Feb 27, 2006 : The Suzuki-Orff School for Young Musicians proudly announces the appointment of David L. Santini as Executive Director.

David's experience in both music and strategic management makes him ideally suited to be the Suzuki-Orff Executive Director. He graduated from the Duquesne University School of Music with a Bachelor of Science in Music Education and sang professionally for 18 years. During that time, he also served as Executive Director or as an executive manager for several national and international non-profit professional and trade associations. Recently, David taught music in an elementary school, and is producing and directing musical theater for middle school students.

David comes to Suzuki-Orff with a passion for music education, vast artistic experience in music, and the management skills needed to successfully move Suzuki-Orff forward into the next quarter of a century.

"I like Suzuki-Orff because it is such a diverse school," Santini said. "Families who can't afford music education can come to our school. We provide all the assistance we can to help them."

He had praise for the teachers: "I'm very impressed with the high levels of our faculty. Most of our faculty members have advanced degrees, and they are very dedicated to our School. When you have such an advanced faculty, children get continuity of quality music education. I believe success in music crosses over into academics," If children are confident in music it is bound to spread into other areas."

David has extensive music experience: "In 1984 I started to sing professionally, and the last opera I sang was in 2000. I've done about 72 productions, mainly the Verdi and Puccini repertoire. I was satisfied with doing the comprimario roles, but my favorite role to sing is Rodolfo in Puccini's La Boheme. I enjoyed doing it all. It was very exciting."

We hope you'll have the opportunity to meet with David and we believe you'll agree that he is an ideal person to lead Suzuki-Orff.