Write to our president if you are interested in serving on the board of NCAOSA
Executive Board
PRESIDENT: Julie Bruins (she/her)
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Julie has been teaching music for 20 years and currently works with TK-4th graders at Children’s Day School in San Francisco’s Mission District. She completed her Orff Levels in 2012 with the San Francisco International Orff Course, and has enjoyed participating in many master classes, including the Latin Course, Polyphonic Singing, and the first Orff Afrique trip to Ghana in 2014. Julie holds a degree in flute performance, struggles to learn tap dance and loves a piano bar. She feels greatly indebted to the wonderful Northern California Orff contingent and is glad to be lending a hand on the board.
VICE PRESIDENT: Annie Smith (she/her)
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Annie is an Orff Schulwerk certified music educator and operatic soprano with an MM in Vocal Performance from San Francisco Conservatory and a BM from The Boston Conservatory. With 10 years of classroom experience, she blends Responsive Classroom, Orff-Schulwerk, and Kodály approaches. Annie performs regularly around the Bay Area and United States with various ensembles, such as 21V and Ensemble Mik Nawooj, a Hip-Hop Orchestra. She is a Program Manager at Music for Minors and oversees the implementation of TK-6th Grade music education for thousands of students in San Jose and on the Peninsula.
TREASURER: Jose Prieto (he/him)
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Jose has been teaching K-4 elementary general music and middle school 
jazz band for two years in Palo Alto USD. He is originally from Miami, Florida where he graduated from the University of Miami’s Frost School of Music with a B.M in Music Education and studied primarily as a jazz/contemporary trombonist. He completed Orff Level I in Carmel Valley in 2024 and has been attending NCAOSA workshops and events since 2023. Jose and his wife Emma are both music teachers who moved out to the Bay Area together in 2023 to start their teaching careers and are so happy to have found such a wonderful and supportive community of educators in Northern California.
REGISTRAR: Alison Mahal (she/her)
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Bio coming soon!
CO-PAST-PRESIDENT: Maggie Eggert (she/her)
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Maggie has been teaching some combination of general
music, band, choir, and technology for 17 years, first in the Midwest and now in the Bay Area. Since moving to the Bay Area, she has taught PK – 5 at The Nueva School, Music & Movement and Primary groups for Ragazzi Boys Choir, and currently teaches middle school music at the Episcopal Day School of St. Matthews in San Mateo, California. She holds a MMEd from VanderCook College of Music and has completed Level III certification and other courses through The San Francisco International Orff Course. Maggie loves living in the Bay Area and tries to take advantage of everything it offers her as a musician, educator, and human being.
CO-PAST-PRESIDENT: Sonya Harway (they/them)
Sonya has been teaching students of all ages for almost 20 years. 
They currently teach music to the Lower Schoolers at San Francisco Day School and recently served as Choral Director at Head Royce School in Oakland. They completed their Orff Levels in Carmel Valley in 2018, took the Jazz course in New Orleans in 2019, and eagerly look forward to every NCAOSA chapter workshop. Sonya is a classically-trained pianist and vocalist, a singer-songwriter, and has been band leader for groups Fall Catalogue and Cocoa Koala. They are also an AOSA affinity group leader for the LGBTQIA+ and Gender Identity Affinity Group. When they’re not making music, Sonya is probably baking bread.
Members at Large
CULTURE AND BELONGING: Could this be you? Talk to us!
RECORDING SECRETARY: Could this be you? Talk to us!
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CORRESPONDING SECRETARY: Could this be you? Talk to us!
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INSTRUMENT CHAIR: Lisa Gorman (she/her)
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Lisa teaches general music for grades K-8th at Brandeis Marin school. She completed all three levels of Orff at George Mason University (in the Washington DC area) and has taken many supplemental master classes. Lisa really loves exploring new types of dance. She has been living in the Bay Area for seven years and is loving it!
PlayNotes BLOG EDITOR: Julia Chanin (she/her)
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Julia grew up in the Bay Area and fell in love with music as a child in an Orff Schulwerk music classroom. She is now a professional saxophonist and has excitedly come home to Orff Schulwerk as an adult. She has been teaching elementary school music for the past four years in Richmond and Los Angeles, CA, and is starting a new position as Choir Director at Credo High School in Rohnert Park. She will continue to work with the little ones through an afterschool program she started called Rhythm and Roots. Julia studied ethnomusicology at Wesleyan University and later completed her Level III Orff training through the San Francisco International Orff Course in 2019. The Northern California Orff community feels like family, and Julia is thrilled to contribute to the chapter!
SOCIAL CHAIR: Jimmy Levi (he/him)
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Jimmy is a composer and teacher with Music for Minors. He will begin his third year
teaching general music TK-5 in the Peninsula this fall and will begin teaching 5th-grade violin in Millbrae as well.
Jimmy has degrees in Composition from St. Olaf College and DePaul University, plays viola, sings, and loves to pick up as many instruments as fit in his apartment (you may spot him playing recorder at open mics!). He completed his first Orff level at San José State this summer and is excited to synthesize Orff method with his Kodály training and his background in composition pedagogy and creativity studies. When he’s not musicking or teaching, you may find Jimmy on his bike, at an amusement park, or out birdwatching.
TECHNOLOGY CHAIR: Dylan Librande (he/him)
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Dylan is an educator, pianist, and composer with a love of music in all its forms. 
Dylan is the music teacher at Walden Center and School in Berkeley and has taught private classical and jazz piano, theory, and composition lessons throughout the Bay Area. Dylan received his Bachelor of Music degree in Music Composition from Willamette University in Salem, Oregon, and is currently pursuing a Master of Arts in Music Education degree at San José State University.