* Margery J. Cohen has been appointed...

* Margery J. Cohen has been appointed the first executive director of the Pasadena Pops Orchestra.

She previously was executive director of the BCPops Orchestra in Binghamton, N.Y., and also served as manager of the Schenectady, N.Y., Symphony. She graduated from Brandeis University and earned her master’s degree at the University of Chicago.

Also, Victor Vener, Pasadena Pops music director, has received the 1991 Community Service Award from Sigma Alpha Iota International Women’s Professional Music Fraternity. Vener, who earned a Ph.D. in musical arts from USC, founded the orchestra in 1987.

* Brent Samuel of Claremont, a cellist, has won the first-place award of $3,000 in the Pasadena Instrumental Competition sponsored by the Pasadena Junior Philharmonic and judged by members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. The competition was open to violin, viola, cello and bass players 23 or younger.

Samuel, 20, is principal cellist in the USC Symphony Orchestra. He also recently won third prize in the International Irving Kline String Competition in San Francisco and third prize in the Julius Stulberg competition in Michigan.