Ovation: RIT’s Performing Arts Showcase

Brynn Tyszka, ARTISTIC DIRECTOR, has worked professionally in the theatre industry for over 20 years. Prior to her new role at Blackfriars, Ms. Tyszka has served as the Social Media Manager (as well as teaching artist, director, and performer) for OFC Creations Theatre Center in Brighton and as Director of Education for Actors' Theatre of Indiana, where she also performed as an ATI cast member (A Comedy of Tenors, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, and a reading of Lindsay Adams' new play, Rattler). Ms. Tyszka served as Acting Department Chair for the Rochester Association for the Performing Arts (RAPA), where she developed and taught several acting classes, including Fundamentals, Scene Study, Characterization, The Art of Comedy, Script Analysis, and Movement for the Stage. Additionally, she taught acting and coached musical theater privately as the founder of BKT Studio for Actors. She has also directed and choreographed several shows for high schools, colleges, community theaters, and semi-professional theaters throughout the Rochester area. A former member of Actors' Equity Association and a proud alum of the Nazareth College Theatre Arts program, Ms. Tyszka has performed nationally on tour with NETworks and ArtsPower productions as well as regionally with Geva Theatre Center, Actors' Theater of Indiana, DEEP Arts, JCC CenterStage, Pittsford Musicals and Playhouse on the Park in Connecticut. Ms. Tyszka's history with Blackfriars began in 2006, when she played Susan in tick, tick ... BOOM! under the direction of Haldoupis. Since then, she has worked and performed several times with Blackfriars, including on Heathers the Musical (Heather Chandler), Beehive (choreographer), and Boeing Boeing (Gretchen), as well as performing in multiple Season Soirées. Most recently, she partnered with Hoskins and Hoffman to conceive, produce, and direct Blackfriars's 2020 digital holiday show, Home for the Holidays. Ms. Tyszka is the first female-identifying Artistic Director in Blackfriars’s 73-year history.

Maestro Eric Townell is an experienced and creative conductor of operatic, orchestral and choral repertoire from the Baroque period through the 21st Century. Since joining the Rochester Oratorio Society in 2006, he has led the ROS in subscription concerts, regional outreach performances, live radio broadcasts, a televised concert, collaborative concerts with the region’s leading arts organizations, a concert tour to Eastern Europe and an award-winning tour to Beijing and Shanghai for the 2008 Olympic Cultural Festival.

Maestro Townell has prepared the Rochester Oratorio Society for a number of appearances with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra and the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra for conductors Christopher Seaman, Jeff Tyzik, Ward Stare, and numerous guests, performing the music of Bach, Beethoven, Vaughan Williams, Handel, Verdi, Gershwin, and Orff, among numerous others. In 2008, Eric also established Resonanz, a select high-quality choral ensemble that represents the Rochester Oratorio Society at special engagements.

Eric concurrently directs the Finger Lakes Choral Festival. He is the former music director of the Festival Choir of Madison (1993-2006), the Master Singers of Milwaukee (2003-2010) and the Central Wisconsin Symphony Orchestra (1991-2001). He holds a doctorate of musical arts degree from the Peabody Conservatory and degrees in music performance and conducting from Northern Illinois University and Indiana University. He studied conducting and solfege with Catherine Comet at St. Louis Conservatory; opera conducting with Georg Tintner in the Czech Republic; orchestral conducting with Frederik Prausnitz at Peabody and Charles Bruck at the Monteux School, and choral/orchestral conducting with Helmuth Rilling as a member of the 2002 Master Class at the Oregon Bach Festival. An experienced and effective communicator on music and arts topics, Eric is in demand as clinician and adjudicator for choral and orchestral festivals and for choirs of all types across the country. He has offered pre-concert chats, creative consultation and program annotation for the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, the Rochester Philharmonic and several other ensembles and chamber music series. Eric is a frequent commentator on arts topics on WXXI radio and serves the Boards of the William Warfield Scholarship Fund and the Arts & Cultural Council for Greater Rochester. He is the producer and host of “In the Spotlight,” an arts interview program distributed via cable access television stations throughout Western New York. His orchestral and choral conducting were the subject of the 1994 Wisconsin Public Radio broadcast “Music from Wisconsin: A Wisconsin Conductor.”

Jimmie Highsmith Jr. is a Grammy®-nominated saxophonist and flutist with critical acclaim, hailing from Rochester, NY. Throughout his career, he has graced the stage alongside numerous Grammy® Award winners, including the esteemed Najee, Alicia Keys, and Natalie Cole. He is also a proud endorser of Eastman Winds saxophones, Jody Jazz mouthpieces, and Silverstein Works ligatures.

His journey in music began at the age of 6 when I started studying piano. After being exposed to Saxophone, I started studying it at the age 8. After graduating from "PA" Rochester NY School of The Performing Arts in 1986, he became a member of The Approaching Storm, the HBCU Delaware State University Marching Band. He also attended The Eastman School of Music where he studied during the summers of 1985 and 1986. After auditioning for the US Air Force Band in Washington DC at Bolling AFB he enlisted in the Air Force and dedicated ten years of service before transitioning to a full-time music career.

To date, he has released 11 top-selling smooth jazz CDs and contributed to over 200 recordings as a collaborator. His sixth CD, "The Anthology of Sound," was honored with a Grammy® nomination, and his work is recognized as being among the best in the Smooth Jazz genre.

Sueann has enjoyed a 20-year career as a professional dancer in classical ballet, modern dance and as a national and international freelance artist. After her performing career, Sueann worked as teacher, coach, ballet master, and repetiteur. She served as Executive/Artistic Director of the Amherst Massachusetts Ballet from 2011-2017. Sueann invigorated the 40-year-old organization through ambitious programming balanced with fiscal responsibility. She created Ballet For All! which brought classical ballet training to dancers aged 8 to 80. As part of this initiative, she produced a week-long workshop with Ilya Kuznetsov, master teacher from the Bolshoi Ballet Academy. Sueann’s FHPAC duties include policy and procedure development, operations, marketing and programming. 

Sanders has nearly 40 years of experience in higher education. He most recently served as the Dr. William D. and Nancy W. Strecker Dean of the College of Engineering at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh from 2020 to 2025. Prior to Carnegie Mellon, Sanders spent 25 years as a tenured professor and held the Herman M. Dieckamp Endowed Chair in Engineering at the University of Illinois.

Founded in 1829, RIT enrolls more than 21,300 students in more than 200 career-oriented and professional programs, making it among the largest private universities in the United States. With 150,000 alumni worldwide, RIT is internationally recognized and ranked for its leadership in technology, the arts, and design. RIT also is home to the National Technical Institute for the Deaf and has one of the oldest and largest cooperative education programs in the country. Global partnerships include campuses in Dubai, Croatia, and Kosovo.

Sanders began his career as an assistant professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Arizona in 1988. He earned his bachelor’s degree in computer engineering; master’s degree in computer, information, and control engineering; and doctoral degree in computer science and engineering, all from the University of Michigan.

Sanders’ research interests include secure, dependable, and resilient computing systems with a focus on critical infrastructures. He has directed work at the forefront of national efforts to make the U.S. power grid smart and resilient. His significant scholarly record includes publishing more than 300 technical papers in this field. He is also a co-developer of a tool for assessing the security of networked systems that is available commercially under the name NP-View from the startup company Network Perception, which he co-founded.

A recognized leader in his field, Sanders was elected to the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) in 2023, one of the highest professional distinctions accorded to an engineer, for his contributions to cybersecurity and resiliency technologies for critical infrastructures. Sanders is also an elected fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). Among many honors, he was the 2016 recipient of the IEEE Technical Field Award, Innovation in Societal Infrastructure, for “assessment-driven design of trustworthy cyber infrastructures for societal-scale systems.”

Sanders is a native of Grand Rapids, Mich. He and his wife, Emily, have two grown children who are both engineers. When he is not working, Sanders enjoys the outdoors, hiking, kayaking, canoeing, and amateur astronomy.