Singing with Maritza S.

Soto was born in Houston, Texas before moving to the Pacific Northwest where she found her passion with music. In 2005, she auditioned for the Whatcom Symphony Orchestra, and was accepted during her sophomore year of high school as the youngest member of the orchestra. As of today she still resides in the orchestra as a 1st violinist under the baton of Roger Briggs. She has had the privilege to perform with stars such as Leon Fleischer, Evelyn Glennie, Erin Wall, Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, Alexander Ardakov, Sarah Chang, and many more! Her teachers, and University proffessors enjoy her participation. During high school, she received many recognitions such as being chosen to play in the All-State Symphony Orchestra, Honor Orchestra, Squalicum High School chamber orchestra, as well as the school's Jazz band's pianist. She is the winner of her high school's annual Johannes Brahms Award. Her past orchestra teachers include her first teacher Mark Schlichting, Chip Bergeron, her private violin instructor Jane Perkins, Douglas Diehl, Margaret Palmer, Ethel Crook, Helen Ward, and her past vocal instructors Judith Page, Heidi Vanderford, Jessica Riley, and Katie Weld. She currently studies violin with Grant Donellan. During her high school carreer, she was part of a barbershop quartet and visited retirement houses to perform almost every weekend. In 2006, she received a national recognition otherwise known as the MENC top-100 high school musicians of America. Being one out of two students chosen in the state of Washington, she immediately started to become recognized in her community. She played the lead role of Professor Kenyon during March 2007 in Ray Henderson's musical comedy Good News! as well as being part of pit orchestra for her high school's Cinderella. She also plays with Skagit Opera Orchestra and has been in many opera productions such as La Boheme, HMS Pinafore, and many more. During the summer of 2007, she was a guest artist with the Mt. Baker Youth Symphony Orchestra and toured to Beijing, China to sing Mozart Arias with the Symphony.