The Sierra Nevada
Balalaika Society

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SNB Orchestra, Feb. 2007

Zeny N. Ocean

  • President, Sierra Nevada Balalaika Society
  • Prima Balalaika, Kontrabass Balalaika
  • Member since 1992

Dr. Zeny Ocean is the founder of the Sierra Nevada Balalaika Society, and a past president of the Balalaika and Domra Association of America. He has performed with various balalaika orchestras in the USA and in Russia, as well as at the Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas. An avid mushroom hunter and the father of four children, Dr. Ocean also plays domra, piano, guitar, accordion, and saxophone.

Margarita Bryant

  • Music Director, Sierra Nevada Balalaika Society
  • Piano
  • Member since 2008

Margarita graduated from the Soviet Government Musical School (Kurganinsk, USSR), 1966-1974. She has a B.A. in music theory and piano from Vladimir Musical College, (Vladimir, USSR), 1975-1979 and an M.A. in choir direction and voice training from Altay University of Culture (Altay, USSR), 1981-1986. She has taught music theory, piano, voice, and choir direction in Russia and Reno, 1977-present. She has conducted several choirs in the USSR, produced musical and children’s shows, performed with different bands in the Soviet Union and performed in throughout the Reno area.


Priscilla Barton

  • Alto Balalaika
  • Member since 1993

Priscilla is a marriage and family therapist, and uses music therapy as one of her techniques in that profession.

Jim Buehler

  • Alto Domra
  • Mandolin
  • Guitar
  • Member since 2003

Jim plays a wide variety of stringed instruments; when he's not strumming and pickin', he's vocalizing. Jim also helps provide the high-end sound on the banjo, fiddle, guitar and mandolin in a blue grass group, Homemade Jam, in the Reno area.

Rich Bremenour

  • Accordion
  • Member since 2001

Rich, an avid accordionist for many years, has been playing with the Sierra Balalaika Orchestra since early 2001. While he is of Polish heritage and enjoys and plays many genres of music, his favorite has always been the Cleveland-style Slovenian polkas/waltzes; however, after performing next to the balalaikas and domras he's tapping his foot to a different beat now and enjoying it tremendously. When he's not tapping his foot, he works as Technical Services Director for a private newspaper corporation.

Tom Dose

  • Kontrabass Balalaika
  • Member since 2003

Tom is originally from the banks of the Mississippi River in Clinton, IA. He and his wife Sharon, both Doctors of Veterinary Medicine, moved to Reno in 1985 and opened their own practice. Tom started playing the Contrabass Balalaika in September of 2003 and has been rocking ever since. One of Tom's first questions to Dr. Ocean, his Contrabass mentor was, "What is the name of the note on the top line?" While enjoying a number of different genres of music, Tom has come to love the joy, camaraderie, and beauty of Russian and Eastern European Folk music, song and dance.

Dawn Hummel

  • Flute, Vocals
  • Member since 1999

Dawn teaches music at the Rita Cannan Elementary School in Reno and she is the Director of the school’s choir. She is also Director of the Fiesta Nevada Dancers. Her choir and dancers perform regularly throughout the Reno-Tahoe Region.

Ketevan Dvali Konko

  • Vocalist
  • Member since 2006

Ketevan, a contralto, received a degree in music and voice from Tbilisi Univ. in Georgia and joined the Tbilisi Opera Choir. Since moving to the USA, she is pursuing a masters degree in music, major in voice, at Univ. of Nevada, Reno. She has soloed at concerts in symphonies of the Russian Masters; Handel’s Messiah with the Reno Pops Orchestra: and, at the Russian festival with the Sierra Nevada Balalaika Orchestra. .

John "Honza" Novak

  • Violin
  • Member since 2005

John was born in Czechoslovakia and began his violin studies at the Prague Conservatorium of Music at age 9. He immigrated to Australia and received a B.A. degree in Music from the New South Wales Conservatorium. While with the Sydney Symphony he was a featured guest on an Australian TV show. Later, he became the Principal Second with the Hobart Symphony. He immigrated to the USA in 1966, joined the Oakland Symphony and Amici de la Musica chamber orchestra. In 1970 he joined the San Jose Symphony and became concertmaster of the Canada Chamber Orchestra and guest soloist with the West Valley College Symphony. He has had numerous engagements in: the Reno area, Harknes Ballet of New York, San Francisco Summer Concert services and Fiddler on the Roof. He now lives in Reno, performs with the Carson City Philharmonic and teaches music and violin.


Nicolai Prisacar

  • Accordion
  • Member since 2002
  • Musical Director of the Sierra Nevada Balalaika Orchestra from 2003 to 2008

Nicolai Sergeyevich Prisacar is a virtuosoic musician from Chisinau, Moldova, who immigrated to the United States in 1995. He toured the world with the National Moldavian Folk Dance Ensemble and Orchestra, ZHOK, playing the accordion and piano for 19 years and, serving as the orchestra director for 10 years. He has also performed with many other professional musicians throughout the world. He is the recipient of the prestigious Zasluzheni Artist, Republic of Moldova Award. He received the equivalent of an Associate of Arts Degree from the National Cultural and Educational College in Soroca, Moldava, and the equivalent of a Master of Arts Degree in Music and Musical Education from the Moldavian National Conservatory in Chisinau, Moldava. Nicolai and his wife Nadia, a 20 year veteran dancer with ZHOK, live in Sacramento, CA.


Judy Robey

  • Alto Balalaika

Judy Robey is a Russophile and former professor of Russian Language and Literature. She enjoys Russian and Eastern European music, culture, and dance. She's back from Germany where she spent time with her husband, who was on sabbatical from his position as Professor of German Language at the University of Nevada, Reno.

Mike Sherrick

  • Prima Balalaika
  • Member since 1995

Natalie Sherrick

  • Prima Domra
  • Member since 1995

As a child, Natalie performed with the San Francisco Ballet and she was a student of Russian ballet with Bronislav Nijinsky. She has performed with the Roger Wagner Chorale, The Los Angeles Int’l Folk Ensemble – Westwind, The Liberty Assembly - Aman, the Fiolice Women’s Chorus and the Balalaika and Domra Association of America. She has studied domra, classical piano and voice. Natalie has an M.A. in microbiology from UCLA. Natalie’s parents came from Siberia and the Urals, emigrating to China and then to San Francisco. Her father, Dimitri Koovshinoff, was a professional music copyist and arranger for stage and screen in Hollywood. Her mother was a pianist and her brother was a Julliard Music School graduate, a recipient of a Fullbright Scholarship and a music teacher for 40 years.