Selected Alumni Bios

• Stewart Pearce

  Stewart Pearce has spent virtually his entire professional career at the Metropolitan Opera and the Metropolitan Opera Guild, in a variety of management positions spanning almost 35 years.
  
  Mr. Pearce received his Master’s Degree in Arts Management from New York University in 1977, which included an internship at the Metropolitan Opera Guild.  Pearce then served as the Guild’s Director of Membership, including broad-based marketing and fund raising responsibilities.
  
  Pearce moved to the Metropolitan Opera in 1982 to become Assistant Development Director, and in 1984 became the Met’s Director of Planning and Budgets.  In the ensuing years, Pearce took on responsibility for operations, box office, marketing and finance and in 1997 was named an Assistant Manager for the Metropolitan Opera.
  
  In 2006, Pearce was appointed Assistant Manager for Operations by Metropolitan Opera General Manager Peter Gelb. In that role, he has been involved in long-range financial planning, budgeting, season planning, touring, box office, audience development and educational outreach, presentations, merchandising, archives, visual arts, and external relations.
  
  In addition to his continuing Met role, Pearce was appointed Managing Director of the Metropolitan Opera Guild in July 2010; a support organization for the Met which publishes Opera News magazine and produces a range of educational programs for audiences of all ages.

• Cecelia Fitzgibbon

  Since 1996, Professor Cecelia Fitzgibbon (M.A. 1982) has directed Drexel University's Graduate Arts Administration Program, which has earned a reputation for attracting high-quality students, equipping them to lead and manage cultural organizations, and developing their capacities to anticipate and understand the future through trend analysis. She also serves as the Department Head for Arts and Entertainment Enterprise and as such advises the Dean on matters related to curriculum development and educational policy.
  
  Professor Fitzgibbon has been a planning consultant for the Newark Arts Alliance and City of Newark, Delaware. She served as evaluator for the stabilization effort, Arts Challenge Fund of New Jersey; written a critical issues analysis for cultural development for the City of Wilmington, Delaware; and was the lead researcher for the Philadelphia component of the National and Local Profiles of Cultural Support Project, a collaborative project with the Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance that investigates how the nonprofit cultural industry is supported in ten communities across the United States. She has been the founding project manager for the Pennsylvania Cultural Data Project, a collaborative effort of the Pew Charitable Trusts, The William Penn Foundation, the Heinz Foundation and the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts.  Together with key leaders of the Pew Culture Program, she conceptualized the original guidelines for the Philadelphia Cultural Management Initiative, a capacity building program for professional arts organizations in the region.
  
  Professor Fitzgibbon formerly served as Executive Director of First Night Wilmington from 1995-96. Prior to that, she was Senior Vice President of ArtsMarket Consulting, Inc., where she conducted program planning and evaluation for clients including the Rochester Area Foundation, Southern Arts Federation, Georgia Council on the Arts, Mississippi Art Museum, New Stage Theater, West Virginia Department of Cultural Affairs, New York State Association of Museums, and The Guggenheim Museum Learning Through Art Program. From 1993-94, Professor Fitzgibbon directed policy planning, program design, fund raising, communications, and organizational development as Executive Director of the New England Foundation for the Arts (NEFA). In this capacity, she instituted the region's cultural facility fund, a technical assistance program and loan fund for the development of arts facilities, and inaugurated the first year of the New England Artists Trust.
  
  Professor Fitzgibbon also spent over eight years as Director of the Delaware Division of the Arts, where she led the concept, design, and implementation of a $21.5 million arts stabilization project; the creation of the state's first economic impact study model; the development of a nationally-recognized dance residency program; the evaluation and design of highly-acclaimed arts in education programs; the establishment of an arts standards and assessment commission; and the institution of the agency's first strategic planning process.

• Virginia Almendarez
  Virginia Almendarez (M.A., Performing Arts Administration, 2003) serves as Development Director for THE POINT Community Development Corporation, an emergent non-profit organization dedicated to youth development and the cultural and economic revitalization of the Hunts Point section of The Bronx. Before coming to NYU, Ms. Almendarez received a Bachelor's of Science in Finance from the University at Buffalo.

   

  Ms. Almendarez has worked with organizations such as The Kennedy Center, Ballet Hispanico and Queens Theatre in the Park. Through her master's work at NYU and its unique summer abroad program, she studied arts administration and cultural policy in an international context in the Netherlands, Germany and France and continues to do independent research on policy issues affecting the arts.
  

• Moy Eng
  Moy Eng (M.A., Performing Arts Administration, 1981) is Program Director for Performing Arts of The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and has amassed over 20 years of experience in the nonprofit sector, working with more than 250 organizations in arts and culture, immigrant rights, international human rights, lesbian and gay rights, and energy fields. Prior to her appointment at the Hewlett Foundation in January 2002, Ms. Moy directed the Joyce Mertz-Gilmore Foundation's domestic and international grantmaking programs in energy and U.S. human rights for five years. In addition, she has worked for over fifteen years on fundraising and institutional capacity building, primarily in the performing arts and in senior development positions in the Orchestra of St. Lukes and the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater.
  
  Moy has taught at New York University and at the State University of New York at Purchase, and has also lectured at national, regional and state conferences on fundraising, organizational development and grantmaking. She has served on a number of national committees encompassing human rights, environmental, and arts issues, including most recently as Co-chair of Grantmakers Concerned with Immigrants and Refugees, and as a Board member of the Funders for Lesbian and Gay Issues.
• Raymond T. Grant
  Raymond T. Grant (M.A., 1984 Performing Arts Administration) has been named Executive Director of Robert Redford's internationally acclaimed arts center and theater, Sundance Village, overseeing a staff of 500. From 1998-2003, Grant served as Managing Director of the Salt Lake Organizing Committee of the Olympic Winter Games of 2002 (SLOC). He also held the title of Artistic Director of the 2002 Cultural Olympiad, the Olympic Arts Festival for the 2002 Games, attracting over 400,000 visitors.

  Previously, Grant served, in New York City, as General Manager of the American Symphony Orchestra from 1985-1991. A native New Yorker, he has produced major events in Carnegie Hall, Madison Square Garden, Radio City Music Hall and New York's Central Park. From 1993-96, Grant headed the Performing Arts and Film programs of the Disney Institute, a division of the Walt Disney Company. There he directed a 365-day per year performance schedule featuring artists in the fields of music, theatre, dance, film and television, science and architecture. He also launched a major artist-in-residence program and conceived of three multi-million dollar performance facilities. He also served as a programming consultant for Walt Disney Attractions, Inc. Grant has also served as a panel member for the National Endowment for the Arts.

• Joseph Kluger
  Joseph H. Kluger (M.A., 1979, Performing Arts Administration) has served as The Philadelphia Orchestra Association chief executive officer since May 1989, when he was appointed Executive Director, and has held the title of President since November 1991. He joined The Philadelphia Orchestra staff in 1985 as General Manager, after working with the New York Philharmonic, where he had been on staff in a variety of positions, culminating in the position of Orchestra Manager. Mr. Kluger studied piano and voice, the latter including a summer at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria. Prior to his in depth involvement with classical music, Mr. Kluger was both a director and performer in numerous amateur musical theater productions.

  During Mr. Kluger's tenure as President of The Philadelphia Orchestra Association, he has led the search and recruitment efforts for both current Music Director Christoph Eschenbach and his predecessor, Wolfgang Sawallisch. He has also played a catalytic role in the development of the Orchestra's new home in the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts. Some of the Orchestra's other accomplishments under his leadership include:

  • Commitments of $75 million, including a lead gift of $50 million from the Annenberg Foundation, towards a $125 million endowment campaign;

  • Development of a model relationship of cooperation and collaboration with the musicians of the Orchestra, who now play an active role in all aspects of governance and decision-making;

  • Establishment of a joint venture partnership with the musicians of the Orchestra, to maximize the distribution of its music via innovative electronic media technology;

  • Pioneering efforts as the first major symphony orchestra to offer its music for "streaming" on the Internet;

  • Historic tours to Vietnam (first by a U.S. symphony orchestra), Israel, China, Latin America; and

  • Major initiatives to increase cultural diversity, educational activities and community partnerships.

  Mr. Kluger is an internationally recognized expert in the classical music industry on recordings, broadcasts, the Internet and other electronic media activities and has served for over ten years as the Chairman of the Orchestra Managers' Media Committee of the American Symphony Orchestra League.

  Mr. Kluger has been an active participant in civic groups in the Greater Philadelphia region. He has served on the Board of the Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance, of which he is a past President, the Executive Committee of the Philadelphia Convention and Visitors Bureau, and Governor Rendell Arts and Culture Transition Team. He is currently a member of the Board of the Arts and Business Council of Philadelphia, the Board of the Marian Anderson Award, and the Board of the Musical Fund Society.