Pam Sohriakoff

Job Titles

• Private Lesson Instructor of Music, Staff Accompanist
  Music and Theatre , College of Arts and Sciences

Highlight

Accompanying, vocal coach, private piano lessons

Started at Bethel

2007

Education

• University of Wisconsin-Superior - B.M., 2002
• University of Minnesota-Duluth - M.M., 2004

Biography

Pamela Sohriakoff holds the Master of Music degree in Piano Performance from the University of Minnesota. Classically trained, she plays and teaches a broad range of music. She is an experienced worship leader, playing piano and leading vocally-from contemporary chord charts to hymns and classical works.

Pamela has had a dual musical journey as a pianist and vocalist throughout her career. She toured as a pianist and singer two summers with Continental Singers in her high school days, touring the South Pacific and Europe. Leading vocally from the piano since she was eleven, she excels in arranging hymns and contemporary chord charts. It is her joy to teach and collaborate with others in improvisation. She teaches the Improvisation Class during the Summer Piano Institute at the University of Northwestern (St. Paul).

Being an accomplished singer, she has an instinctive awareness as a collaborative pianist that is attuned to the nuance of the vocalist. As an adjunct professor at Bethel University, she enjoys teaching piano and collaborating in the vocal department, playing for competitions, recitals and Opera Workshop. Literally hundreds of pages of music are sight-read and performed each term, in a wide range of styles.

Recently, she has worked with choirs such as Evangelion Chorale, touring Ukraine as vocalist and featured as a classical pianist. In 2016, she collaborated as guest pianist with the South Dakota Chorale, and at the Dan Forrest Jubilate Deo Festival. She played and sang with Two Rivers Chorale for two seasons, highlighted as a solo pianist playing Aaron Copland music. She plays for theatre auditions, coaches high school students and young professionals for upcoming auditions, and recordings. She is also a staff accompanist for the Bethel University Chapel Choir, Men's Choir, and Bethel Choir. Pamela is a member of Minnesota Music Teachers' Association and works as a certified judge in their contests.

This season, in addition to her collegiate work, Pamela will be a vocalist with Deo Cantamus. Pamela and Herbert Johnson will perform a two-piano concert on February 13, 2018 in Benson Great Hall featuring works of Claude Bolling, Darius Milhaud, Jonathan Veenker, and Fats Waller. She will also tour with the Bethel Choir as accompanist to Sweden, Estonia, and Latvia in late May-early June 2018.

Areas of expertise

Accompanying, vocal coach, private piano lessons