ABOUT THE CONDUCTORS

Webster Alexander Rogers, Jr. is an American conductor who has directed numerous ensembles and choruses in the Washington, D.C. area. He is a graduate of the Benjamin T. Rome School of Music at the Catholic University of America, where he is currently a doctoral student there in musicology. He has studied conducting with Randall Craig Fleischer, formerly the Associate Conductor of the National Symphony Orchestra; with Dr. Robert Ricks, Conductor Emeritus of the Catholic University Symphony Orchestra; and with Piotr Gajewski, Music Director of the National Philharmonic Orchestra and also a former music director of the Catholic University Symphony Orchestra.

Mr. Rogers also serves as music director of the Friday Morning Music Club Chorale of Washington, D.C., where in his nineteen seasons as director he has presented Johann Sebastian Bach's Mass in B Minor, Cantatas No. 4 and 140, Magnificat in D Major, and major excerpts from his Christmas Oratorio; Johannes Brahms's Ein deutsches Requiem, Nänie, and Schicksalslied ; Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Requiem in D Minor, KV. 626, Coronation Mass, Great Mass in C Minor, KV. 417a/427, and both settings of his Solemn Vespers; George Frideric Handel's Messiah, Israel in Egypt, and Dettingen Te Deum; Franz Josef Haydn's Mass in Time of War, Theresienmesse, "Great Organ" Mass in E-flat, Harmoniemesse, Lord Nelson Mass, and his oratorios The Creation and The Seasons; Felix Mendelssohn's oratorios Elijah and St. Paul and his under-performed secular cantata, Die erste Walpurgisnacht; Franz Schubert's Mass No. 5 in A-flat Major, Mass No. 6 in E-flat Major and his Magnificat; Gabriel Fauré's Requiem, Leonard Bernstein's Chichester Psalms and John Rutter's Gloria; and Ludwig van Beethoven's Missa Solemnis in D Major, Meeresstille und Glückliche Fahrt (Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage (Schiller)), and Beethoven's Fantasia for Piano, Orchestra, and Chorus featuring internationally acclaimed pianist Thomas Mastroianni, D. M. A., head of the Piano Department and a former Dean of the Benjamin T. Rome School of Music at Catholic University of America, as guest pianist. Other repertoire has included Camille Saint-Saëns Oratorio de Noël and Ralph Vaughan Williams's Hodie.

Mr. Rogers teaches in the District of Columbia Public Schools at Calvin Coolidge High School (his alma mater), where has previously served as Assistant Band Director of the Duke Ellington School of the Arts. He also has served as the Director of Bands and Orchestras at Wheaton High School in Silver Spring, Maryland and at Tilden Junior High School in Montgomery County, Maryland. He has also taught in Prince George's County, Maryland, where he served as Chairman of the Music Department and Director of Bands and Orchestras at the Suitland High School Visual and Performing Arts Magnet, and as Director of Bands and Choruses at Crossland High School.

Mr. Rogers served as the music director of the Traditional Choir of St. John the Baptist Catholic Faith Community in Silver Spring, Maryland from 1975 to 2003. In this capacity, he conducted the choir in many prominent venues in the United States and abroad, including a concert tour in Italy that culminated in a concert in Rome at the Chiesa di Sant'Ignazio Loyola and solo participation in a Mass celebrated by the late Pope John Paul II at Saint Peter's Cathedral; a musical tour of Montreal and Quebec City, Canada; and Masses at the Cathedral of Saints Peter and Paul in Philadelphia and St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York City. In addition, he has led the choir in providing the music liturgy for occasions that featured the late Mother Teresa of Calcutta.

Mr. Rogers is known in the Washington area as an accomplished conductor of orchestral as well as choral music, having conducted the Friday Morning Music Club Orchestra in a program that featured Johannes Brahms's Symphony No. 4 in E Minor, Ludwig van Beethoven's Fifth Piano Concerto (the Emperor), again featuring Dr. Mastroianni at the piano, and Emmanuel Chabrier's Danse Slave from his opera, "Le Roi malgre lui."

Mr. Rogers has also conducted a number of choral sing-alongs, including G. F. Handel's Messiah for the Washington Summer Sings! and for Reston Sings! with The Reston Chorale, as well as Antonio Vivaldi's Gloria and W. A. Mozart's Vesperae Solennes de Confessore, KV 339, also for Summer Sings!. In July 2007, he shall lead a community sing-along of Felix Mendelssohn's oratorio Elijah at the First Baptist Church of Washington, D.C., under the auspices of the Friday Morning Music Club Chorale.

Mr. Rogers has been music director or theatre director for more than fifty shows and operas in the Washington area, including many Hexagon Club Revues, most recently the Potomac Theatre Company's acclaimed and Ruby Griffith award-winning production of "Nunsense" in November 2006. Mr. Rogers also has been retained by the Victorian Lyric Opera Company as the conductor for productions of Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado, Trial by Jury, and The Sorcerer, and as musical director and conductor for a production of The Pirates of Penzance, as well as its production of the Jacques Offenbach operetta La vie Parisienne; he also musically directed the Maryland-based Rosebud Musical Theater Company, currently in hiatus.

Steven Alan Honley has been the Friday Morning Music Club Chorale's assistant conductor since September 1997 (during the 2002-2003 season, he served as consulting guest conductor). He is also the Chorale's rehearsal accompanist, a position he previously held from September 1999 through June 2002.

An accomplished pianist, organist, accompanist, singer, composer, and conductor, he has been active on the musical scene in Washington, D.C. since 1981, appearing with a wide range of area ensembles as well as in solo performances. In the FMMC Chorale's June 1999 concert, he sang several short bass solos in Mendelssohn's Elijah; in the January 2000 Twelfth Night Concert, he sang the countertenor solo in Handel's Dettingen Te Deum; and in its June 2002 concert, he sang the tenor solos in the Mozart Vesperae Solennes de Confessore da Dominica.

In addition to serving since 1994 as director of music at Beverley Hills Community United Methodist Church in Alexandria, Virginia, he currently sings in the Virginia-based early music ensemble Carmina and plays piano for the Maryland-based Rosebud Musical Theater Company, among other musical activities. He has accompanied a number of FMMC members in recital, including soprano Denise Young, and sang and played organ in two 1999 programs featuring FMMC composer Ruth Norman's music. In February 2004, he will give the world premiere of FMMC composer Wang An-Ming's "Crossings" for organ.

Programs of the Friday Morning Music Club are open to the public free of charge, with no tickets needed. Programs are subject to change without notice. The Friday Morning Music Club is a member of the United Arts Organization. Please support our artistic and educational programs through the United Way or the Combined Federal Campaign by designating #8624.