Our Team
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Susan Klebanow, conductor and artistic director
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Jeff Whicker, accompanist
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Lorena Guillén

Susan Klebanow is the Zachary Smith Term Distinguished Professor of Music and Director of Choral Activities at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill where she conducts the Carolina Choir and Chamber Singers and teaches courses in conducting. She is a recipient of UNC’s Tanner Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching and a Chapman Family Teaching Award from UNC’s Institute of the Arts and Humanities. 

In addition to conducting the standard choral repertoire with her UNC ensembles, Klebanow has commissioned and conducted many new works; also devoted to period instrument performance, she has regularly conducted the UNC historical performance ensembles. Klebanow has prepared choirs to sing with renowned conductors Vladimir Ashkenazy, Dennis Russell Davies, Grant Llewellyn, and Murry Sidlin, among others, and has collaborated in performance with pianist Pedja Muzijevich, the Martha Graham Dance Company, and slam poet/hip hop artist Saul Williams.

Susan Klebanow is in high demand as a guest conductor and clinician and has led choral festivals and workshops throughout the U.S. and in Mexico, China, and Italy. Active as a vocalist, pianist, and harpsichordist, Klebanow has performed extensively with contemporary music and early music groups based in Boston, North Carolina, and Mexico. She currently sings and plays harpsichord with Ensemble Matiz based in Chapel Hill, NC and serves as Chazzan for the High Holiday services at the Chapel Hill Kehillah and Congregation Etz Chayim.

A native of Danbury, Connecticut, Klebanow holds degrees from Brandeis University and the New England Conservatory of Music. Before joining the UNC faculty, she held faculty positions at Brandeis University and the New England Conservatory Extension Division, and taught junior high and high school in the Boston area and in Los Angeles.

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Jeff Whicker is the music director and pianist/organist at Emerywood Baptist Church in High Point.  He has served congregations in that capacity continuously since the age of 15.  He taught high school chorus for 16 years, most recently at Riverside High School here in Durham and he remains actively employed by Durham Public Schools, accompanying high school, middle school, and elementary all-county choirs.  He is the accompanist for the Durham Children’s choir and plays for all choirs at the Durham School of the Arts.

 

He received Bachelors and Master’s degrees in Music Education from UNC-G, and in another lifetime, graduated from UNC Law School and practiced as an attorney in the Triangle. He loves vacationing in Yosemite, where he recently successfully climbed Half Dome (above his right shoulder in the photograph) for the 17th time since he was 15 years old.

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Lorena Guillén, Music Director Emerita

We pay special tribute to our beloved Music Director Emerita, Lorena Guillen, who led the TJC from 2011 through her retirement in the spring of 2024, bringing us to a new level of excellence and diversity of music, including tangos from her native Argentina. A highlight of her tenure includes a 2015 trip to Argentina, where we sang concerts with local choirs in a variety of venues and got to experience some of the treasures of her country.