Marianna Parnas-Simpson

Marianna is an alto who graduated with a master’s degree in Choral Conducting from the St. Petersburg Conservatory, Russia. She founded the award-winning St. Petersburg Girls’ Choir, Kamerton, which she directed for ten years before coming to the United States. Since 1999, Ms. Simpson has taught at Parker Elementary School, a Houston ISD magnet school for music, and created a chorus program that grew from 30 to 250 children, grades 1-5. In 2005, she was named Teacher of the Year by her fellow teachers at Parker Elementary. In 2006, Marianna founded the Treble Choir of Houston, a youth ensemble for young women whose mission is to help young women in grades 6-12 find their voice. From 2008 to 2010, Ms. Simpson served as the Artistic Director of the summer program for the American Boychoir in Princeton, NJ. Her choirs have been selected to perform at Carnegie Hall, the Houston Symphony, the Organization of American Kodály Educators Conference, TMEA, and ACDA multiple times. She has conducted numerous children’s chorus festivals and workshops in the United States and internationally. Marianna Parnas-Simpson is the founding member of the Houston Chamber Choir