Board
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Board President
Thomas Neenan, Board President
Thomas Neenan founded the Music Guild in 1985 and co-founded The Chamber Orchestra at St. Matthew’s the same year. As Music Director and Conductor from the time of the orchestra’s founding until 2017, he conducted more than 250 concerts, commissioning and premiering more than thirty-five works by composers Christopher Tin, Richard Danielpour, David Conte, Miklos Rozsa, David Newman, Tom Pasatieri, Tarik O’Regan, Paul Chihara, Roger Bourland, Ethan Helm, Dante De Silva, Maria Newman, Mary Lou Newmark, John O’Reilly, Dwayne S. Milburn, Gerald Near, Ross Wright, and others. With the orchestra, he produced a CD, “Music from the Left Coast,” in 2013, featuring the Soweto Gospel Choir of South Africa. In 2017 he retired as Music Director and Conductor of the orchestra and transitioned to Board President of the Music Guild.
For more than thirty years Tom has been a featured speaker on the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s “Upbeat Live” pre-concert presentations and for the Philharmonic’s Organ Recital Series. Since 2021, he has been a program annotator for the LA Philharmonic. He has lectured and written program notes for the New West Symphony and several other arts organizations in Los Angeles, and enjoys presenting “Liner Notes with Tom Neenan,” a pre-concert lecture before all Music Guild events from November to June each season.
From 1991 to 2021 he was Lecturer in Music History and Theory at California Institute of Technology (Caltech). At Caltech he taught Music History, Music Theory, and courses devoted to special topics, including Jazz History, The Orchestra: Its History and Conductors, Opera History, Major Figures, Choral-Orchestral Literature, Chamber Music, and other course subjects. He was honored by the Associated Students of California Institute of Technology with an ASCIT Outstanding Teaching Award.
Tom holds a B.A. in Organ Performance from California State University, Northridge, and an M.F.A. in Performance Practices from UCLA, where he was honored with an Outstanding Academic Achievement Award and was a prizewinner in the Atwater-Kent Performance Competition. During his time at UCLA, he was Teaching Assistant and Assistant Conductor of the UCLA Men’s Glee Club, most notably during a three-week tour of Japan.
From 1981 – 2017 he was Music Director at The Parish of St. Matthew, Pacific Palisades. He led a St. Matthew’s Choir tour through Central Europe during the summer of 2003, presenting concerts in Budapest, Prague, Leipzig, Dresden, and Berlin. The choir toured England, Wales, and Ireland in July 2006. In August 2011 they served as Choir in Residence at Winchester Cathedral (UK) for a week and were the resident choir at Durham Cathedral (UK) for a week in the summer of 2016.
Tom is married to Robin Guyett-Neenan, also a co-founder of the orchestra, who has been a member of the cello section since 1985. They live in Encino and have a daughter, Heather, who is Lead Grant Manager for Caltech’s Department of Physics, Mathematics, and Astronomy.
Board Members
Catherine Carrick
Catherine joined the Music Guild Board in 2015. As Secretary of the Board, Catherine works closely with Board President, Tom Neenan, and Board Treasurer and Chair of the Finance Committee, Gordon Dressler, in all aspects of officially documenting the business and activities of the Music Guild. Aside from these responsibilities, Catherine’s primary focus has been on subscriber development.
Catherine was raised in Atlanta, Georgia and Paris, France. She received a Bachelor of Arts in French and Studio Arts from Sweet Briar College in Virginia and a MA in French from Middlebury College in Vermont. Catherine has been in academia for the past 21 years, teaching French in E. Rivers Elementary School in Atlanta and is currently a lower and middle school French teacher at Viewpoint School in Calabasas, CA.
Catherine lives with her husband John in Pacific Palisades, CA.
John Carrick
John grew up in the New Jersey Tri-State area and played piano as a young child “under duress,” as he puts it. Later, in high school, he took up the drums and found it more to his liking but decided it would not be an advisable career path. He received a BA from Bucknell University and a JD from The Columbus School of Law at Catholic University of America. After practicing law for five years, he continued his education at UC Berkeley and earned an MBA at the Haas Graduate School of Business where he was awarded the prestigious Marshall Bennett Real Estate Fellowship.
John met Catherine Lanter through mutual friends in late 2013, and she invited him to the opening performance of SMMG’s concert season as their second date. He was so impressed with the quality of the music (and of Catherine’s company) that he bought a subscription on the spot! John and Cat were subsequently married in 2016 making them the second couple, along with Gordon and Karen Dressler, to have cemented their relationship as a result of the Music Guild’s concert series. John joined the Music Guild Board in 2024.
In his day job, John serves as Co-Founder and Managing Principal of Integrated Capital Management. Originally seeded by the Roy Disney family in 2017, Integrated is a Los Angeles-based investment management firm that functions as an international multi-family office (MFO) to invest the real estate and sports-related allocations of numerous affluent households around the world.
John and Catherine live in Pacific Palisades where they enjoy an active lifestyle that includes adventure sports, travel, philanthropy, and a love of music. He is a member of the Board of CLARE MATRIX, an organization that seeks to address substance abuse disorder and mental health challenges among LA’s indigent population.
Mary Libbey Conley
Mary joined the Music Guild Board in 2014 and for the past 10 years has been a valued liaison between the Board and the Music Guild’s subscribers. She has worked tirelessly with subscription campaigns and patron events.
Mary was raised in Southern California and graduated with a BA in Psychology from Loyola Marymount University. She earned a MA in Psychology at California State University, Los Angeles and a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She spent time in academia at San Diego Mesa College and at Mount Saint Mary’s University in Los Angeles and as an independent educational consultant to the children’s television industry. Mary then became a Vice President in the non-profit Coalition on Children and Television, lecturing, providing reports to the FCC, and fundraising for public interest events.
Mary spent almost 3 decades with Capital Cities/ABC as the Director of Broadcast Standards and Practices for children’s programs and also worked on medical and psychiatric themed movies and primetime series. After the acquisition of Capital Cities/ABC by The Walt Disney Company, Mary worked in her same capacity as Director of Broadcast Standards for many of Disney’s animated and live-action children’s series.
Mary and her husband Bryan live in Pacific Palisades, CA.
Pablo Corá
Pablo Corá is a rare hybrid professional. He is both a professional singer by training and a Certified Public Accountant by trade. He currently serves as the Director of Finance for the Los Angeles Master Chorale, one of the resident organizations of the Music Center of L.A. County. Having started his career at KPMG LLP in 2012, Pablo has over ten years of nonprofit public accounting experience. He holds business and accounting degrees from California State University Northridge, and music degrees from Ithaca College and Indiana University.
Originally from Buenos Aires, Argentina, Pablo has sung both as a soloist and chamber musician in a wide variety of repertory ranging from early music and oratorio to twentieth-century opera. He has performed at the Argentine Colón Theatre, Amsterdam Concertgebouw, Lincoln Center, Weill Recital Hall, Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Disney Concert Hall, and the Brooklyn Academy of Music. He has sung with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Los Angeles Master Chorale, Los Angeles Chamber Singers and Cappella, and Musica Angelica Baroque orchestra. He is also a founding member of the award-winning Concord Ensemble. He has collaborated often with “period” ensembles such as the Folger Consort, Piffaro, Camerata Pacifica Baroque and the Catacoustic Ensemble.
His recording credits include works for the label Harmonia Mundi with Paul Hillier’s Theater of Voices and The Pro Arte Singers, Dorian Recordings with The Concord Ensemble and Piffaro, Rubis Canis Mundi (RCM) with the L.A. Master Chorale and Los Angeles Chamber Singers & Cappella, Gothic Records, Nonesuch and Clarion labels. He was featured in the 2007 Los Angeles Chamber Singer’s Cappella GRAMMY© winning recording: Padilla: Sun of Justice. Pablo joined the Music Guild Board in 2022.
Sarah Doering
Sarah joined the Music Guild Board in 2021. She worked closely with Board President Tom Neenan and Music Director Dwayne Milburn in the selection of San Francisco composer, David Conte, for a major new commission premiered in our June 2023 concert. In addition, Sarah collaborated with Mr. Conte in the selection of poems for his new work, “Hymn To Life.”
Sarah grew up in Lake Forest, Illinois and graduated from Barnard College in New York City with a degree in economics. She had a 24 year career as a regional sales manager for the western half of the US for a wholesale manufacturer of bakery products.
Sarah serves on the alumnae board of the Ethel Walker School in Simsbury, Connecticut. She is also is on the board of the Bay Area Rehabilitation Center, Inc. in Santa Monica and is an Emeritus board member with the CLARE|MATRIX Foundation in Santa Monica, a treatment center for people suffering from substance abuse.
Sarah resides in Malibu and can be found during summers at the beloved family cottage on Lake Huron in Canada.
Gordon Dressler
Gordon has served as Chair of the Music Guild’s Finance Committee continuously since 2014, and as Treasurer continuously since 2020. He brings to these positions – as well as his overall service as a member of the Board of Directors – his experience and skill as an aerospace engineer having parallel responsibilities for hands-on management of staff personnel and program/contract budgets in excess of $5 million. He takes great pride in having worked on programs that directly and positively impacted the defense of the United States and her allies.
Gordon was born in Texas, spent his early childhood in Tennessee and his teens in Florida. He is a true “child of the space age,” earning a BS degree from the Florida Institute of Technology and a MS degree from the California Institute of Technology. Gordon retired from a 36-year career in rocket propulsion engineering and management and is delighted he now has time to volunteer to work with fellow members of the Board of St. Matthew’s Music Guild.
Gordon lives with his wife Karen in Manhattan Beach. Their daughter, Lauren, began graduate school for her PhD in Physics and Cosmology in 2023.
Karen Dressler
Karen Wunch Dressler, who joined the Music Guild Board in 2024, grew up in Pacific Palisades where her love of music began in the children’s choir at Saint Matthew’s Church. During her teenage years she joined Job’s Daughters in Los Angeles and its all-girl choir. She became an adult learner of piano while attending choral and instrumental concerts at St. Matthew’s Music Guild. One evening in April 1996, she invited her “blind date” to enjoy the beautiful gardens at St. Matthew’s Church, followed by a Music Guild concert. As they say, the rest is history. Karen and Gordon were married in 1998 and are blessed to have brought daughter Lauren into the world several years later. She too attended SMMG concerts and enjoys singing, playing piano and cello, while pursuing her doctoral degree in Physics at University of Washington.
Karen’s professional calling has been in healthcare for 50 years. She graduated from the University of California with a Bachelor of Science degree in Nursing and Master of Science in Nursing from Boston University. Karen’s clinical expertise is in Rehabilitation Nursing, working with patients and families who are living with stroke, spinal and brain injuries, and other neurological and orthopedic conditions, and preparing countless nurses working in rehabilitation settings. In 1994 Karen was selected to serve Los Angeles County as the Chief Nursing Officer at Rancho Los Amigos National Rehabilitation Center. For the last 12 years she has directed a system-wide competency assessment program for LA County Department of Health Services. Throughout her career, Karen has served as President, Treasurer, and Secretary of several professional boards for Nursing and Rehabilitation Medicine.
She is very happy with almost any activity where she helps others. She volunteers weekly with South Bay Children’s Choir as a choir “mom,” and on various national and international travel adventures with the children (ages 8-18). She joined the SMMG concert volunteers in the midst of the pandemic, and is the familiar face at the subscriber table before concerts. She welcomes the opportunity to serve as the new Director of Concert Operations.
Jim Huser
Jim Huser grew up in Cincinnati and attended the University of Cincinnati College of Design, Architecture and Art, majoring in Painting. Drawn to a business career, he moved to Southern California in 1978 and attended the UCLA Graduate School of Management. In 1988 he was named Chief Information Officer for the Walt Disney Company’s Consumer Products division with responsibility for the company’s global consumer products businesses, overseeing technology for international licensing, the Disney Stores, Disney interactive and music publishing.
Jim retired from the private sector in 2014 and worked as an advisor to non-profit organization executives and boards. He was named a Senior Fellow with Community Partners, and subsequently served as Senior Vice President of Operations/Chief Financial Officer at Sycamores in Pasadena, one of the largest children’s behavioral health services agencies in LA County. He has also served in leadership capacities at both St. Matthew’s Church and St. Matthew’s Parish School.
Jim lives in Pacific Palisades with his wife Susan. Their daughters, Annie and Emma, both graduated from St. Matthew’s School before moving on to Marymount High School and, later, Trinity College and New York University respectively. Jim joined the Music Guild Board in 2024.
Patricia Massey
Clarinetist Patricia Massey has performed for over 40 years with numerous orchestras and ensembles. She has been Principal Clarinet with the Chamber Orchestra at St. Matthew’s since 1997 and the Orchestra Manager since 2001. She also is a member of the Opera Santa Barbara Orchestra and the Chamber Orchestra of the South Bay and is Principal Clarinetist with the Downey Symphony. In addition, Patricia performs regularly with a number of other ensembles in Southern California and is on the summer music faculty at Idyllwild Arts.
Patricia plays an important role as the liaison between the Music Guild Board and the orchestra. As the Orchestra Manager, Patricia works with the Music Director and the President of the Board in planning the overall season and the repertoire; contracts all the orchestra members for every concert; oversees the orchestra budget; and manages all rehearsal schedules.
Patricia is active in community outreach in schools through her involvement with Campus Concerts and the Downey Symphony Quintet.
Patricia lives in Woodland Hills with her husband Duncan, who is also a member of the Chamber Orchestra at St. Matthew’s.
Cynthia Alden Smith
Cynthia joined the Music Guild Board in 2015 after many years’ involvement in the music program at St. Matthew’s Church. She has been an active chorister since childhood, singing under nationally recognized choral directors in the Episcopal church. Cynthia brings her deep love of ensemble singing and fine musicianship to the SMMG.
Cynthia has been active in industry and trade associations and clubs throughout her career. She has served on the Boards of Directors of nearly every professional and volunteer organization in which she’s belonged, from advocating for legislation at the state and national level to local marathon running and dog performance clubs.
A native of Connecticut, Cynthia graduated cum laude from Mount Holyoke College and moved to Los Angeles in the mid-70s. Her professional career began in medical and biological research at the House Ear Institute and UCLA. She transitioned to the entertainment industry in the early days of cable television in Los Angeles. She spent a decade at USA Networks where she rose to Regional Vice President, with overall responsibility for the distribution, revenues, marketing and local ad sales support in a 14-state region. After USA, she worked with several interactive TV technology start-ups as a consultant. After leaving the cable industry, she founded her current professional organizing business, Your House In Order.
For over ten years, Cynthia has brought her organizational skills to the “front-of-the-house” experience for SMMG concert patrons, graciously and expeditiously checking in ticket holders and those purchasing tickets on the patio prior to concerts.
Cynthia lives in Venice with two highly trained standard poodles.
Dorry Tooke
The Music Guild has a strong commitment to community outreach and Dorry oversees all the Music Guild’s community concert activities. These are live events throughout the Los Angeles area, in all genres of music, performed by professional musicians. Community concerts included 32 live events during the 2023 – 2024 season. Performances take place at multiple LA Family Housing centers, shelters for female victims of domestic abuse, Neighborhood Youth Association, Union Rescue Mission, and Bread & Roses Café in Venice.
Dorry formerly served for two years on the Board of the Greensboro, N.C. Symphony Orchestra. She also served for 10 years on the Greensboro Symphony Guild Executive Board. In Greensboro, she was involved with major fundraising for the Symphony, youth outreach programs, the Greensboro Youth Orchestra, and concerts for 12,000 public school students annually.
Dorry was born and raised in Ottawa, Canada. Her professional career was as a Physical Therapist as well as an educator in her native Canada. In the US, she worked in the neonatal intensive care unit at St. John’s Hospital in Santa Monica, CA and had a private pediatric Physical Therapy practice. Dorry has an MA in Special Education from UCLA. She lives in Santa Monica with her husband Michael.