About the directors
In selecting the best music school, it's important to consider the background of the directors. It's essential that there is a strong background in music, education as well as performance, and operational and business strengths. In Beha and Nathan, the directors, there is a perfect balance of the necessary skills
Beha P.
Behafarid was born in Iran and immigrated to the United States at the age of 24. She has always had a passion for business and art. She grew up in a musically inclined family; her mom is a great singer, and her siblings are also professional artists and directors. Growing up, she took violin and piano lessons and always liked to surround herself with art and music.An academic achiever, even in middle school she was ranked number 13 in the National Mathematics Olympiad. She went on to be selected for Farzanegan, the National Organization for Development of Exceptional Talents, when she was a teenager. For university, she received her Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, her first Master's degree with honors in Architecture, and her second Master's degree with honors as an MBA with a minor in Finance from Pepperdine University.While a student at Pepperdine, she was the Captain of the investment banking team. Among various awards most notably she was selected as an honorary student to have lunch with the Dean of the school and the Graziadio family, the founders of Business School at Pepperdine University.Moving into her professional career in finance, she worked as a Portfolio and Data Analyst at a Real Estate Investment company and continued by joining a public tech company with 33,000 employees. In this company, she had the opportunity to work in the finance and strategy team, which consisted of under 20 employees working directly with the founder and managing all different aspects of the business. The founder of this company was always an important mentor to her. In January 2020, Beha and Nathan decided to join their efforts and start the first commercial location forming Angeles Academy in Westwood. Their focus has been to bring the highest quality music education to the forefront of their community, and to instill a passion and love of music to kids and adults. In 2024, Beha was selected to receive one of the 10 Entrepreneur awards for Women of Impact from the Chamber of Commerce and Congress.
Nathan P.
Nathan’s achievements prior to age 20 include a commission to write music for the internationally respected Carmel Bach Festival, a gold medal award from the Monterey Bay Blues Festival for outstanding musicianship, and fourth place in California’s statewide piano competition. He attended Indiana University School of Music on youth merit scholarship, and later for degrees in both composition and vocal performance. After moving to Los Angeles, he became the music director and choral master of a prominent Los Angeles cathedral. As a classical composer Nathan’s work ranges from a series of Nocturnes for solo piano, song cycles, both in french and Italian, chamber works, including the commission from Hidden Valley Institute of the Arts for a work for flute ensemble, full orchestral works and choral work. In 2015 Nathan’s “Requiem”, for full chorus and orchestra received a world premiere with William Jewell’s Concert Choir, an 80 Member Nationally Award Winning Chorus. In the film industry Nathan, has composed numerous scores for feature films, short films, and commercial projects. His career began mostly in commercial music, notably scoring commercials and documents for Purina/Nestle aired on NBC. Nathan has scored numerous features and shorts with some of the leading producers and directors in Los Angeles including Steve Tisch, (Forest Gump) Mitchell Block (Big Mama), and Vanessa block, (The Testimony). Nathan has underscored performances by actors such as Wilford Brimley, (Cocoon), and Tom Sizemore, (Saving Private Rion). Nathan’s collaboration with Steve Tisch and Vanessa Block earned their project a shortlisting at the 2016 Academy Awards. Then at the end of 2016, Nathan won an Emmy Award for his soundtrack to “Lew Wallace”, 90 minutes of music composed for this feature documentary about the civil war that aired on PBS. In 2017 Nathan received a Telly award in recognition of the same soundtrack. In addition to the two awards, the soundtrack received critical acclaim for a live performance of the score by Ohio Northern Symphony in 2016. In 2017, Nathan teamed up with Mina Chow to score “Face of a Nation”, a politically relevant documentary that has been gaining traction in festivals, as well as a recent notable screening in the National Museum in Washington DC. As an educator, Nathan has trained thousands of music students over the years, many of which have had success in the music industry. His students have had their work performed by Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra, and attended music degree programs at places like Yale and USC. In 2020 Beha and Nathan teamed up to form Angeles Academy of Music, with the goal being to bring music to the forefront of our communities and provide well run and exceptional music education for all.