7. Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra
Musicians
We could point to the fact that the 99 musicians of the PSO held down the fort this past year in an artistic leadership vacuum. We could mention their continued prestige (one of few orchestras booked annually at Carnegie Hall). We could zero in on their extensive community involvement, from teaching to collaborating with local groups. But for this ranking, we primarily recognize their tremendous musical skill. Individually and collectively, the PSO is awash with world-class talent.

	Meet the PG's contributors to the Top 50 Classical music critic Andrew Druckenbrod; Sunday Magazine editor Sharon Eberson; jazz critic Nate Guidry; copy editor James Heinrich; Features associate editor Brian Hyslop; book editor Bob Hoover; architecture critic Patricia Lowry; pop music critic Ed Masley; Weekend Mag editor Scott Mervis; TV editor Rob Owen; cultural arts writer Marylynne Pitz; drama editor Christopher Rawson; arts critic Mary Thomas; movie editor Barbara Vancheri; dance critic Jane Vranish; assistant managing editor/Features, Allan Walton; staff writers Rosa Colucci, John Hayes, Adrian McCoy and Johnna A. Pro; and page designer Tricia Reinhold.

8. Terrence Orr
Artistic director, Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre
The New York Times' Jennifer Dunning offered a tribute to Orr and wife Marianna Tcherkassky while colleague John Rockwell sniped at PBT's Joyce Theater program. It's been that kind of year as Orr took over the reins of a company on shaky financial ground. A year in transition it may be, but there is no doubt that the dancers still loomed large and confident, the finest group of dancers ever assembled at PBT, and obviously inspired by Orr's choreographic choices.

9. Elizabeth Bradley
Head of drama, Carnegie Mellon; artistic director, Pittsburgh International Festival of Firsts
Bradley leads one of the nation's premier drama training programs. But she makes the Top 50 for the first time for curating the theater event of 2004, the Festival of Firsts, sponsored by the Cultural Trust. To create a theatrical parallel to the Carnegie International, Bradley traveled the world to select 11 productions by eight companies for three eye- and mind-opening weeks in the fall. From "Titanic," staged on a North Shore barge, to the surreal intensity of Theatre O's "The Argument (a Family Portrait)," it was a grand assault on conventional American theater.

10. Ed Ochester
Editor, Pitt Poetry Series
A poet in his own right, Ochester, 66, has guided the series at the University of Pittsburgh Press for 27 years as it became one of the nation's most respected and active poetry publishers. He was also instrumental in launching the series' much-coveted Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize in 1981. Under his direction, the series was an early supporter of two poets who became U.S. poet laureates: Billy Collins in 2001 and last year, Ted Kooser. It's a rare distinction for an academic press. Ochester won a Creative Achievement Award from the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust in 2001.

11. George Romero
Film writer/director
Long live zombies ... and the man who put Pittsburgh on the movie map. He's back with "Land of the Dead," getting a premiere at the Byham Theater on June 22, complete with klieg lights and zombie ushers. The film, opening nationwide June 24, was teased at the Cannes Film Festival and will close the CineVegas Film Festival, also honoring Romero this month.

12. Barbara Luderowski
Founder/director, Mattress Factory
The seminal installation art museum that Luderowski has nourished through more than a quarter decade could be described as minimalist radical chic. Its exhibitions, which she and Michael Olijnyk personally research and organize, never shout "activist," but any thinking person will find plenty to read between the lines of aesthetics and experimentation. This year's "New Installations, Artists in Residence: Cuba" took place in spite of the U.S. government's denial of visas to the 11 participating artists, the first time in museum history that the artists did not install their works. The show was deemed "the year's most important Cuban art exhibition" by columnist Soren Triff in the Miami-based "El Nuevo Herald."

13. Tracy Brigden
Artistic director, City Theatre
It was a year of risk and change for Pittsburgh's second-biggest, most adventuresome nonmusical theater. It purchased an adjacent South Side property for parking and eventual expansion, and a search is under way to replace managing director David Jobin. And, while celebrating its 30th anniversary, City stayed true to its emphasis on new plays and carried its intensive weekend, "Momentum," into its third year. Besides overseeing all this, Brigden directed with creative flair such wildly different material as "Outlying Islands," "Fiction" and "The Underpants."

14. Laura Hoptman
Curator, 2004-05 Carnegie International
Having assumed the helm of the 54th incarnation of the prestigious Carnegie International shortly before the terrorist attack of Sept. 11, 2001, New Yorker Hoptman, who was at home that day, found her travels and emphasis largely defined by that event. As such, her exhibition pluckily countered art-world trends to raise questions about life and the human experience that she referred to as the "ultimates." The resulting exhibition offered much to ponder and to remember.

15. Hilary Masters
Writer
In a career spanning 50 years, Hilary Masters has been a press agent, newspaper editor, novelist, memoirist, essayist and teacher. The 76-year-old Carnegie Mellon English professor published two books in less than a year: the reprint of his memoir, "Last Stands," in fall 2004, and last month, "Shadows on a Wall: Juan O'Gorman and the Mural at Patzcuaro."

16. Andrew Paul
Founder and artistic director, Pittsburgh Irish & Classical Theatre
Under Paul's bold leadership, PICT goes from strength to strength. There was no international tour this year, but, in an expanded Pittsburgh season, PICT gave us two of the top four shows of 2004, "Uncle Vanya" (with Paul directing) and "James Joyce's The Dead." It also had a popular hit with "Stones in His Pockets" (returning this summer), and started an ambitious 2005 season with an epic "Henry IV" (both parts), with Paul directing again.

17. Marty Ashby
Executive producer of MCG Jazz, Manchester Craftmen's Guild
Ashby oversees the jazz education program and concert series at the Guild, which continues to expand its profile nationally and is building an impressive catalog of recordings on the MCG label. The Guild added to its Grammy count with Nancy Wilson's "R.S.V.P. (Rare Songs, Very Personal)" recording this year.

18. Andres Cardenes
Violinist
As concertmaster of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, Cardenes is crucial to maintaining ensemble while soloing. He also programs and conducts the PSO Chamber Orchestra's concerts in Squirrel Hill's Jewish Community Center. Beyond Heinz Hall, he is an influential teacher at CMU and an advocate of new music. This past year, Cardenes soloed with the Philadelphia Orchestra, conducted the Bavarian Radio Symphony and participated in the Breckenridge and Brevard summer festivals. Other highlights included his first local recital in 15 years and the release of an excellent disc by his Diaz Trio.

19. Michele de la Reza/Peter Kope
Founders and performers, Attack Theatre
What haven't they accomplished this year? Either the husband and wife duo have been very busy or they've found a way to send their clones to Pittsburgh Symphony performances of "L'Histoire du Soldat" and "The 31st Chair," the Frick Art Museum improvisations built around the Felix de la Concha exhibit and, of course, "This Ain't the Nutcracker." But now the popular couple rehearses in their new studio in Garfield, which also appears to be an important training ground for the next generation.

20. Susan Corbett
Director, Pittsburgh Arts and Lectures
Susan Corbett last year expanded the scope of her organization from producer of the Drue Heinz Lectures, a 12-event speakers series. She added the American Shorts Reading Series aimed at young adults to complement Black, White and Read All Over, a program that brings leading children's authors to the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh.

21. Modey Lemon
Band members: Phil Boyd, Paul Quattrone, Jason Kirker
Last fall, they returned to the CMJ Music Marathon in New York and, earlier this year, they were back at the South-by-Southwest festival in Austin, Texas. Then they headed to the U.K. for a 26-date tour, followed by European dates with the Secret Machines. Now signed to Mute Worldwide, they celebrated the release of "The Curious City," their Mute debut, last week in London, bringing Pittsburgh's Ice Capades along to open. Next week, they're in Germany, Amsterdam, Belgium and London with Dinosaur Jr. Then it's off to play the Glastonbury Festival.

22. Ted Pappas
Artistic and executive director, Pittsburgh Public Theater
For the second year, Pappas served as both artistic and administrative director of Pittsburgh's biggest nonmusical theater. His most welcome initiative was to celebrate the Public's 30th year with a new play reading series and expanded lectures. He brought in acting heavyweights Brian Murray, Elizabeth Franz and Hayley Mills, the latter two for an American premiere by Frank McGuinness, and notably directed an epic "Mary Stuart" and a classy revival of an early gangsters-and-showgirls comedy, "Broadway."

23. Squonk Opera
More than a few writers have tried to describe Squonk Opera over the past 13 years. More than a few admitted defeat. This musical, theatrical performance troupe formed in 1992 has taken its show from local junkyards to theaters across the United States, Canada, and last year, Belgium and Korea. In addition, Squonk Opera premiered its acclaimed production "Rodeo Smackdown," a multimedia music spectacle. Squonk's merry band includes Christina Acosta, Jackie Dempsey, John Allen Gibel, Kevin Kornicki, Buzz Miller, Steve O'Hearn, Bob Steineck, Denny Strauser and Nathan Wilson. In the coming year, they'll premiere a new show titled, "Pittsburgh. The Opera."

24. Lee Gutkind
Director, Creative Nonfiction Foundation
A writer and teacher of nonfiction at the University of Pittsburgh for more than 30 years, Gutkind has endeavored to give the genre national recognition. He founded the Creative Nonfiction Foundation, publisher of a national literary journal and promoter of the teaching of the genre. Gutkind last fall produced a literary festival at Pitt, bringing to town John Edgar Wideman and other authors and publishers of national prominence for a three-day event.

25. Natalie Forbes
Executive director, Pittsburgh Chamber Music Society
Classical music organizations are famous for not capitalizing on a good thing. Not Forbes. Seizing on the success of her presenting society's complete Beethoven String Quartet cycle two years ago, she booked not one, but two cycles this past season: the complete Bartok string quartets with the Takacs Quartet and the complete Beethoven cello sonatas with David Finckel and Wu Han. Forbes didn't rest there, filling out the season with the Emerson, Miro and Pacifica quartets and the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.

26. Jonathan Eaton
Artistic director, Opera Theater
Emphasize the "artist" in artistic director with Eaton. He not only runs Opera Theater, booking operas and casting singers, but he also directs the productions. That's rare in today's operatic world, and he does it with depth and flair. Eaton's eclectic choices of operas for the smaller company, such as this past season's premiere of Nathan Davis' "Just Above My Head" or William Bolcom's "A View From the Bridge," enrich the scene with edgy repertoire we might not otherwise hear.

27. Van Kaplan
Executive producer, Pittsburgh CLO
Pittsburgh's biggest-budget theater continued to provide nine weeks of top-line summertime musicals, plus its annual "Christmas Carol" for the holidays, and to invest in the development of new musicals like "Spamalot." But its signature initiative in 2004 was to go year-round, opening the Cultural District's newest major venue, the Cabaret at Theatre Square, where it offers "Forever Plaid" and a revolving menu of Late Night attractions.

28. Kenneth Beer
President, Associated Artists of Pittsburgh
Beer assumed leadership of the 95-year-old organization the year after it sold its Downtown building because of financial difficulties and when its annual exhibition had slipped off of the Carnegie Museum of Art's calendar. Under his tenure, the AAP has established an office as an independent tenant at the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts and has negotiated a return to the Carnegie, which Beer describes as the region's finest venue -- and promises to provide the region's finest art to it. Members have taken to calling him and his artist wife Terri Perpich, who's become the AAP unofficial documentarian, "Mr. and Mrs. AAP" for their creative role in rejuvenating the organization.

29. Mark Clayton Southers
Founder and artistic director, Pittsburgh Playwrights Theatre
A promising playwright in the August Wilson mode, Southers nurtures the work of others with his young theater company. In 2004 he raised its profile by moving into a rough space around the corner from Heinz Hall, creating a theater in a parking garage in the best tradition of urban arts homesteading. The company's signature event remains its Festival in Black and White, pairing black playwrights with white directors and vice versa in a practical demonstration of the value of theatrical multiversity.

30. Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble
Several years ago, PNME shifted its concerts to the summer, once thought of as a barren landscape for classical music here. But the concerts drew, increasing with a move to City Theatre. With shows sporting a continuous flow of music, video, dance and poetry, artistic director Kevin Noe has enticed audiences to come out in the heat -- and for new music, too.

31. The Povertyneck Hillbillies
Band members: Chris Higbee, Chris Abbondanza, Ryan Lucotch, Dave Cramer, Jeff Volek, Bob Crafton, David Guthrie
For the first time in decades, one of the top-drawing unsigned local original bands plays hot mainstream country. Under the guidance of Pittsburgh hit songwriter and producer Bob Corbin, the Povertyneck Hillbillies have just released their second independent CD, "Don't Look Back."

32. The Clarks
Band members: Scott Blasey, Rob James, Greg Joseph, Dave Minarik Jr.
The Clarks, a Pittsburgh institution since 1988, continue to be the city's top-drawing rock band, routinely selling out consecutive nights at the Chevrolet Amphitheatre. Last August, the Clarks got their biggest national exposure yet with a spot on "The Late Show With David Letterman," performing "Hell on Wheels," the single to their latest record, "Fast Moving Cars." This month, the guitar-rock band looks back with a greatest-hits package, "Between Then and Now."

33. Beth Corning
Artistic director, Dance Alloy
When Corning arrived in Pittsburgh, she brought with her a certain edge that had been missing on the local dance scene. She has singlehandedly lured her enthusiastic dancers into a strange new theatrical world of her own making, marked by six world and local premieres.

34. Karla Boos
Founder and artistic director, Quantum Theatre
Every year is new for Quantum, Pittsburgh's original guerrilla theater, the product of Boos' personal artistic passion. The growth of the past year gave way to a focus on an ambitious production of Dan Jemmet's "Dog Face," which may well prove the best production of 2005 and which Quantum will take to Spain this fall.

35. Eric Moe/Mathew Rosenblum
Co-directors, Music on the Edge
These composers are important artists: Moe's satirical "Tri-Stan," for video, mezzo and ensemble, and Rosenblum's lighthearted "00Opinions," with tape manipulation, both received performances here in March. But their co-direction of Pitt's Music on the Edge carries broader import. The series is about the only avenue for new-music groups to visit here. Last year, it booked the latest Pulitzer Prize winner, Paul Moravec, clarinetist David Krakauer, a Feldman minifest, Sequitur and more.

36. John H. "Doc" Wilson
Trumpeter, arranger and professor
Wilson retired in 1996 as director of the jazz program at Duquesne University, but he's as busy as ever. When he isn't performing, he can be found teaching at CMU or arranging music for the likes of Paquito D'Rivera. His arrangements can be heard on "A Nancy Wilson Christmas" (2001) and "Day In, Day Out" for Nancy Wilson's 2005 "R.S.V.P.," the Grammy winner for Best Jazz Vocal. That same Wilson/Wilson collaboration was selected by the National Endowment for the Arts' "Jazz Masters," a double-CD compilation.

37. Linda Benedict-Jones
Executive director, Silver Eye Center for Photography
The emphasis on quality that once informed Benedict-Jones' curatorship of the Polaroid Collection has shaped Silver Eye into an organization with a national membership and reputation. Her creative vision includes collaborations with the community -- such as a deck designed by CMU architecture students -- as well as exhibitions that speak not only to opportunities for local photographers but to the city itself. For example, the curated exhibition "Pittsburgh NOW" showcases contemporary Pittsburgh to a national audience, replacing the decades-old image of a smoky industrial city.

38. Merging Media
Partners: Marco Cardamone, Barney Lee, Clay Kisker, Dennis Loughran
Merging Media is doing a lot with a limited amount of space. In February, the company launched "Live at Club Cafe: The Next Stage in Music," a half-hour TV show that airs on WNPA, Channel 19. It features live performances by national acts who have performed at its 125-seat South Side venue and includes backstage interviews and bonus content. Merging Media has also released DVDs by Janis Ian and Jill Sobule, among others.

39. Ronald Allan-Lindblom
Artistic producing director, Pittsburgh Playhouse of Point Park University
Leader of Pittsburgh's largest theater training program, covering theater, musical theater, dance and film, Lindblom is also producing director of a professional company, Playhouse Rep, which advanced in public consciousness this year with an ambitious collaboration with Opera Theatre on Arthur Miller's "A View from the Bridge" and a darkly comic revival of "The Visit."

40. Joe Grushecky
Rocker
The veteran Pittsburgh rocker doesn't have the actual Grammy to show for it, but he co-wrote the song, "Code of Silence," which won Bruce Springsteen the honor this year. In December, Grushecky brought the Boss in for Flood Aid at Heinz Hall, a benefit that raised $255,000. Also in December, his life as teacher-by-day, rocker-by-night was featured on CNN's "NewsNight with Aaron Brown."

41. Janet McCall
Executive director, Society for Contemporary Craft
Proffering both diversity and homogeneity would be a tough act for some directors to pull off, but not for McCall, whose own creative and eclectic interests complement her administrative proficiency. It is her artistic vision that charts the direction of the SCC and has defined its uniqueness in the larger national craft field while establishing it as a major player. During the past year, McCall curated two exhibitions on the subjects of homeland/immigration and dreams that traveled to significant national venues, and she's co-curator of the current exhibition on African-American artists.

42. David Stock
Composer and conductor
Stock earns a slot on this list not just for his own award-winning and critically acclaimed work, but also because he's such an enthusiastic supporter of other musicians, conductors and composers. Stock was the driving force behind an expanded version of the U3 Festival this past season, a biannual event that showcases the work of composers and ensembles from Duquesne, Carnegie Mellon and Pitt. Stock also had several pieces premiered in the past year, including String Quartet No. 5, by Cuarteto Latinoamericano, and "Sea of Reeds," by the Pittsburgh Reed Trio.

43. Rick Sebak
Producer/writer/director/narrator
The WQED documentarian brought viewers two specials this past year, including the national PBS show "A Program About Unusual Buildings & Other Roadside Stuff," which he promoted for the first time to the nation's TV critics at an appearance on press tour last summer. Closer to home, Sebak pointed his camera at unique regional nooks and crannies for "It's the Neighborhoods & the Suburbs & the Small Cities & Towns & All the Surrounding Hills & Valleys That Really Make Pittsburgh." Plus, the guy got a street named after him in the new Summerset at Frick Park development. That has to count for something.

44. Tim Collins and Reiko Goto
Project director and artistic/education director, 3 Rivers 2nd Nature
Through their affiliation with the STUDIO for Creative Inquiry at CMU, these artists have initiated projects that draw attention to the status of, and encourage plans for the revitalization of, the city's natural environment. Their ongoing range of engagement encompasses both organizing at a community level and bringing globally respected environmental lecturers and artists-in-residence to the region. They were principals of The Nine Mile Run Greenway Project and the Monongahela Conference and have just completed a five-year collaborative study of the three rivers and 53 streams of Allegheny County, which they are reporting on at public presentations this month.

45. EDGE
Architects
Launched 10 years ago, EDGE studio is building a national reputation for innovative, contemporary design with projects like the live/work lofts at 947 Liberty Ave., Downtown, and the renovation of Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh's main location in Oakland. When partners Gary Carlough and Dutch MacDonald created their studio at 5411 Penn Ave. in 2003, they included a gallery to showcase the work of architects and artists from around the country. This year, EDGE added partner Matt Fineout, a former Frank Gehry associate, and one of its young architects, Swee Hong Ng, won an international competition to design a soccer field and health-care facility in South Africa. The firm's work has been featured in publications such as Metropolitan Home, which this month named MacDonald one of five designers to watch.

46. Sreyashi Dey
Artistic director and performer, Srishti Dances of India
With a charismatic presence born of authority and stillness, Dey this year collaborated with three other Indian dancers on "Lavanya: Graceful Expressions of the East," produced in a monthlong tour of the United States. As always, Dey reached beyond classical Indian dance this spring to unveil "Kaleidoscope: India," a partnership with Vijay Palaparty that embraced the global performance scene with promises of more in the future.

47. Ken Gargaro
Artistic director, Pittsburgh Musical Theater
Survival is what brings Gargaro back onto this list after a year's absence. PMT has returned to its Downtown home at the Byham Theater and reaffirmed its core commitment to providing professional opportunity for Pittsburgh's deep well of young musical theater talent, while offering family-friendly theater at affordable prices.

48. River City Brass Band
Conductor Denis Colwell and his cohorts have been increasing their fan base, now more than 100,000 strong, so that the upcoming season will include Heinz Hall, not Carnegie, next year. Of course, the musicians will still practice, practice, practice, resulting in taut renditions of everything from classical to jazzical, marches to musical mayhem, wrapping it all up in an audience-embracing style bolstered by Colwell's witticisms.

49. Grand Buffet
Members: Grape-a-Don Lord Grunge
These hip-hop pranksters conquered the South-By-Southwest festival, earned a line in Rolling Stone for their part in the [Expletive] Clear Channel Tour with Sage Francis, crossed the border into Canada with the Suicide Girls, a punk burlesque act, and returned to Europe. A post at the Mr. Roboto Project message board notes that a highlight of their set at SXSW (on the same bill as Modey Lemon) was a Lord Grunge "diatribe about how the Steelers have won every Super Bowl over the past 10 years, but no one really knows about it." A greatest-hits collection on CD and DVD should be in stores next week. And then it's back to Europe for a three-week tour with Francis.

50. CRAVE
Members: Emmanual "Manny" Deanda, Mandell "Dell" Loman, Maurice "Reese" Walker
CRAVE has topped the WAMO charts not once but twice -- first with "7 & Up," then "Real Chik." WAMO music director Kode Wred said, "This is a first, to be honest with you. Compounded by all the requests we're getting, this may be the one. I had the opportunity to see a show of theirs, and I was blown away. I was thinking this may be the group that Pittsburgh has been looking for to actually blow up and have other people start looking at Pittsburgh." Both songs can be found on the R&B trio's debut full-length "Dem Boyz," which features a cameo by Southern rapper Lil' Flip.