Board of Directors

Bryan Armington

As the players’ representative on the board, Bryan Armington has been a member of the viola section of the Cape Ann Symphony for the past twenty one years. Bryan started college as a music major and studied at Boston University and the State University of New York at Purchase, before migrating to the profession of supply chain management, where he continued to work today. He also performs regularly with a number of other musical groups around the North Shore in addition to the Cape Ann Symphony but he feels that the Cape Ann Symphony is one of the best not only for the caliber of the players, but also the quality of the performances and the supportive strength of its organization.

David Benjamin

Business Manager

After joining the Cape Ann Symphony as a clarinetist in 1968, David was named the Business Manager in1981. He also serves in the wider community as a conductor, orchestra manager and active community music presenter. He is equally at home on the symphony concert stage, marching in parades, playing in jazz clubs or playing in church services in and around Cape Ann.

He is also currently the Director of Instrumental Music for the Gloucester Elementary and Middle Schools, the Conductor and Music Director of the Cape Ann Community Band as well as the North Shore Concert Band, a professional ensemble sponsored by the American Federation of Musicians, Local 126, Lynn, Mass. As the Summer Music Director for the City of Gloucester, he presents the annual Antonio Gentile Bandstand concert series. “Mr. B”, as he is known in Gloucester, also performs jazz with his good friends: guitarist, Anthony Weller and pianist, Jonathan Jarvis.

David’s honors include a Scholarship in his name given annually to a Gloucester High School graduating senior(s) with a performance background.

Henry (Hank) Betts

Hank has always enjoyed many types of music but became intimately involved with classical music when he married his wife, Wendy. She is a classically trained singer, as well as a trained organist and pianist and Hank has supported her efforts throughout their five relocations with the Dupont Company where Hank was a manufacturing manager. Hank grew up on the North Shore, born in Gloucester and raised in Beverly. They moved to Rockport 15 years ago, developing a vigorous music-filled life including formation of the musical group Share the Music through whose efforts monies are raised for various local charities, as well as for the Cape Ann Symphony. Hank provides business and back stage support for these efforts. Wendy is the director of The Cape Ann Symphony Singers who perform at the Holiday Concert. Hank continues to be a consultant for Dupont, helping major global businesses learn how to manage their work forces in a way which prevents personal injuries as well as how to analyze and prevent process malfunctions thus avoiding catastrophic incidents.

John B. Bjorlie

John Bjorlie is a transplanted mid-westerner who was born and raised in Minnesota. One of six children, he learned to play the piano and trombone so that he could join in the family orchestra. He recalls attending concerts of the Minneapolis Symphony from an early age. He and his wife, Cynthia, moved to Gloucester thirty years ago, since which time he has been active in a variety of civic and cultural organizations, such as The Gloucester Civic and Garden Council, the Waterways Board of the City of Gloucester and three terms on the City Council. He is a lawyer with offices in Gloucester and specializes in litigation, real estate and probate work. He has been on the Board of the Symphony for some years, including four years as President, and is currently the Secretary of the organization. In addition, he is a member of the Cape Ann Symphony Singers.

Philip Chambers

Philip Chalmers was born and educated in Boston, attending Boston public school, then Bentley College and Suffolk University. He and his family came to Cape Ann in 1964, where he served as Controller at Gloucester Engineering until 1976.

Now the owner of Chalmers & Associates, CPA, with his son Donald, he was also a past Chairman of the Board of Granite Savings Bank until retiring in 2006, and served as an associate at Addison Gilbert Hospital and as a director of Bomco for many years.

Dana Cohen

Dana brings to the Cape Ann Symphony Board a lifelong love of both Big Band and classical music. He began playing the trombone at age 13 and has continued it up to the present day. In High School he played the bass trombone in the Boston Youth Symphony Orchestra and was part of their trip to Great Britain during the summer of 1972, where the orchestra performed for the British Parliament and the Queen.

Dana graduated from Brandeis University in 1976. During college, he played in a brass rock band called Legacy. In 1980, Dana was one of the original founding members, with his father, of the Soft Touch Dance Band out of Waltham, MA, a band that continues its success to his day. He enjoys playing trombone with the pianist at the Unitarian Universalist Church in Rockport, where he is co-chair of their music committee. Dana also helped found, and plays in, the newly formed Cape Ann Big Band.

During college Dana studied to be an optician with his Optometrist Dad and became a licensed Dispensing Optician. In 1976 Dana took over ownership of Medford Optical in Medford, MA and went on to become one of the premier Pediatric Opticians in the Greater Boston area. In 2006, Children’s Hospital Boston selected Dana to partner with them in their optical shop at the Waltham location. He is also involved in managing several Ophthalmology stores in the Boston area.

Rev. Anne Deneen

Anne Deneen is Pastor of St. Paul Lutheran Church and is involved in building community in and around Cape Ann in several ways, from the ground up. She serves on the Symphony Board and works with other local organizations, such as Cape Ann Interfaith Commission, the Gloucester Coalition for the Prevention of Domestic Abuse, Essex County Community Organization, and the Chill Zone — a youth center. She cares about public access to excellent music, especially for young people.

Robert Y. Ellis

Bob Ellis holds a degree in economics from Swarthmore College and a law degree from the University of Pennsylvania. He was a journalist with the Christian Science Monitor, editor of Skating Magazine and Executive Secretary of the United States Figure Skating Association. He and his wife Barbara owned and operated the Yankee Clipper Inn in Rockport for 35 years until they sold it in 2001. Ellis is the author of the home improvement book How To Buy and Install Floor Covering, Scribner’s, 1980. In 2008 he authored A Collision of Truths: A Life in Conflict With A Cherished Faith, iUniverse. Ellis has had a life long love of music, especially blue grass, jazz and classical. He has served 12 years on the CAS board and is a member of the Cape Ann Symphony Singers, the choral side of the symphony. He also is chairman of the Symphony’s Artistic Committee and a member of the Marketing Committee.

Stan Feener

Stan Feener is a “Gloucester Kid” who came to the Board with a keen interest in life, music and the cultural wellness of the community. He served in the U.S Marines for 4 years and has a degree in Business Administration from Salem State College. Stan was the Senior Seafood Buyer at Gorton’s during most of his 34-year career. Since his retirement, in addition to being on the Board as a member of the House and Entertainment Committees, he has been a volunteer tutor for Wellspring, a volunteer deliverer of books for the Sawyer Free Library and a reader at Veteran’s Elementary School.

He has expanded his musical interests by taking vocal lessons, trying to do justice to Bach, Handel and Beethoven as well as singing in his church choir alongside friend and fellow bass, John Bjorlie. Likewise, he sings with Bob Ellis in two further groups: Share the Music and The Cape Ann Symphony Singers. He has become interested in gospel music and is in the process of joining an energetic, local group.

Frances Conover Fitch

Frances Conover Fitch has been a professional musician since her teens. A performing harpsichordist and organist, she has more than a dozen commercial recordings, on a variety of labels, and has performed throughout the United States and Western Europe. She has appeared as a performer with the Cape Ann Symphony, at Rockport Music, and with every major Early Music organization in New England.

As a dedicated pedagogue, Frances has had long associations with the New England Conservatory of Music, the Longy School of Music, and Tufts University. She has been a guest teacher in North Carolina, Ohio, Missouri, California and Mexico City.

Frances has also served as Director of Music (Organist and Choir Director) for several parishes including, in the 1980s, St. John's Episcopal Church in Gloucester. The author of a number of music encyclopedia articles, she is currently finishing a co-authored workbook on keyboard improvisation in the Baroque era. Frances has served on the Executive Committee of the American Guild of Organists, Boston Chapter, on the Liturgy and Music Committee of the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, on the Leadership Development Committee of the Unitarian Universalist Musicians Network, and has been on the faculty of the Presiding Bishop’s Leadership Program for Musicians. While teaching at Longy, she served as Dean and Chair of the Early Music Department.

William (Bill) Fonvielle

Bill brings to the board a life-long love of all music, but especially classical music. In high school, he was student conductor of the pep and concert bands and played first chair alto saxophone. Much later in life, and prior to joining the CAS board, Bill spent a dozen years as an Overseer and then a Governor of the Handel & Haydn Society, America’s oldest performing arts organization. He is a globally recognized authority on performance measures, business scorecards, innovation, research methodologies and customer and employee research. In addition, he has chaired or been part of numerous cultural and educational committees and groups.

In his volunteer experience and on Committees, he has served as chair of Career Collaborative, a Boston-based non-profit organization, and the Massachusetts Product Development Corporation, a state quasi-public body. He has served on the boards of many civic, non-profit, governmental and educational institutions, including Rockport Chamber Music Festival Development Committee, two committees with O’Maley School (Site-Based Management and Principal Selection), as well as social services organizations, such as Career Collaborative, Home of Private Enterprise and Association House, aimed at helping the underprivileged in many areas of their lives. Bill has also been deeply involved with the City of Gloucester, as current chair of the Gloucester Plan 2001 Implementation Committee, that being only one of his numerous involvements with the City and its government.

Bill puts his MBA to good use as a management consultant, business researcher and realtor. He heads Performance Measurement Associates, a Gloucester-based consulting firm, and is a founding senior partner of Promising Outcomes LLP, an international business service firm based in the United Kingdom. He is also actively involved with his wife, Carole Sharoff, in her businesses, Atlantic Vacation Homes and AVH Realty, Inc.

Thomas Mannle

Thomas (Tom) Mannle first attended Cape Ann Symphony when he lived with his family in Gloucester from 1981 to 1993. During that time, Tom's son Ryan was a student (saxophone) of David Benjamin at O’Maley Middle School.

The Mannles moved to the Washington, DC area in 1993, but always returned to Cape Ann for some part of the summer and for the Christmas holidays. Because Tom's consulting work can be done anywhere, the planned move back to Cape Ann (truly "home") Tom and Ann accomplished in early 2009. Shortly thereafter, Tom joined the Cape Ann Symphony Board. Tom and Ann both enjoy all varieties of music, including classical.

Tom is also a graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point, the Kennedy School of Government of Harvard University, and has been a health care consultant, particularly focused on the unique planning requirements of the federal Departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs, since the early 1990s.

David Stotzer

Dave’s love of classical music began in college with a Music Appreciation course. Since then, he has enjoyed choral singing with the Chorus North Shore, Share the Music, and has been a member of the Cape Ann Symphony Singers since they began.

As owner of Cape Ann Photography (www.capeannphotography.com), Dave regularly photographs the orchestra and its members and donates all of his photography services to the symphony. Dave also writes and edits the SymphonE-Club online newsletter, issued regularly throughout the year. In addition, he serves on the Artistic, Marketing and Development Committees of the Symphony.

Besides his extensive involvement with the Symphony, Dave is currently a director of the Gloucester Rotary Club and also serves on the Board of Directors of the Gloucester Pride Stride Association.

Robert K. Whitmarsh, Jr.

Bob grew up in Gloucester and graduated from Gloucester High School where he played the baritone horn in the ROTC Band. Continuing his interest in music, Bob played with the Gloucester and Rockport Legion Bands, the Gloucester Community Band, and the GHS ROTC Alumni Band. Bob graduated from Benjamin Franklin Institute of Technology and Northeastern University with Associate and BS Degrees in Electrical Engineering.

In his early work career, Bob wrote and administrated US Department of Labor Jobs Programs for Action, Inc. in Gloucester. After over a decade of engineering work at Sylvania, General Electric, and United Shoe Machinery, Bob took over the family locksmith business, Whitmarsh Lock & Safe. He was the Chairman of the Massachusetts Locksmiths Association’s Education Program. Bob was an instructor at the Yankee Security Convention. He is a member of the Associated Locksmiths of America where he received a rating of Certified Professional Locksmith. Bob’s interest in Gloucester’s history and architecture led him to attend the Boston Architectural College where he received a Certification in Historic Preservation. He is a volunteer and a member of the Cape Ann Museum, as well as a member of the Cape Ann Chamber of Commerce and the City of Gloucester Downtown Development Commission.

The fondest memories Bob has from his years at Gloucester High School is when he practiced with the Gloucester High Band in the High School Auditorium on the same night as the Cape Ann Symphony, which had an important effect in shaping Bob’s interest in classical music.