Producing Artistic Director – Jennifer Boesing
Jennifer Boesing began working professionally as a singer/actor in Minneapolis at the age of nine. Before she graduated from high school, she had performed with At the Foot of the Mountain Theater Company, Mabou Mines Theater, Heart of the Beast Puppet and Mask Theater, the Minnesota Orchestra, and the Minnesota Opera.
Jennifer graduated from the Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theater in New York City, where she studied acting with Sanford Meisner and Richard Pinter. In 2002 she earned a Masters in Music from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, where she received the Award for Outstanding Achievement in Operatic Performance. Locally, she has performed opera, oratorio, and new music theater; her professional credits include work with San Francisco Opera Center, San Francisco Lyric Opera, Pocket Opera, Golden Gate Men’s Chorus, Gold Coast Chamber Players, Berkeley Symphony Orchestra, Berkeley Opera, Oakland East Bay Symphony, Oakland Opera Theater, Festival Opera, and North Bay Opera. She has been teaching voice privately since 1998.
Boesing began working with YMTC in 2000 as Music Director, and served as Vocal Coach in 2002. In 2004, she came on board as YMTC’s stage director, assisted the company in forming a board and incorporating as a non-profit in 2004, took on the mantle of Artistic Director, and began to design, implement and teach acting and musical theater workshops throughout the season. Boesing has been leading the company as its Producing Artistic Director since 2012.
Contact Jennifer Boesing
Resident Music Director – Dave Möschler
David Möschler is an award-winning San Francisco Bay Area-based musical director and conductor, and has music-directed over one hundred productions of musical theater, opera, and theater productions for companies such as Berkeley Repertory Theatre, San Jose Repertory, Shotgun Players, Center REPertory Theatre, Ray of Light Theatre, Boxcar Theatre, Erika Chong Shuch Performance Project. Möschler is the recipient of two Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle Awards, and won second place for the 2012 The American Prize in Music for YMTC’s production of Ragtime. In addition to staying active as a frequent guest lecturer, vocal coach, cabaret artist, orchestra contractor, in the spring of 2013 he founded the Awesöme Orchestra Collective, a non-profit incubator orchestra. Möschler has also served as adjunct faculty for several Bay Area high schools and colleges, and served on the the conducting staff of Cape Cod’s College Light Opera Company for six summers. After receiving his Bachelor of Music and Bachelor of Arts in Physics at UNC Chapel Hill, he completed his Master of Arts in Music for conducting, under the tutelage of Professors D. Kern Holoman and Jeffrey Thomas at UC Davis, publishing his thesis on Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Carousel. Möschler began music-directing YMTC productions in 2010, and in 2012 was named the company’s first Resident Musical Director.
Contact Dave Möschler
Production Manager and Director of Programs – Molly Bell
Molly joined YMTC in January 2022, culminating a five-year tenure as Director of Dramatics at a Marin County high school. Recent producing/directing (musical) credits include “Anastasia,” “The Wedding Singer,” “Little Women,” and “Cinderella." Previously she created and implemented curriculum, taught, and facilitated a variety of arts education programs in university settings, social service agencies, private schools, and museums - working with students ranging from age five through adulthood. A Berkeley native, Molly is lifelong performing artist, a YMTC alum (“Sweeney Todd,” ‘05), and BHS graduate; she earned her MA in Applied Theatre at the University of London’s Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, where she specialized in youth theater practice in non-traditional settings (e.g., hospitals, prisons, museums) to address and explore solutions to social concerns (e.g., bullying, domestic violence, social equity and bias).
Contact Molly Bell
Director of Marketing, Casting, and Outreach – Celeste Kamiya
Celeste Kamiya is a San Francisco-born actor, singer, and teaching artist. As a child, she couldn’t get her hands on enough classes and workshops in singing, acting, and performance. She trained and performed with the San Francisco Girls Chorus for 6 years, appearing during that time in the children’s choruses of Il Tritico: Suor Angelica and Die Tote Stadt at San Francisco Opera. A YMTC alum, Celeste appeared in and worked on many, many YMTC productions, from Anything Goes in 2010 to Carousel in 2016 – and she credits Jennifer, Dave, and Pam with instilling in her a deep love and respect for teaching the arts to young people. After gaining her BA in Theater at The New School in New York City, and studying acting at the British American Drama Academy in London, she realized she wanted more than anything to return to YMTC and be a part of the astounding work going on with the young artists there – so she came back as a teaching artist in 2018 and to perform in the inaugural YMTC+ production and hasn’t left since! She worked as Resident Stage Manager from 2018–2022, becoming Casting and Outreach Director in 2021 and the Marketing Director in fall 2022.
When not working at YMTC, Celeste holds a variety of odd jobs, but always keeps performing. She has performed, stage managed, and taught at Contra Costa Civic Theater, West Edge Opera, Oakland Theatre Project, San Francisco Shakespeare Festival, Custom Made Theatre Company, Theatre Rhino, and South Bay Musical Theatre. Being a part of YMTC has been the joy of her life, and she looks forward to helping train the young artists of tomorrow.
Contact Celeste Kamiya
Director of Development – Martha Westland
Martha Westland recently stepped down from her position as Executive Director of the San Francisco Bach Choir, which she led (and sang with) for 12 years. In previous incarnations, she has been a software development project manager, radio host and arts reporter for Capitol Public Radio, and has taught at CSU Sacramento, San Francisco Conservatory Pre-College and Continuing Education Divisions, and the San Francisco Community Music Center. Other projects include working with archival material and exhibits at the Museum of Performance + Design, and coordinating a dance preservation video project for the Dance Heritage Coalition. A former professional French horn player, she earned a M.Mus. from Northwestern University, B.A. in English literature and B.Mus. from Oberlin College and Conservatory, and maintains a PMP project management credential.
A parent alum of two kids who have participated in 9 YMTC shows and multiple workshops, Martha is a big fan of the amazing work that YMTC does and is delighted to be a part of the organization in a new way.
Contact Martha Westland
Registrar – Pam Crane
Pam Crane received her BA in Drama and English Literature from Occidental College, and her MBA from Golden Gate University. Her past choreography credits include Kiss Me Kate, Anything Goes, How to Succeed in Business, Guys & Dolls, Godspell, Cabaret, Fiddler On The Roof, Jesus Christ Superstar, West Side Story, The Drowsy Chaperone, Urinetown and The Music Man. She was a founding board member when YMTC was incorporated as a non-profit organization in 2004, and served as Board President until 2009, and as Managing Director until 2010. She is currently YMTC's Registrar, but is trying to fade away into obscurity.
Contact Pam Crane
Pit Orchestra Apprenticeship Program Coordinator – Diana Lee
Diana Lee is a classically trained pianist and cellist. She did her undergraduate studies at UC Berkeley, and has been teaching, performing and freelancing ever since. She maintains her own private studio in the East Bay, and has been the Music Director for various theater companies throughout the Bay Area including the San Francisco Arts Education Project, Pacifica Spindrift Players, Spindrift School of Performing Arts, and Bay Area Educational Theater Company. Most recently she has been working with San Francisco Bay Area Theater Company and, of course, with YMTC. She has played in the pit for many YMTC shows since 2012, and is grateful for the continued opportunity to work with the incredible staff and students in the program.
Contact Diana Lee
Volunteer Coordinator – Whitney Moss
Whitney Moss is the co-founder and publisher of {510} Families, the hyperlocal guide for East Bay parents. She has been a YMTC parent since Spring 2019 when her son completed a TAAP internship. Her daughter has performed in four YMTC shows during which Whitney volunteered in the box office, concessions, and as the house manager.
Whitney was not a theater kid herself; she cannot carry a tune and was last seen on stage in first grade when she played the mother of Goldilocks. She lives in Berkeley with her husband, their two teenagers, and a very spoiled cat.
Contact Whitney Moss
Facilities Manager – Bill Brewer
Based in the Bay Area, Bill Brewer has been the Technical Director and Master Builder for the last three seasons with YMTC, and now works as the Facilities Manager. He received both his Bachelors and Masters degrees at the University of Oregon. He has worked in design and production for most of his career, including his own bespoke furniture company and as COO and product design team lead for Solid Manufacturing. An avid athlete and former collegiate distance runner, he brings that determination, energy, and grit to his work with YMTC. He is privileged to contribute to providing a safe and effective space for YMTC students and staff to follow their passions and reach their potential.
Susannah Martin, an award-winning director, teacher, and theatre maker, Susannah has taught and directed for organizations throughout the Bay Area. For five years, she was the Joint Artistic Director of Paducah Mining Co., a San Francisco-based theatre ensemble that produced acclaimed work by established playwrights and devised original pieces on complex material such as domestic terrorism, spousal abuse, and poverty in America. During her tenure with Paducah, she was awarded three Dean Goodman Choice Awards. She is also a Bay Area Critic’s Circle, Broadway World, and Shellie Award nominee.
Susannah has directed for Shotgun Players (company member), Mugwumpin (company member), San Francisco Playhouse, TheatreFIRST, A.C.T., Golden Thread Productions, Porchlight Theatre Company, Sonoma County Rep, La Peña Cultural Center, the San Francisco International Arts Festival, and directed countless readings and workshops for companies as varied as the Aurora Theatre Company, the Playwright’s Foundation, the Magic Theatre, Marin Theatre Company, Crowded Fire Theatre Company, TheatreWorks, and Z Space.
Susannah is currently Guest Faculty at Saint Mary’s College and the Theatre Director and Arts Program Coordinator at San Francisco University High School. Susannah has also taught for UC Davis, Los Medanos College, California Shakespeare Theater, Berkeley Playhouse, and a variety of high schools throughout San Francisco and the East Bay. Susannah received her BFA in Theatre from NYU and her MFA in Directing from UC Davis. To keep up with Susannah’s work go to www.susannahmartin.net.
Zoë Swenson-Graham returned to the Bay Area in 2015 after living in London for nearly seven years, where she worked as an actor, dancer, and trained as a stage combat instructor and fight choreographer-- working around the UK teaching in various drama schools, and working with organizations such as the Royal Opera House, The Globe, Southwark Playhouse and The Kings Head Theatre. Since returning to the Bay, Zoe has choreographed for and taught with the American Conservatory Theatre, Berkeley Rep School of Theatre, Oakland School of the Arts, Sierra Repertory Theatre Company, Broadway By The Bay, East Bay Center for the Performing Arts, YMTC, Palo Alto Children's Theatre, Mountain Play Association and MoonSchool with 42nd Street Moon. Dance choreography credits include: Newsies (Hillbarn Theatre), Camelot (Sierra Rep Theatre), Mamma Mia (Mountain Play and Hillbarn Theatre), White Christmas (Sierra Rep Theatre Company), The Producers, A Chorus Line, Company (Mayhem Musical Theatre Company, London) and she worked as the Associate Choreographer on Music Man and Saturday Night Fever at Broadway By the Bay. Zoe's horror film Lasso features her acting and stunt work, which was released internationally last year and her motion capture and voiceover work will be seen in an upcoming feature film. Zoe still loves to perform on stage, most recently appearing in Cabaret at the SF Playhouse and A Chorus Line at Sierra Repertory Theatre.
Sheela Ramesh is a music director and composer, and is excited to be working with Youth Musical Theater Company again! Bay Area theater credits include work with YMTC, Contra Costa Civic Theatre, Musical Cafe, Spare Stage, Theatre Rhinoceros, Inferno Theatre, and more. Sheela received undergraduate and graduate degrees in music at the Carnegie Mellon University School of Music and the Royal College of Music, and she has performed as a mezzo-soprano in musical theater and opera productions in the US and UK. Sheela also holds degrees in psychology/cognitive science (BS, Carnegie Mellon; MSc, University College London) and law (JD, Yale Law School), and has spent her nonmusical professional life working to ensure that youth who’ve experienced trauma have opportunities to thrive.
David Crane is a teaching artist and YMTC alum based out of New York City. He has performed all over the Bay Area and California, including in YMTC+ productions of Next to Normal and Don’t Stop Me. He most recently spent a pandemic year teaching physical theatre, acting and performance at Oakland School for the Arts—all over Zoom! He’s very excited to get back to working and playing in person. A graduate of UCLA’s Ray Bolger Musical Theatre program, he has continued to study movement and composition with award-winning theatre companies Steppenwolf Classes West and SITI Company. More info at www.davidtcrane.com
Dean Linnard is a bicoastal actor and teaching artist … and proud YMTC alum! He holds a BFA from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts and trained at the Stella Adler Studio of Acting and the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London. Recent Bay Area acting credits include The Three Musketeers and Love’s Labour’s Lost with Marin Shakespeare Company, A Midsummer Night’s Dream and The Good Person of Szechwan with California Shakespeare Theater, and Groundhog Day: The Musical with San Francisco Playhouse (for which he won a San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle Award). Dean toured to 25 states with the musical The Lightning Thief . He has performed with and taught acting at Marin Shakespeare Company, Vermont Shakespeare Festival, and the Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey. Dean is also a teaching artist for Broadway.com’s Broadway Classroom in New York City. Dean founded the Anti-Isolation Arts Factory ( @ai_artsfactory ) in November 2020 to give creative opportunities to out-of-work artists. www.DeanLinnard.com
Daniel Alley is a music director, conductor, and pianist specializing in musical theater and opera. Recent work with YMTC includes the summer Songs & Scenes Workshop (music director), Light in the Piazza (cover conductor), and Merrily We Roll Along (Keys II). He is a company member at Shotgun Players, where he is music directing Passing Strange and Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812 for their upcoming 30th anniversary season. Recent credits include music director for Vinegar Tom (Shotgun Players), Memphis (Berkeley Playhouse), The Fantasticks (Piedmont Center for the Arts), Threepenny Opera and Spelling Bee (Oakland School for the Arts), Chicago, Pippin, Freaky Friday, and A Chorus Line (Berkeley Playhouse YouthStage) and rehearsal pianist and choir master for La Bohème, The Magic Flute, and Aroldo at West Edge Opera. He studied orchestral and choral conducting at UC Berkeley and is the choir director and organist at Christ Lutheran Church.
Katy Mlodzik is a dance teacher and theater educator working and living in the Bay Area. She graduated in 2019 from UC Santa Cruz with a degree in Theater and Dance, and has been working with several companies in the Bay Area since! She is incredibly passionate about representation in the arts, and has been very lucky to be working with several companies actively working towards this through their education and outreach. She has a passion for dramaturgy and history, and works hard to bring that necessary context to her classes and her arts. A lifelong dancer, she has taken just about every kind of dance class and uses that experience to bring life and story into her movement. Her first musical theater show was with YMTC, and she is beyond thrilled to get the chance to bring that training to youth students.
Dr. Phillip Harris teaches at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music (SFCM) on the voice faculty of the Pre-College division and as an adjunct professor in the music history and literature department where he created the first ever class at SFCM on art songs by black composers. He was previously performing arts chair and vocal music director at Head-Royce School, a voice teacher for P.A.L.S. at the Aspen Music Festival, as well as Stuart Hall for Boys. An avid researcher on the classical songs of black composers, he has given lectures on the topic at Peabody Institute of The John Hopkins University, Westminster Choir College, University of California, Santa Cruz, Alabama State University, and San Francisco City College. Co-chair of Student Auditions for the San Francisco Bay Area Chapter of the National Association of Teachers of Singing, he has held masterclasses at Alabama State University and Los Medanos College. His students have graduated
from Boston Conservatory at Berklee and attend the Pre-College division at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. Phillip earned voice degrees from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (Doctor of Musical Arts), the University of Michigan (Master of Music), and the University of California, Irvine (Bachelor of Music). This fall, he will teach voice and musical theatre at Menlo School and teach as an adjunct professor at West Valley College. In the spring of 2022, he co-music directed YMTC’s production of Shrek.
Nicole Helfer is an award-winning choreographer, director, equity actor, and Chair of the School of Theatre at Oakland School for the Arts. With over twenty years of experience, she has taught dance and theatre at such well-known bay area organizations as Dance Mission Theatre, Laureen Fender’s Ballet School, Steppin’ Out Studios, SF Park and Rec, Kid Stock Inc., Handful Players, YMCA, Spindrift School for the Performing Arts.
Nicole has also studied at SFSU, the Dell’Arte International School of Physical Theatre, Big Sur Theatre Lab, the Dunham Technique Seminar in East St. Louis, and many professional workshops across the state. She has worked with many Bay Area theatre companies, including SF Playhouse, 42nd Street Moon, Broadway By the Bay, Center Rep, Ray of Light, The Mountain Play, and Pacific Coast Reparatory Theatre. Most notable choreography credits include Cabaret (TBA and SFBATCC nominee), Groundhog Day (SFBATCC nominee), Dames at Sea (TBA and SFBATCC nominee), She Loves Me (SFBATCC nominee), The Music Man (TBA nominee), West Side Story (TBA Award), In the Heights (TBA Award), No No Nanette (TBA and SFBATCC nominee), and Lizzie (SFBATCC nominee). In the fall of 2022, Nicole choreographed YMTC's production of Matilda the Musical.