior Chamber Music and ViolaFest Los Angeles. Dr. Moerschel sits on the boards of the Southern California Viola Society and the Greater Los Angeles Area branch of the American String Teachers’ Association.
In addition to her teaching, Dr. Moerschel is an active performer in southern California. She is a member of the New West Symphony, and has performed with many other groups in LA, including the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Los Angeles Opera, Opera Pacific, Pacific Symphony, Los Angeles Master Chorale and Long Beach Symphony.
Her students have been heard performing in leading youth orchestras in Los Angeles, as well as conservatories and music festivals across the country.
Dr. Moerschel received a doctorate in viola performance from the University of Texas at Austin in 2003.
Kirsten Bersch
Program Director, Violin Coach
Kirsten Bersch is an elementary music teacher in the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District, where she has been teaching since 1999. She holds a BA in Music Education from California State University, Northridge, and an MA in Music History and Literature from California State University, Fullerton. She has been a violin coach for Elemental Strings since its inception in 2004, and Program Director for the orchestra since 2009.
Jason Aiello
Director of Sinfonia, Cello Coach
Jason Aiello is currently in his fifth year of teaching orchestra and piano at Santa Monica High School. Jason graduated with honors from UCLA in 2006, as the recipient of the Joyce Fahlman Fellowship. While at UCLA, Jason studied music education with Dr. Frank Heuser, cello with Antonio Lysy, and did his student teaching at Santa Monica High School. Currently, Jason is serving as president-elect on the board of the California Orchestra Directors Association, where his primary responsibilities have included creating and maintaining the CODA website and auditioning high school cellists for the CODA Honor Orchestras and the CMEA All-State Orchestra. This will be Jason’s third year coaching the cello section for Elemental Strings.
Robert Anderson
Violin Coach
Robert Anderson has been performing, recording, and composing in the Los Angeles area since graduating from the University of South Carolina in 2000. He was a founding member of the jazz string quartet Supernova from 2002-2005 and is currently performing with pioneering electric jazz trio Eartha Austria, Composers Ensemble Los Angeles, country artist Angela Wood, pop/rock band Uncle Daddy, and Bear McCreary's Battlestar Galactica Orchestra. Other notable performances include stage and television appearances with Katie Melua, Paul Oakenfold, Rhianna, and Pink. He can be heard playing baritone violin on the soundtrack to Fox's "Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles", and violin on the Sci-Fi network's "Battlestar Galactica."
As co-founder and music director of String Project Los Angeles, established in 2006, Robert enjoys teaching the art of improvisation and encouraging musical creativity in young string players. An active clinician for Yamaha strings, Robert travels throughout the US to educate teachers and students about creative string playing. He is co-director and arranger for the Electric Chamber Orchestra at Lincoln Middle School in Santa Monica, CA, and is a violin coach for the Santa Monica High School orchestras and the Elemental Strings program.
Robert is a faculty member of the Thornton School of Music at the University of Southern California in the new Popular Music program, teaching jazz and alternative violin.
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Grace Hsu
Cello Coach
Cellist Grace Hsu is a graduate of The Juilliard School Pre-College Division and received her Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Cello Performance from Carnegie Mellon University. She won first-place in the 1996 Aaron Silberman Chamber Music competition. Ms. Hsu pursued graduate studies in Music Education at Teacher's College, Columbia University and is a certified Suzuki Cello Instructor. As as dedicated music educator in New York, Ms. Hsu is a former faculty member of The School for Strings in New York City, The Henry Street Settlement Abron Arts Center, The Music School of Westchester, The Portledge School, The Waldorf School of Garden City, Gemini Youth Orchestra and The Children's Orchestra Society. Ms. Hsu performed with the New York Virtuosi Chamber Symphony and the Prometheus Chamber Orchestra, and was a founding member of the Tedesca String Quartet. In 2003, Ms. Hsu joined the SMMUSD music faculty as a String Specialist at Malibu High School and as a cello coach for the Dreamstrings program in the elementary schools. In addition to coaching cello at John Adams Middle School, Ms. Hsu maintains a private cello studio.
Jody Rubin
Violin Coach
Jody Rubin has been an active free lance musician since moving to Los Angeles in 1990. She has appeared with the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, LA Opera, Long Beach Symphony, Pasadena Symphony, Glendale Symphony and LA Master Chorale and can also be heard in numerous movie soundtracks. For the last ten years she has been the violin/viola coach at Paul Revere Middle School in Brentwood and has also coached strings at Palisades and Mira Costa High Schools. She holds a degree in Viola Performance from the New England Conservatory of Music. She is looking forward to joining the Elemental Strings team this year!
Julian Hallmark
Violin Coach
Julian Hallmark has performed as soloist, chamber musician and as a member of many chamber orchestras in Europe, India, China, Japan, Korea, and across the United States.
At the age of nine Mr. Hallmark was invited by Lord Yehudi Menuhin to study at his school in England, where he studied with Menuhin, Felix Andrievsky, and Robert Masters violin. In 1987, he was accepted at The Juilliard School in New York, where he studied as a scholarship student of Dorothy DeLay, and was coached in chamber music by Felix Galimir and Harvey Shapiro. At Juilliard, Mr. Hallmark worked as Dorothy DeLay’s assistant, managing her studio and teaching a technique class for students. At the Aspen Music Festival, Mr. Hallmark was the director in charge of the Starling Recital series, Concerto concerts, and the visiting artist’s master classes. He was also the concertmaster of the Festival orchestra for five summers.
Since graduating from Juilliard, in 1994 with his Masters of Music Degree, Mr. Hallmark has been much sought after as a chamber musician and chamber orchestra player. He is a co-founder of the Concertante Chamber Players based in New York, and has been concertmaster of the Aspen Valley Chamber Orchestra, in Colorado, for 11 years. He performs regularly with the Crown City String Quartet based in Bend, Oregon. Most recent solo performances have been with the Koblenz radio orchestra, Aspen Chamber Orchestra; recital at the Festival of Guanajuato, in Mexico; recital at Fleur de Lis in Montereau, France.
As a chamber musician Mr. Hallmark performs regularly at the Sunflower Music Festival in Topeka, Kansas, The Buzzards Bay Music Festival in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, and The Busan Music Festival in South Korea. Other festivals Mr. Hallmark has performed at are The Salzburg Music Festival, Evian Festival, France, and New music Live, Finland. He has also performed with the Grammy award winning Southwest Chamber Music, Mladi Chamber Group, both based in Los Angeles.
When not performing, Mr. Hallmark’s other great passion is working on his boat and sailing off the coast of Santa Barbara, California.
Susan Rishik
Violin Coach
Susan Rishik joined the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra in 1999 and made her Carnegie Hall debut on the Orchestra’s east coast tour in 2001. As a member of LACO, Susan has been featured both as a soloist and chamber musician. In addition to her appearances with LACO, Susan performs regularly with the LA Opera, and other local orchestras and chamber music groups. She also performs and coaches chamber music every summer as a faculty member of the Gold Coast Chamber Music Festival, and has been a coach for the Junior Chamber Music program for the past two years.
Before joining LACO, she was assistant concertmaster for the LA Mozart Orchestra. In 1998, she served as the concertmaster for a two-month run of Matthew Bourne’s production of Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake at the Ahmanson Theatre. Prior to moving to Los Angeles in 1994, Susan was immersed in the world of string quartets. As a member of the Anacapa and Rider quartets, she performed throughout the United States and collaborated with such distinguished groups as the Colorado and Muir quartets.
Susan has recorded on the Nonesuch label in Steve Reich’s You Are and on CRI in William Kraft’s Quartet for the Love of Time. She has also recorded with LACO in Ned Rorem’s More than a Day featuring Brian Asawa on BMG and in the Bach violin concertos with Hillary Hahn, Margaret Batjer and Allan Vogel as soloists on Deutsche Grammophon. She can be heard on many pop and jazz albums, as well as on the soundtracks of many major motion pictures. Susan holds a bachelor’s degree in performance from Indiana University and a master’s from UC Santa Barbara, where she was in the Young Artists String Quartet program.