JEFFREY THOMAS, Professor of Music, is conductor of the UC Davis University Chorus, Alumni Chorus, and Chamber Singers. He joined the UCD faculty in 1996, was a recipient of a 2001-2006 Chancellor’s Fellowship, is the first holder of the Barbara K. Jackson Chair in Choral Conducting, and was recently awarded a prestigious Residency at the Bellagio Study and Conference Center at Villa Serbelloni for April 2007, to work on his manuscript, "Handel's Messiah: A Life of Its Own."

Professor Thomas is also Artistic and Music Director of the American Bach Soloists and American Bach Choir, with whom he has directed and conducted recordings of more than 25 cantatas, the Mass in B Minor, the Musical Offering, motets, chamber music, and works by Schütz, Pergolesi, Vivaldi, Haydn, and Beethoven. He has appeared with the Baltimore, Berkeley, Boston, Detroit, Houston, National, Rochester, Minnesota, and San Francisco symphony orchestras; with the Vienna Symphony and the New Japan Philharmonic; with virtually every American baroque orchestra; and in Austria, England, Germany, Italy, Japan, and Mexico. He has performed at the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Spoleto USA Festival, Ravinia Festival, Saratoga Performing Arts Center, Berkeley Festival and Exhibition, Boston Early Music Festival, Bethlehem Bach Festival, Göttingen Festival, Tage Alte Musik Festival in Regensburg, E. Nakamichi Baroque Festival in Los Angeles, the Smithsonian Institution, and at the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Next Wave Festival, and he has collaborated on several occasions as conductor with the Mark Morris Dance Group.

Before devoting all of his time to conducting, he was one of the first recipients of the San Francisco Opera Company’s prestigious Adler Fellowships. Cited by the Wall Street Journal as “a superstar among oratorio tenors”, Mr. Thomas’ extensive discography of vocal music includes dozens of recordings of major works for Decca, EMI, Erato, Koch International Classics, Denon, Harmonia Mundi, Smithsonian, Newport Classics, and Arabesque. Mr. Thomas is an avid exponent of contemporary music, and has premiered song cycles of several new composers, including two cycles written especially for him. He has performed lieder recitals at the Smithsonian, song recitals at various universities, and appeared with his own vocal chamber music ensemble, “L’Aria Viva!”.

Educated at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, Manhattan School of Music, and the Juilliard School of Music, with further studies in English literature at Cambridge University, he has taught at the Amherst Early Music, Oberlin College Conservatory Baroque Performance Institute, San Francisco Early Music Society, and Southern Utah Early Music Workshops. Formerly on the faculty of Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, he has presented master classes at the New England Conservatory of Music, San Francisco Conservatory of Music, SUNY at Buffalo, Swarthmore College, and Washington University.

JESSICA BEJARANO (teaching assistant and assistant conductor) is about to enter her final year as candidate for the Master of Arts degree in Conducting from UC Davis. Jessica earned her Bachelor of Music in Music Education from the University of Wyoming in 2006. As a trumpet player she studied with Thomas Pfotenhauer and sought out private conducting lessons from Michael Griffith, director of the University of Wyoming Symphony Orchestra.  Jessica has worked closely with the University of Wyoming Orchestra and conducted Mozart's Cosi Fan Tutte Overture at the Dorothy Jacoby Concerto Competition as well as Dr. Anne Guzzo's (UCD alumna) composition, Mechanations, in various performances.

Jessica is an active member of the Conductors’ Guild and has attended the 2005, 2006, and 2007 annual conferences in Boston, New York, and Toronto. She has also been accepted to the Conductors’ Guild training workshops with the Lamont Symphony Orchestra in Denver, Colorado, with Marin Alsop as principal conductor; Bowling Green Philharmonia with Gustav Meier and Leonard Slatkin; and the California Conducting Institute with John Farrer, Daniel Lewis, and Donald Thulean. 

During the summer of 2007, Jessica was one of nine participants from around the world who were accepted to attend the International Academy of Advanced Conducting after Ilya Musin in Beloit, Wisconsin, and Saint Petersburg, Russia.  This intensive conducting program gave Jessica the opportunity to study with Oleg Proskurnya, Director of the IAAC and Director of the Beloit College Orchestra, and Leonid Korchmar, Director of Opera at the Mariinsky Theatre and Professor of Conducting at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory.   At the end of the summer program Jessica conducted the Classical Symphony Orchestra of Saint Petersburg in concert at Herzen University in Saint Petersburg, Russia.  Jessica is also Music Director of the Davis Summer Symphony and studies conducting with Professor Holoman and Professor Thomas.