Abigail McBride
Abigail McBride is a musician and artist, based in Las Vegas. Her latest album, Fire of Creation is a collection of her original music. Abbi is also a lead singer and percussionist for Zingaia, and part of the Sweet Ride to Heaven Jubilation and Wonderment Band in Las Vegas. Her recent solo release, Fire of Creation, has won critical acclaim. She travels worldwide, performing magic, belly dancing, and teaching drumming, chanting, movement and awareness workshops.
John Phillips and Michelle Phillips were members of The Mamas & the Papas, a folk rock vocal group which recorded and performed from 1965 to 1968. The group was a defining force in the music scene of the counterculture of the 1960s. Formed in New York City, the group consisted of Americans John Phillips, Cass Elliot, and Michelle Phillips, and Canadian Denny Doherty. Their sound was based on vocal harmonies arranged by John Phillips, the songwriter, musician, and leader of the group, who adapted folk to the new beat style of the early 1960s. “California Dreamin’” is one of their biggest hits.
Jennifer Levenhagen
Jennifer Levenhagen is a musician, artist, and creative, who composed the original version of “Most Beautiful Sky.”
Sean Ivory
Sean Ivory is a composer and conductor in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Sean directs the Grand Rapids Symphony Youth Chorus, an affiliate organization of the Grand Rapids Symphony. He is also the choral director at Forest Hills Central High School and an affiliate artist with the Youth Choral Theater of Chicago. Sean is an adjunct professor at Calvin College where he conducts the Campus Choir and the Oratorio Society. He lives in Grand Rapids with his wife Leah and their children, Emma, Samuel and Meredith.
Moira Smiley
Singer, composer, and song-collector Moira Smiley has sung in arenas, cathedrals, kitchens, back porches, sound stages, and on glaciers. She’s performed with the likes of Ladysmith Black Mambazo, Tune-Yards, Tim O’Brien, Eric Whitacre, Los Angeles Master Chorale, New World Symphony, Solas, and The Lyris String Quartet. An active composer and performer, Moira has written commissions for the LA Master Chorale, Conspirare, Cincinnati Vocal Arts Ensemble, Mirabai, Stile Antico, American Choral Directors Association, Voces Novae, VocalEssence, Pacific Chorale, NOTUS, Ad Astra Festival and countless others. Her arrangements and original compositions for choir – especially those with her signature body percussion – are performed by millions of singers around the world.
Meagan Johnson and Tyler Secor
Meagan Johnson and Tyler Secor collaborated as artistic leaders of Indianapolis Women’s Chorus from 2015-2021, Johnson as conductor and artistic director, Secor as assistant director and pianist. Composers as well as active performing musicians, educators, and arts administrators, Johnson and Secor co-wrote "The Winter Bird" for Indianapolis Women’s Chorus in January 2021. Tyler Secor is now Director of Publications and Content Development with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, and Johnson continues her work as Artistic Director of IWC (see full bio for more information).
The Highwomen
The Highwomen is an American country music supergroup composed of Brandi Carlile, Natalie Hemby, Maren Morris, and Amanda Shires, whose name an intentional play on the all-male country band ‘The Highwaymen.” The Highwomen have called the band "a movement” that is about "more than just the country music ... we're trying to celebrate women in all fields...We're trying to make a statement and bring more women front and center.” As Brandi Carlile has said: "open the door and hold it open for other female artists."
Roman Surzha is a Ukrainian composer whose creative assets include music for plays, cinema, choreographic productions, and choral works. He was born in Kyiv in 1960 into a family of musicians. He studied choral conducting at music college, where he began to show interest in composition, and then studied at the Odesa Conservatory. At the 2005 international choral and sacred music festival Musica Sacra in Rome, held in the summer residence of the Pope, Roman’s work “Alleluia,” performed by the Shchedryk Choir, received the highest score and brought them victory in the competition.
Sara Bareilles and Ingrid Michaelson are award-winning American song-writers and performers. This song, co-written for a compilation of winter songs by female artists, was performed by Bareilles and Michaelson for President Obama and his family as well as many spectators at the National Christmas Tree Lighting in December 2010.
Michael Bussewitz-Quarm
The choral music of Michael Bussewitz-Quarm engages singers and audiences with the leading social and environmental issues of our time. Michael is passionate about effecting change through choral music on topics ranging from the health of the world’s coral reefs to the epidemic of gun violence in the United States to the global refugee crisis. Michael is an active advocate for the transgender community. It is her fervent wish to spread knowledge and understanding of the transgender community through guest speaking and by simply being present in the lives of the talented musicians and artists surrounding her. Ms. Bussewitz-Quarm made her debut at Carnegie Hall as a composer in the spring of 2023 with the performance of "Where We Find Ourselves" under the direction of Dr. Rodney Wynkoop.
Sherryl Sewepagaham
Sherryl Sewepagaham is of Cree-Dene ancestry from the Little Red River Cree Nation in northern Alberta. She holds a Bachelor of Music Therapy (Capilano University), a Bachelor of Education and Masters of Education (University of Alberta). Having taught elementary music for 14 years, Sherryl is an experienced elementary Music Educator focusing on Indigenous Music Education and First Nations songs for the classroom. Now as a Music Therapist, she works with Indigenous patients in the areas of Geriatric and Palliative Care at the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Edmonton, AB, but still continues to provide education workshops in schools on Fridays.
Sherryl is also a 22-year member of the 2005 Juno-nominated, Edmonton-based trio Asani and composes drum songs in the Cree language. Asani received a 2010 Canadian Folk Music Award, a 2010 Indian Summer Music Award, a 2005 Canadian Aboriginal Music Award, and many other music awards nominations. Asani toured extensively around the world performing at Carnegie Hall in New York, The Kennedy Centre in Washington D.C., and the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver BC.
Sherryl is also a composer of traditional and contemporary First Nations drum songs. Her 2014 debut solo album, Splashing the Water Loudly, received a 2015 Indigenous Music Award nomination and is featured in APTN’s Chaos and Courage series. Sherryl wrote the music and lyrics for the National Arts Centre’s Music Alive Program (MAP) song, “Music Alive”, which has been shared with elementary schools across Canada. Sherryl also created and co-created three teacher resources for the MAP program and continues to develop cultural programs for music teachers.
Lea Morris
Lea Morris is a SoulFolk Singer and Songwriter whose sound often draws comparisons to Tracy Chapman and Joni Mitchell. It’s no wonder, with her warm vocals, insightful lyrics and familiar melodies. However, as Lea’s compositions expand to include looped harmonies, vocal percussion and other elements, it’s clear that her SoulFolk style is unique.
Born in Washington DC to a father who toured the world playing trumpet in a funk band and a mother who dreamed of opera, Lea began to sing in the Baptist church as soon as she could speak. In high school, she started teaching herself to play acoustic guitar by writing songs. Then, she embarked on an exchange year in Halle, Germany, where the artist dabbled in classical, jazz and pop. Lea’s voice and musicianship are often heard on recordings by Stockfisch Records for whom she frequently provides backing vocals. In fact, she has been nominated for and won several awards, including, Best Vocalist, Best Recording, and Songwriter of the Year.
Having shared the stage with luminaries including Odetta and Mavis Staples, Lea is also returning to her roots by composing multi-layered chants and grounding a community singing experience in Braunschweig, Germany, where she currently resides.
Dale Trumbore
Dale Trumbore is a Los Angeles-based composer and writer whose music has been called "devastatingly beautiful" (The Washington Post) and praised for its "soaring melodies and beguiling harmonies deployed with finesse" (The New York Times). Her compositions have been performed widely in the U.S. and internationally by Central West Ballet, Chicago Symphony's MusicNOW ensemble, Conspirare and the Miró Quartet, soprano Liv Redpath, Los Angeles Children's Chorus, Los Angeles Master Chorale, Modesto Symphony, Pasadena Symphony, and Phoenix Chorale. She recently released She Only Remembers, a ballet for solo piano about memory loss and forgetting, and The Gleam, her second album with soprano Gillian Hollis. A winner of the American Choral Directors Association (ACDA)'s inaugural Raymond W. Brock Competition for Professional Composers, an ASCAP Morton Gould Award, and a Chamber Music America Classical Commissioning Grant, Trumbore has also been awarded artist residencies at Copland House, the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation, Tusen Takk, and Ucross.
Charlie Murphy
Charlie Murphy (July 4, 1953 – August 6, 2016) was an American activist and singer-songwriter. Touring as a folk singer in the 1970s, he was a pioneer of the men's movement and sang openly about gay rights, making him one of the few out and proud gay singer/songwriters of his day. One of Charlie’s best-known compositions is “Burning Times,” which became a beloved song of the women’s movement.
