Anj Vancura

Anj Vancura is an active Los Angeles-based multi-instrumentalist (check out my one-person, 100 piece wind orchestra video below!), audio engineer, and music educator. Anj has been directing and teaching music for 17 years, and has a B.Mus. from the USC Thornton School of Music and an M.A. in Composition for Visual Media from the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music. [One person wind orchestra video].

Anj’s teaching experience includes designing and leading a variety of workshops, classes, programs, and private lessons, from Pre K through the university level. Anj works with each student to build a foundation in solid technique, while incorporating creative activities and relevant pieces. Anj is a friendly, patient teacher whose goal is to help each student to own their musical journey and meet their goals! A performing member of groups from 100+ member wind ensembles and orchestras, to mid-size jazz groups and experimental improv ensembles, to worship bands & church music groups, prog/psych rock bands, and early music groups (specializing in sackbut — the Renaissance ancestor of the trombone), Anj brings fresh insights drawn from this diversity of experience to each class and lesson.

Anj’s teaching experience includes positions on faculty at Cornerstone Music Conservatory in West Los Angeles, Hills Academy of Music, Art, and Dance in Torrance, CA, and Music On Main in El Segundo; as an instructor at Gray School of Music in San Pedro and El Segundo Arts Academy; teaching a musicianship (sight singing and ear training) section at UCLA; and teaching general music and beginning winds classes at a variety of Los Angeles-area schools. Anj has performed at venues from the Walt Disney Concert Hall to the bluewhale jazz club in downtown Los Angeles and at countless private weddings, anniversaries, and other special events.

As a sound engineer, Anj regularly mixed concerts, theatre, and other events at the indoor and outdoor venues of the Getty Center in Los Angeles and the Getty Villa in Pacific Palisades. Highlights of Anj’s performing career include opening for John Zorn and Secret Chiefs 3, special performances with Ozomatli and Gwen Stefani, playing in Kenny Burrell’s Ellingtonia Orchestra, and performing at Heidi Duckler’s Ebb&Flow festival. To date, Anj has recorded seven releases as Sunrise Transparence (a solo multi instrumental project), and has recorded on many other artists’ releases as a featured artist or session musician, and as a part of several bands/musical groups. The Los Angeles Symphonic Winds has premiered several of Anj’s compositions (Anj has also been a performing member of the LASW), and Anj has also served as co-artistic director of the Commercium Musicum renaissance winds.