Buddy James is Professor of Music at California State University, East Bay, where he serves as Chair of the Department of Music. At CSUEB he was the Founding Director of the School of Arts and Media, was the 2015-16 George and Miriam Phillips CSUEB Outstanding Professor, and was the 2022-2023 recipient of the Faculty Excellence Award in the College of Arts, Letters, and Social Sciences. He previously taught at Millersville University of Pennsylvania where he was named Professor of the Year in 2004. He was named the Outstanding Doctoral Graduate in Choral Music at the University of Southern California and was a Chancellor’s Fellow at the University of California Irvine. He has held leadership positions in ACDA, CCDA, NAfME, and IMC and was a Founding Officer and Past-President of the National Collegiate Choral Organization. His teachers included William Dehning, Joseph Huszti, Edward Maclary, Morten Lauridsen, and Robert Page and he is currently the Artistic Director of Schola Cantorum Silicon Valley and the San Francisco Bay Area Chamber Choir. 

The East Bay Singers

Comprised of some of Cal State East Bay’s finest students, each singer must pass a vocal and musical audition to earn a roster position in The East Bay Singers. Performing widely on campus, in the community, on annual tours of California, and internationally as ambassadors of CSUEB, the East Bay Singers have been acclaimed for their sensitive and exciting performances of varied and demanding repertoire. Music critics have rated them among the finest choirs in the San Francisco Bay Area and they have performed with the San Francisco and Oakland Symphony Orchestras, the San Francisco Chamber Orchestra, Composers Inc, and have appeared in conferences of the American Choral Directors Association and California Choral Directors Association. Recent tours have taken them to Mexico, Lithuania, Japan, and New York, including a performance at Carnegie Hall in Spring 2023. The East Bay Singers have also performed several world premieres of major choral works composed specifically for them, including P.D.Q. Bach’s Liebeslieder Polkas, which Peter Schickele “discovered” in 1979 and Libby Larsen’s If I Begin to Sing, commissioned in honor of CSUEB’s 40th Anniversary, as well as works by CSUEB faculty and student composers. The choir has been led by Buddy James since 2006.