Sun Lakes United Church of Christ is proud to announce their new musician, Aida Olarte. The previous musician, Titus Kautz, took a faculty position at the University of North Dakota. Aida began her new work with Sun Lakes UCC in June. Aida Olarte, a native of Colombia, is currently earning a Doctoral of Musical Arts degree in Collaborative piano at ASU. She earned her Master of Music degree in Piano Performance from Duquesne University in the piano class of Natasha Snitkovsky, as well as a Bachelor of Music in Piano Performance from Duquesne University, where she was part of the piano faculty at the City Music Center. For six years, she was the music director for Hebron Presbyterian Church (Clinton, PA). Currently, she is the pianist for the Sun Lakes United Church of Christ.
She received a full fellowship award to pursue an Advanced Music Studies Certificate for the Collaborative Piano Program at Carnegie Mellon University in August 2016. Additionally, she was selected to be one of the Resident Artist Pianists for the Opera Theater of Pittsburgh Summer Festival. She earned an Associate in Arts from Miami Dade College (Miami, FL). She has served as an accompanist for the Percussion Ensemble at Duquesne University (Pittsburgh, PA), Symphony Orchestra at Duquesne University (Pittsburgh, PA), Wind Symphony at Duquesne University (Pittsburgh, PA), Coro Latino Americano (Pittsburgh, PA), Undercroft Opera (Pittsburgh, PA) and went on tour with the American Wind Symphony Orchestra (USA).
She is also a member of the National Music Honor Society Pi Kappa Lambda.
Sun Lakes UCC would also like to extend an invitation to anyone who would like to join their church choir to contact the church office for more information. They are especially looking for sopranos.