BILLIONS LISTEN TO PROFESSOR OLYMPICS AUDIENCE TUNES IN.

Byline: Mariel Garza Staff Writer

NORTHRIDGE - When the world's athletes paraded into the Olympic Stadium at Salt Lake City, Utah, during opening ceremonies last week, they were stepping to a beat arranged by Elizabeth Sellers, a music professor at California State University, Northridge.

And when NBC announcer Katie Couric stopped talking, 3.5 billion TV viewers could hear it, too.

``It was a dream job,'' Sellers said of the experience as one of the coordinators of music that will have been heard worldwide by the time the 2002 Winter Games end Feb. 28.

``I don't really know how to say it,'' she said. ``Just that you are a part of that global esprit de corps, and everyone works together. ... It's a wonderful thing.''

Sellers, a music composer and conductor, got the gig because she had worked with Mark Watters, music director for the Olympics ceremonies, on an animated film, ``Doug's First Movie.'' Watters, an Emmy Award-winning composer for movies such as ``Aladdin and the King of Thieves,'' welcomed her help when she called and asked to be involved in the Olympics.

``It's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to be involved in something on a global scale,'' Sellers said of her work as an assistant to Watters. ``The fact that it's in our back yard and the person in charge of music was someone I worked with before - well, it seemed like an opportunity I couldn't pass up.''

In October, she began working for Watters, who had been involved in the project since summer.

Most of her work was done on a computer in Watters' studio in Los Angeles. The pair pieced various music compositions together, listened to the results and kept only the best of their experiments.

The result, which Sellers can't discuss because of a confidentiality agreement she signed, is a mix of contemporary and classical music combining prerecorded and other performances that complement the Olympic theme of ``Light the Fire Within.''

Sellers called the music the result of hard work by many recording companies, orchestras, producers and composers, including celebrated film-music composer John Williams.

According to the official Olympics Web site, internationally known producer Don Mischer has been working on the Utah ceremonies for three years with a staff that includes 350 full-time people.

Sellers' involvement in the Olympics does not surprise Jerry Luedders, chairman of the CSUN music department.

He called it an outstanding department including Matt Harris, who heads the campus jazz program and writes music for the Disney Channel, and Paul Smith, head of the choral program, who conducts the World Youth Choir.

``This is a normal part of what faculty does,'' Luedders said. ``We feel the faculty needs to be active in the profession so we're not educating the students (just) in (the) abstract or theory.''

Sellers, 53, conducted symphonies in Helena and Bozeman, Montana, for 10 years. She worked in scoring films before she joined the CSUN staff 2 1/2 years ago.

A full-time assistant music professor, she oversees CSUN's media composition program.

Her love of music composition comes naturally. Born into a long line of musicians, she composed her first song when she was 2 years old.

``It's a question of who I am,'' said Sellers. ``It's in my pores.''

CAPTION(S):

photo

Photo:

Elizabeth Sellers, a professor at California State University, Northridge, helped arrange music for the Winter Olympics.

Gus Ruelas/Staff Photographer