Kim Addonizio
Afternoon Workshop Faculty
Kim Addonizio is the author of seven poetry collections, two novels, two story collections, and two books on writing poetry: The Poet’s Companion (with Dorianne Laux) and Ordinary Genius.
George Aschmann
Violin
Among other musical endeavors, George plays violin and sings with the collective Frog and Henry, who’ve played the streets of New Orleans since 2013. They revive the music first made popular in the 1920’s and 1930’s in New Orleans, Chicago, and across the U.S., a mixture of jazz, jugband, stringband, blues, and popular songs. Most of the instruments are from the same time period.
Brook Adams
Past Faculty
Brook is an atavistic dinosaur of 20th century pop. His songs evoke a timeless blend of soul, surf & psychedelia. He is a skilled player on guitar and ukulele.
Claire Allen-Africa
Operations Associate
deposited by the Fates at a small vineyard in Port Townsend after many years of world travel by sea, elephant and bicycle, this sailor brings a multi-world view to her responsibilities at Centrum. A no-nonsense approach inherited from her British roots instills in Claire the ability to initiate eloquent solutions to her problem-solving and logistics. Claire enjoys jamming with friends when not tending to grapevines, making wine and savoring the results with her husband and collie dog.
Andrew Alli
Harmonica
This Richmond, Virginia native was always passionate about music and stumbled upon the blues while taking up his first instrument, the harmonica. He instantly fell in love with the blues and the history that comes with the harp.
Ben Allison
Faculty
Bass
In a career that spans over 30 years, bassist, composer, producer and educator Ben Allison has developed his own instantly identifiable sound. Known for his inspired arrangements, inventive grooves and hummable melodies, Ben draws from the jazz tradition and a range of influences from rock and folk to 20th century and a broad range of music from around the world, seamlessly blending them into a cinematic, cohesive whole.…
Rion Amilcar Scott
Morning Workshop Faculty
Rion Amilcar Scott is the author of the story collections The World Doesn’t Require You and Insurrections, which was awarded the 2017 PEN/Bingham Prize for Debut Fiction and the 2017 Hillsdale Award from the Fellowship of Southern Writers. He teaches creative writing at the University of Maryland. His work has appeared in The New Yorker, The Kenyon Review, Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2020 and McSweeney’s Quarterly, among other publications.
Yaw Amponsah
West African Drumming
Yaw Amponsah is a master percussionist from Ghana. Coming from a musical family from West Africa he is at home in the world of rhythm. A versatile player, Yaw can play many styles of music from Ghana including Highlife, Agbadja, Kpanlogo and more. His specialty is the music of the multi-part percussion ensembles of the Ashanti people.…
Alice Anderson
Afternoon Workshop Faculty
Alice Anderson is the author of the national bestselling memoir, Some Bright Morning, I’ll Fly Away, which was published in fall of 2017 from St. Martin’s Press and was recently optioned for film. Anderson’s second poetry collection, The Watermark, was published in the UK and US simultaneously from Eyewear Publishing. A bestselling first collection of poems, Human Nature, was awarded both the Best First Book Prize from the Great Lakes Colleges Association and the Elmer Holmes Bobst Prize from NYU.…
Bryce Andrews
Morning Workshop Faculty
Bryce Andrews is a rancher, conservationist, and co-owner of Thunder Road Farm. His award-winning books Badluck Way (2014), Down from the Mountain (2019), and Holding Fire (2023) describe the complex realities of living and working in the wild landscapes of the contemporary American West. He lives with his family on the Flathead Indian Reservation, in Montana.
Keeth Monta Apgar
“An acoustic treat.” – Seattle’s Child Magazine
With a 1000 songs written in his 35 prolific years of songwriting, Northwest singer-songwriter Keeth Monta Apgar has created an enormous pile of music.
Keeth strums ukuleles, acoustic guitars and fronts Indie-Folk band The Harmonica Pocket.…
Keeth Apgar
Faculty
With a 1000 songs written in his 35 prolific years of songwriting, Northwest singer-songwriter Keeth Monta Apgar has created an enormous pile of music. Keeth strums ukuleles, acoustic guitars and fronts Indie-Folk band The Harmonica Pocket. Rich in image, harmony and rhyme, his lyrical songs tell stories about plants, love, forgiveness and the outdoors.…
Big Jon Atkinson
Early Electric Guitar
Big Jon Atkinson speaks the language fluently and with such a well-articulated deep emotion that when you hear this young man play and sing the blues it is an experience you will never forget.
Quenton Baker
Morning Intensive Faculty
Quenton Baker is a poet, educator, and Cave Canem fellow. Their current focus is black interiority and the afterlife of slavery. Their work has appeared in The Offing, Jubilat, Vinyl, The Rumpus and elsewhere. They are a two-time Pushcart Prize nominee, and the recipient of the 2018 Arts Innovator Award from Artist Trust. They were a 2019 Robert Rauschenberg Artist in Residence and a 2021 NEA Fellow. They are the author of we pilot the blood (The 3rd Thing, 2021) and ballast (Haymarket Books, 2023).
Christine Balfa
Christine Balfa is a native Louisiana French speaker, a committed and caring teacher, and a deeply- rooted Cajun musician with a passion for culture and education. As the daughter of Cajun cultural ambassador and National Heritage Fellow Dewey Balfa, she grew up in the center of the renaissance of Cajun and Creole culture. After his passing, she formed the musical group Balfa Toujours and created the non-profit Louisiana Folk Roots, of which she was the founding executive director.…
Dan Balmer
Faculty
From coffee house gigs at fifteen to chart-topping success with the Tom Grant Band in the 90s, world tours with two-time Grammy Award winner Diane Schuur and contemporary jam-bands, Dan Balmer brings fire and heart every time he plays the guitar. His playing spans nearly one hundred CDs including twelve as a leader from which his original works have appeared internationally in television, film and radio.…
Swanky Kitchen Band
Cayman Islands
fiddle, guitar, grater, cooking
Swanky Kitchen Band is on an essential quest to revive the traditional music of the Cayman Islands. Set amidst the crystal blue waters of the Caribbean Sea, the three tiny islands are home to kitchen dance music, an infectiously danceable fiddle-driven style. The kitchen dance sound, created through a crossroads of European and African influences, might have disappeared save for the efforts of Swanky Kitchen Band, the last of the Caymanian Kitchen Bands.…
Genevieve E Barlow
Artist Network Coordinator
Genevieve E Barlow (Artist Network Coordinator) graduated from the University of Montana in 2018 with a BFA in Acting and Directing. As the Food Security Coordinator for the YMCA, Genevieve led numerous hunger relief programs in Jefferson County focusing on transportation and expanding family nutrition. She has worked for several local theater companies and directed Men on Boats in 2019 and As You Like It in 2022.…
Sunpie Barnes
Accordion
Bruce Sunpie Barnes is a veteran New Orleans musician, former Park Ranger with the National Park Service for 30 years, actor, photographer, book author, former high school biology teacher, former college football All-American, and former NFL player (Kansas City Chiefs). Sunpie Barnes’ many careers have taken him far and wide. He has traveled to over 50 countries playing his own style of what he calls Afro-Louisiana music incorporating Blues, Zydeco, Gospel, Caribbean and African influenced rhythms and melodies.…
Holly Barousse
Registrar
Holly Barousse (Operations and Residency Assc.) Holly joined Centrum in 2020 after several years in other roles at Fort Worden. Her experience working at the Fort introduced her to Centrum’s staff and programs. She was thrilled to join the operations team, working with the Registrar, Residency Program Manager and the Operations Manager. Holly grew up in Michigan, spent time in Alaska and Oregon and fell in love with Port Townsend.…
Kristen Barron Kinney
Faculty
Kirsten Barron Kinney graduated cum laude from the University of California, Irvine in where she earned her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Choreography and in Dance Performance. While attending UCI, she was a member of Donald McKayle’s modern company Etude Ensemble, Fresno Ballet under the direction of Donald Bradburn, and has returned to UCI as a guest choreographer for Bare Bones Dance Theatre in 2007, and as a guest performer for the Donald McKayle’s Tribute in 2009.…
Patrick Bartley, Jr.
Faculty
Saxophone
Grammy-nominated saxophonist, composer, and bandleader Patrick Bartley, Jr. is a musician with experience in a wide range of situations, most notably for appearing on the Late Show with Stephen Colbert and being featured in the Emmy-nominated HBO special Wynton Marsalis: A YoungArts Masterclass, which premiered at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.…
Erica Bauermeister
Afternoon Workshop Faculty
Erica Bauermeister is the NYT bestselling author of five novels, including No Two Persons, The Scent Keeper, and The School of Essential Ingredients. She has also written a memoir, entitled House Lesson: Renovating a Life, and is the co-author of two readers’ guides — 500 Great Books by Women and Let’s Hear it for the Girls.…
Ignacio Berroa
Faculty
Drums
Ignacio Berroa has been recognized as one of the greatest drummers of our time. A leading innovator in the blending of Afro-Cuban and American jazz styles, his artful drumming has supported a wide spectrum of the very top names in jazz, including Dizzy Gillespie, McCoy Tyner, Chick Corea, Wynton Marsalis, Freddie Hubbard, Charlie Haden, and Gonzalo Rubalcaba.…
Vivienne Bessette
Vivienne Bessette (b. 1982) is a queer artist of mixed settler and Michif heritage (Red River Treaty 1). They are based on the stolen and unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh and səlí̓lwətaʔɬ Nations. Bessette incorporates drawing, painting, woodworking, sculpting, dying, writing, fermenting and building relationships with plants into their practice. They work in and out of the studio, the garden and the kitchen, developing sustainable and alternative modes of food production and utilizing unconventional materials.…
Reginald Dwayne Betts
Morning Workshop Faculty
Reginald Dwayne Betts is a poet, lawyer, and the Founder & CEO of Freedom Reads, an initiative to radically transform access to literature in prisons. The author of a memoir and three collections of poetry, he has transformed his latest collection of poetry, the American Book Award Winning FELON, into a solo theater show that explores the post incarceration experience and lingering consequences of a criminal record through poetry, stories, and engaging with the timeless and transcendental art of papermaking.…
Pat Bianchi
Faculty
Piano/Organ
Pat Bianchi has never been afraid to take the concepts of “Jazz Organ” into new directions. His playing draws from a wide range of musical influences including organists Dr. Lonnie Smith and Joey DeFrancesco (both who mentored Bianchi in his early years) but also encompasses other instrumentalists and approaches that stretch beyond the Hammond B-3 world.…
Dave Biller
Faculty
Dave Biller has toured and recorded with Wayne Hancock, Dale Watson, and Deke Dickerson and is mostly known as a professional pedal steel player, but his record, Hot Guitars of Biller & Wakefield, captured the ears of music lovers everywhere.
Robert Birman
Executive Director
Robert Birman (Executive Director) Named 2022 Business Leader of the Year in Jefferson County, Rob joined Centrum in 2013, having served as a senior executive in the orchestra world for more than 20 years in San Francisco, Louisville, Santa Barbara, Boston and elsewhere. He is a former arts administration fellow with the National Endowment for the Arts; an ISPA fellow at the New World Symphony in Miami Beach; and worked two summers at the Colorado Music Festival in Boulder.…
Dina Blade
Dina Blade is a singer with a deeply relaxed sense of time and swing. She spent her early childhood watching old cartoons with jazz soundtracks and has been enthralled with the music ever since. She has graced stages in the U.S., Canada, Europe, Cuba and Brazil, singing at festivals, jazz clubs, schools, parties and other community events.…
Arna Bontemps Hemenway
Past Faculty
Arna Bontemps Hemenway is the author of Elegy on Kinderklavier (Sarabande Books), winner of the PEN/Hemingway Prize, finalist for the Barnes and Noble Discover Award, and long-listed for the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Prize.
Bill Brennan
Faculty
Billy is a dynamic songwriter and performer who has been commissioned to create stage shows, produce albums of original music, and star in video projects for prominent environmental organizations such as the National Geographic Society, The World Wildlife Fund, Project Learning Tree, The Cleveland Museum of Natural History, Baltimore Woods Nature Center and the France and Merrick Foundations.…
Eden Brent
Piano
Blues lady Eden Brent is a modern-day piano-pounding, juke-joint hollering powerhouse of American roots music. A legendary performer and southern songwriter, she spent the first two decades of her career under the tutelage of Abie “Boogaloo” Ames, before winning The Blues Foundation’s Challenge and bouncing onto the international scene. Since then she lands steady honors, three Blues Music Awards among them.…
Matt Brewer
Faculty
Bass
Matt Brewer is one of the world’s premier bassists. He was born April 20, 1983, in Oklahoma City but spent most of his youth in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Born into a musical family, Matt was surrounded by music from an early age, both his father and grandfather being jazz musicians, and his mother an avid music lover and radio DJ (who, before Matt was born, would play classic jazz albums for him).…
Marianne Brogan
Marianne Brogan grew up in a musical family and played flute, piano, guitar and drums. In middle age she found her instrument – the ukulele – and that was that.
She founded the Portland (Oregon) Ukulele Association in 2001, and has been happily teaching ukulele, and organizing events for well over a decade.
Ginger Brooks
Ginger Brooks Takahashi is a transdisciplinary artist and educator. Her performance, installation, and site responsive works examine our relationships to the mediums that connect us. These public projects are platforms for intimate interaction, an extension of feminist and queer praxis. She received her BA from Oberlin College, 1999; and attended the Whitney Independent Study Program, 2007.…
Mark Brooks
Bass
Mark Brooks is one of New Orleans’ premiere bassist. He is noted for his versatility vocally as well as instrumentally. Mark is a protégée of the late great Jazz Master, Alvin Batiste along with several of his close friends Branford Marsalis, Donald Harrison, and Henry Butler. Mark has toured and performed with an array of artists across genres such as Jazz, Blues, R&B, and Gospel.…
Jevon Brown
Jevon Brown is a multidisciplinary artist and designer. He received his BFA in Textiles from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2023. Brown’s work explores black masculine kindred barbershops. Artifacts and cultural icons within my environments defy pattern, gravity, family roots, and personal history embedded within each fiber of his hair. He uses textiles to drape storytelling, connecting my Miami and Caribbean ancestry.…
Paul Brown
with Terri McMurray and Chester McMillian
North Carolina
fiddle, banjo, guitar
Paul Brown is an award–winning fiddler and banjoist who offers unique insights into evolving fiddle styles of southwest Virginia and northwest North Carolina
As a young man who’d learned his first songs from his mother’s Virginia repertoire, heimmersed himself in the old, nearly Celtic-sounding fiddle styles of Virginia artists Luther Davis, Parley Parsons and others, plus the stunningly rich Round Peak community tradition of players including Tommy Jarrell, Kyle Creed, Earnest East and Fred Cockerham.…
Lloyd Buchanan
Gospel Choir
Lloyd Buchanan is rooted in Gospel and the Blues. His connection to the Hammond organ began at a very early age in church accompanying his mother.
Charlie Burnham
Violin
Charlie Burnham is an American violinist and composer. He has a unique highly imaginative style that crosses genres, including bluegrass, delta punk, free jazz, blues, classical and chamber jazz. He often performs with a wah-wah pedal. He initially became renowned for his work on James “Blood” Ulmer’s Odyssey album. The musicians on that album later performed and recorded as Odyssey the Band, sometimes known as The Odyssey Band.…
George Cables
Faculty
Piano
When George Cables was going to school in New York City he used to walk the streets at night, taking in the cosmopolitan sights and sounds, mentally recording his encounters with “so many different kinds of people.” In his musical career as well, Cables has prowled side streets and main thoroughfares in relative anonymity, absorbing countless influences into his personal style.…
Etienne Cakpo
West African Dance
Etienne Cakpo (he/him) is an award-winning professional dancer, choreographer and musician from Benin, West Africa. He is specialized in instruction and performance of traditional African dance from Benin as well as contemporary African dance styles, and has been building his dance repertoire for nearly thirty years. He is director of Gansango Music & Dance, a dance company registered in Washington State.…
Obed Calvaire
Faculty
Obed Calvaire, a native of Miami and of Haitian descent is a graduate with both a master and bachelor degree of music from one of America’s premiere private music conservatories in the nation, Manhattan School of Music.
Jere Canote
Past Faculty
Washington
Jere Canote is a teacher, musician, and luthier. Since the mid seventies, Jere has honed his skills playing old time country, swing, and novelty songs on guitar, banjo and ukulele. Jere has recorded many projects with his twin brother Greg, including “Uke Snack” (old time tunes and songs), and “Uke Life” (clawhammer and flat picked Uke).…
Laurie Carney
Violin, American String Quartet
A founding member of the American String Quartet, Laurie Carney (violin) holds the distinction of performing quartets longer than any other woman in this elite field. The American String Quartet began concertizing while she was still an undergraduate at Juilliard. Apart from the Quartet, she has performed trios with her husband, cellist William Grubb, and pianist Anton Nel; duos with violist Michael Tree; and as an ensemble partner to such artists as Isaac Stern, Pinchas Zukerman, Salvatore Accardo, Cho-Liang Lin, Joshua Bell, Yefim Bronfman, Misha Dichter, Ralph Kirshbaum, Alain Meunier, and Frederica von Stade.…
Carrie Wells Carter
Kentucky
Carrie Wells Carter was born and raised in Red Bush, Kentucky, immersed in traditional Appalachian music and art. Learning fiddle from her father, Jamie Wells, from the age of 7, she also spent a good deal of time in her youth learning from her uncle, Robbie Wells, and brother, Jesse Wells. She currently lives in Whitesburg, Kentucky, with her husband, Matthew, and two daughters.…
Lucinda Carver
Artistic Director, Port Townsend Chamber Music Festival
Lucinda was appointed Port Townsend Chamber Music Festival Artistic Director in late 2009. Called “a first rate conductor” by the New York Times, she is active as a conductor / pianist and her orchestral appearances have included the National Symphony, Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, Pacific Symphony, and Los Angeles Philharmonic. Opera conducting credits include the Minnesota Opera, New York City Opera, and the Lyric Opera of Kansas City.…
Claudia Castro Luna
Afternoon Workshop
Claudia Castro Luna is an Academy of American Poets Poet Laureate fellow (2019), WA State Poet Laureate (2018 – 2021) and Seattle’s inaugural Civic Poet (2015-2018). She is the author of Cipota Under the Moon (Tia Chucha Press, 2022); One River, A Thousand Voices (Chin Music Press); the Pushcart nominated Killing Marías (Two Sylvias Press) also shortlisted for WA State 2018 Book Award in poetry, and the chapbook This City (Floating Bridge Press).…
Claudia Castro Luna
Morning Workshop Faculty
Claudia Castro Luna is an Academy of American Poets Poet Laureate fellow (2019), WA State Poet Laureate (2018 – 2021) and Seattle’s inaugural Civic Poet (2015-2018). She is the author of Cipota Under the Moon (Tia Chucha Press, 2022) and Killing Marías (Two Sylvias Press, 2017) both shortlisted for the WA State Book Award in poetry, 2023 and 2018 respectively.…
Conrad Cayman
Ukulele
Conrad Cayman is a Los Angeles-based multi-instrumentalist who teaches and plays ukulele (tenor, baritone, and U-bass), and also performs on guitar, plectrum banjo, and bass (upright and electric). An artist for Ohana Ukuleles, Conrad has performed at the Los Angeles Ukulele Festival and UkeCon San Diego, and taught and performed at the Reno Ukulele Festival and the Centrum Foundation’s Acoustic Blues Festival in Port Townsend, WA.…
Dawn Cerny
Dawn Cerny was born in Carpinteria, CA and currently lives in Seattle, WA. Cerny’s sculptures begin with the notion that “furniture” and “mother” are figures that secure a value (to others) for their potential to hold, display, or be absent-mindedly left with things. Putting form and color to work and entrusting no small part to contingency, these works behave as something like gestural understudies for a play about the day-to-day grinding weariness and joyful slapstick absurdity of human relationship—about trying to Work It Out…or not.…
Sabrina Chacon-Barajas
Faculty
Sabrina Chacon-Barajas graduated from Seattle Pacific University with a BA in Studio Art and is currently working on her M.Ed at UW Bothell. Her artwork incorporates multi-media art to represent the intersectional identity of being a woman of color from immigrant parents. Sabrina is a teaching artist that cares about representation in the classroom through the power of the arts.…
Neal Chin
Award winning artist and Maui, HI native Neal Chin, has been both an ‘ukulele educator and performer over the course of his musical career. His clear and direct enthusiasm for music has come to life in countless workshops, concerts, and private instruction. While his heart is in jazz, Neal has played with many musicians of different genres including Hawaiian, folk, rock, and hip-hop.…
Daniel Ching
Violin, Miró Quartet
Daniel Ching, a founding member of the Miró Quartet, began his violin studies at the age of 3 under tutelage of his father. At age 5, he entered the San Francisco Conservatory Preparatory Division on a full twelve‐year scholarship, where he studied violin with Serban Rusu and Zaven Melikian, and chamber music with Susan Bates. At the age of 10, Daniel was first introduced to string quartets.A graduate of the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, Daniel studied violin with Kathleen Winkler, Roland and Almita Vamos, and conducting with Robert Spano and Peter Jaffe.…
Sam Christian
Sam Christian (They/Them) is a mixed media fiber artist who focuses on the celebration of Black and queer stories, both good and bad. Sam’s work talks through their own experiences growing up in the South as the grandkid of a quilter, parentified first-born and Black body existing within the “American Dream”. These ideas show up in multiple forms of media including Fiber (Quilting), Digital Design, and ceramics all book-ended with Sam’s background in writing and performance.…
Cláudio Rabeca Band
Cláudio Rabeca is a fiddle player, composer, singer, teacher, music producer and luthier from the Northeast of Brasil. For more than 20 years he has fiddled, sang, and played percussion with multiple Brasilian groups, including 11 years with the forró group Quarteto Olinda. After he dedicated himself fully to the fiddle, he found that the instrument informed his creative process and is the basis for his singing.…
Gerald Clayton
Faculty
Piano
Gerald Clayton searches for honest expression in every note he plays. With harmonic curiosity and critical awareness, he develops musical narratives that unfold as a result of both deliberate searching and chance uncovering. The four-time GRAMMY-nominated pianist/composer formally began his musical journey at the prestigious Los Angeles County High School for the Arts, where he received the 2002 Presidential Scholar of the Arts Award.…
John Clayton
Former Artistic Director, Jazz Port Townsend
Bass
Bassist, Composer, Arranger and Producer, John Clayton, is a busy man. With a Grammy on his shelf and nine additional nominations, artists such as Diana Krall, Paul McCartney, Regina Carter, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Gladys Knight, Queen Latifah, and Charles Aznavour have had spots on his crowded calendar.
In 1985 John, co-founded the Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra and rekindled The Clayton Brothers Quintet.…
Dawn Clement
Artistic Director, Jazz Port Townsend
Piano
Pianist, vocalist, and composer Dawn Clement is a joyful and formidable force in the landscape of modern creative music. For over two decades, Clement has served as both a torchbearer of the jazz tradition and as a trailblazer in fresh sonic explorations. “In all this world of jazz, there are very few individual voices, no matter what the instrument, but Dawn has come up with a voice that’s unique…” says legendary jazz trombonist Julian Priester.…
Eloise & Co.
Vermont
Eloise & Co. features the combined creative force of two of the country’s most sought-after traditional musicians, fiddler Becky Tracy and piano accordionist Rachel Bell. These two, sometimes playing as a duo and other times joined by various guest guitar and piano players, crank out concert and dance music with unbridled energy and soaring beauty.…
Anat Cohen
Clarinet & Saxophone
Ever charismatic, prolific and inspired, Grammy-nominated clarinetist-saxophonist Anat Cohen has won hearts and minds the world over with her expressive virtuosity and delightful stage presence. The New York Times writes, “Ms. Cohen on the clarinet was a revelation. Using the clarinet’s upper register, she could evoke infectious joy.…
Elizabeth Colen
Past Faculty
EJ Colen is a PNW-based educator, writer, and editor interested in long-form poetry, the lyric essay, literary and visual collage, and research-based approaches to storytelling and memoir.
George Colligan
Faculty
Piano
George Colligan is not only one of the great jazz pianists of his generation, but he has earned an international reputation as a multi-instrumentalist (drums, trumpet, organ, keyboards), composer, accompanist, teacher, and bandleader, as well as popular blogger(jazztruth.blogspot.com). Winner of the 2015 DownBeat magazine Critics Poll (Keyboard), he has had a long association with living jazz legend Jack DeJohnette; recent touring took Colligan around the U.S.…
Nicole Comforto
Grants Officer
Nicole Comforto is a writer, musician, and non-profit professional with many years of experience bringing grant funding to innovative organizations. She is a graduate of Whitman College and Columbia University’s Graduate School of Arts & Sciences. After graduating, she worked in communications at UNESCO, then in fundraising roles at several nonprofits focused on international literacy. She is delighted to return to her hometown of Port Townsend with her family and join Centrum’s development team.
Gary Copeland Lilley
Gary Copeland Lilley is the author of eight books of poetry, the most recent being The Bushman’s Medicine Show (Lost Horse Press, 2017), and a chapbook, The Hog Killing (Blue Horse Press, 2018). He is originally from North Carolina and now lives in the Pacific Northwest. He has received the DC Commission on the Arts Fellowship for Poetry and is published in numerous anthologies and journals, including The Best American Poetry 2014, Willow Springs, The Swamp, Waxwing, Taos Journal of Poetry and Art, and African American Review.…
Tanya Darby
Faculty
Trumpet
California native Tanya Darby is a current and veteran member of such groups as the Vanguard Jazz Orchestra, the Roy Hargrove Big Band, the DIVA Jazz Orchestra, the Michel Camilo Big Band, and the Rufus Reid Large Ensemble, among others. She has performed and toured with artists such as Dianne Reeves, Clark Terry, Jon Faddis, Paquito D’Rivera, and Gladys Knight, and ensembles including the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, the Count Basie Orchestra, the Ron Carter Great Big Band, the Duke Ellington Orchestra, and the Mingus Big Band.…
Gail Davies
Gail Davies is one of Nashville’s finest singers, songwriters, and record producers. A pioneering performer, she was the first female in country music to produce her own recordings and has been cited as a major influence by such diverse acts as Mary-Chapin Carpenter, Kathy Mattea, Suzy Bogguss, and Pam Tillis. A gifted, multi-faceted musician with country, bluegrass and blues leanings, Gail has delighted in spreading her creative wings since she scored with her revival of Webb Pierce’s No Love Have I in 1978.…
Quincy Davis
Faculty
Drums
Currently Associate Professor of Jazz Drum Set at the University of North Texas, QUINCY DAVIS was born in Grand Rapids, MI, and comes from a very musical family. He began taking piano and drum lessons at age 6. In his elementary and middle school bands, he also played trumpet and tuba.…
Allison De Groot
Faculty, Allison De Groot Band
Banjo virtuoso Allison de Groot is known for her great clawhammer technique, exquisite tone, timing, and taste. She has deep roots in the old time tradition and yet she’s fearless when it comes to breaking new ground. In addition to playing with Molsky’s Mountain Drifters, she is also member of the super group the Goodbye Girls, and tours often with the Tatiana Hargreaves.
Alyssa de Leon
Program Manager for Creative Youth Development
Alyssa de Leon (Program Manager for Creative Youth Development) was raised in the forests of Northern California on a steady diet of reggae music, arts festivals, and hippie counterculture. She studied education, philosophy, and politics at the Dominican University of California, and went on to obtain a Master’s of Education. Her professional career has ranged from preschool and forest school director to aquarium naturalist, to Community Radio Station Manager.…
Nikki Dee
Past Faculty
Nikki Dee is an award-winning vocalist and transformational vocal coach based in Honolulu. Her renowned Deeva Method takes the mystery and confusion out of vocal technique, making vocal power, confidence, and healing accessible to singers and speakers around the world.
Alice Derry
Past Faculty
Alice Derry is the author of five volumes of poetry, most recently Hunger (MoonPath 2018) along with three chapbooks, including translations of poems by Rainer Rilke.
Nova Karina Devonie
Nova Karina Devonie hails originally from Vancouver, B.C. She has been delighting audiences with her sensitive (and sometimes humorous) accordion playing, sonorous singing style, and sideways fashion sense since the 1980’s.
Amanda Donnan
Amanda Donnan is a Seattle-based curator with twenty years of experience in non-profit art organizations. She was formerly Chief Curator & Director of Exhibitions at Frye Art Museum, where she oversaw the artistic program and organized more than thirty exhibitions between 2017 and 2024. Her projects at the Frye include the solo or two-person presentations Jessica Jackson Hutchins: Wrecked and Righteous (2024), duane linklater: mymothersside (2021; traveled to MCA Chicago and Berkeley Art Museum), Dress Codes: Ellen Lesperance and Diane Simpson (2019), and Tschabalala Self (2019), as well as group exhibitions Door to the Atmosphere (2022; co-curated with Srijon Chowdhury) and Group Therapy (2018).…
Ryler Dustin
Afternoon Workshop Faculty
Ryler Dustin began his poetry career by performing spoken word; he placed eighth while representing Seattle in the Individual World Poetry Slam, headlined at spoken word venues across the country, and was featured in The Best of Button Poetry. He is the author of Heavy Lead Birdsong from Write Bloody Publishing and Trailer Park Psalms, winner of the University of Pittsburgh’s Agnes Lynch Starrett Prize.…
Jeremy Dutton
Faculty
Drums
Moving in a matrices of sound, Houston born drummer Jeremy Dutton weaves a netting of intention, comprising explicit and implied articulations, steady and emergent pulses. (Bluenote Records) A resident of New York for the past 9 years, Dutton is the rhythmic force behind some of the most critically acclaimed jazz records including “Kingmaker” (Joel Ross Bluenote), “Who Are You?” (Joel Ross Bluenote), “Flight” (James Francies Bluenote), “Purest Form” (James Francies Bluenote), and “Magdalena” (Maria Grand Biophilia).…
Chuck Easton
Vocal Accompanist & Music Theory
Guitar
Guitarist Chuck Easton is a long time Olympic Peninsula resident who teaches and plays locally. He plays bass in the Pt. Townsend Symphony Orchestra and owns a few other instruments as well. Chuck is a graduate of the Berklee College of music in Boston.
Taylor Eigsti
Faculty
Piano
GRAMMY® Award-winning pianist and composer Taylor Eigsti started playing the piano when he was four years old. Growing up in Menlo Park, CA, Eigsti was quickly labeled a prodigy, and has since released 8 albums as a bandleader, in addition to appearing on over 70 albums as a sideman. Eigsti recently won a 2022 GRAMMY® Award for Best Contemporary Instrumental Album for his most recent album “Tree Falls”, released in 2021 on GSI Records.…
Maude Eisele
Faculty
Maude is a founding ensemble member of Saltfire Theatre in Port Townsend. Her passion for collaborative theatre has brought her into many theatre ensembles over the years: from Poor Players, a bold and wacky Shakespeare ensemble rehearsing in the shadows of Balboa Park in San Diego…to world and regional premiers with the Boulder Ensemble Theatre Company…to the Colorado Shakespeare Company’s touring troupe’s explorations of bullying behavior and its remedies through Shakespeare’s words.…
Rebecca Elatiki
Faculty
Rebecca is a Moroccan-American singer-songwriter, heavily influenced by spiritual and folk traditions from the Middle East/North Africa, South America, as well as contemporary music genres from the West. Born to a classically trained opera singer and a natively born Moroccan father, she brings a unique blend of vocal techniques, and influences. She has facilitated music for concerts, retreats around the world, festivals, sound journeys, and hosts songwriting groups for both youth and adults.…
Shane Endsley
Faculty
Trumpet
The child of symphony musicians, Shane Endsley grew up immersed in the sound of trumpet and flute practice and surrounded by stacks of vinyl records. This early classical instruction served him well in terms of technique and tone production. Then using his father’s Bix Beiderbeck and big band records as a springboard, Shane began pointing his horn in a more experimental direction as he grew older.…
Pamela English
Gospel Choir
Pam English’s musical journey began at age three, when Pam began singing in the youth choir at Unity Baptist Church Detroit. Private piano lessons began at age 7 and she recorded her first album with the youth choir at age 9. Pam began playing for churches, directing and teaching choirs at the age of 10. This continued throughout high school, college, and well into her adult musical career.…
Belen Escobedo
and Ramon Gutierrez
Texas
fiddle, bajo sexto
(written by Dan Margolies) – It’s not only hard to describe Belen Escobedo’s gardens, it’s hard even to comprehend what you are seeing. Flowers, trees, vegetables, vines, and who-knows-exactly-what of local and Texas native plants grow everywhere, in, over, and through things in two yards. Plants assert themselves alongside terraces, awnings, containers of all descriptions, bird baths, signs, statuary, old rusted things, compelling little tableaux of children’s toys, collectibles, antiques.…
Queen Esther
One of country and Americana music’s most fascinating artists, Queen Esther’s range stretches far and wide creatively. Bold and outspoken, sweet and generous in spirit, her music shines a light on violence against Black Americans, her passion for country music, and the myths that have haunted the South since long before the Civil War. She’s a vocalist, songwriter, lyricist, musician, solo performer, playwright, librettist, essayist, actor, TED speaker and producer.…
Leroy Etienne
Percussion
Leroy Etienne is a drummer, percussionist, washboard player, and vocalist, based in Lafayette, Louisiana. His critically album released in 2018 features original compositions by Etienne composed in Louisiana Creole. Featured song writer on the album and book ‘Le Kér Creole’ (Creole Compositions and Stories from Louisiana) native Creole speaker Leroy Etienne said in the 1950s, he was told by teachers not to speak “French” in school.…
Arit Emmanuela Etukudo
Arit Emmanuela Etukudo is a Nigerian-American artist whose practice deals with the fluidity and metamorphosis of Black identity through self-portraiture, moving image, installation and performance art. Etukudo earned her BA in Cinematic Arts from University of Maryland Baltimore county and her MFA in Fine Art from Nottingham Trent University. She has earned achievements such as a 2024 VCCA Fellowship, 2023 MacDowell Fellowship, the 2020 Foundation for Contemporary Art Emergency Grant, 2019 NAE Future Exhibition Prize, and the 2017 Indie Capitol Award for Best Experimental/Animated film.…
Jonathan Evison
Jonathan Evison is an award-winning full-time novelist. He has published ten bestselling novels: All About Lulu, West of Here, The Revised Fundamentals of Caregiving, This is Your Life, Harriet Chance!, Lawn Boy, Legends of the North Cascades, Small World, Again and Again, and The Heart of Winter.…
Robert Eyerman
Robert Eyerman, aka Bboy Bobby Drake, started breaking in 2005 at the age of 13. Three years later he co-founded the Dog Pound Crew. His group works frequently alongside the Seattle Theater Group, dancing in productions such as DANCE This, Global Party, and Sasquatch Music Festival. Robert highly values education, graduating from the University of Washington with two degrees – chemistry and biochemistry.…
Albanie Falletta
Guitar
A native of Monroe, Louisiana, Albanie Falletta was in their formative years exposed to the local music of Louisiana: the sounds of cajun, zydeco, blues and gospel musics at festivals and backyard parties. After relocating with their family to San Marcos, Texas at the age of nine, Albanie began taking guitar lessons. They began their love and study of early American Jazz when hey were exposed to the Parisian Romani guitarist Django Reinhardt.…
Melissa Febos
Past Faculty
Melissa Febos is the author of the memoir Whip Smart; and three essay collections: Abandon Me, a LAMBDA Literary Award finalist and Publishing Triangle Award finalist; Girlhood, a national bestseller; and Body Work: The Radical Power of Personal Narrative.
William Fedkenheuer
Violin, Miró Quartet
William Fedkenheuer is widely respected as a performer, teacher, and consultant. Uniquely drawing on two decades of experience onstage and off as a member of three internationally renowned string quartets (The Miró, Fry Street, Borromeo Quartets), he dedicates his life to serving others through performance, teaching, personal and professional development.
Growing up in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, William became the youngest member of The Calgary Fiddlers in 1983 and was named a Canadian national fiddle champion in 1989 before making his solo debut with the Calgary Philharmonic in 1994.…
Adolfo “Dolfu” Fernandez
Asturias, Spain
fiddle
Dolfu R. Fernández began playing the violin in 1989 and has been an active part of the Asturian music scene for more than 25 years, being a member of the so-called “folk generation.” He has studied and researched traditional and folk music from Asturias, and is at the forefront of the resurgence of fiddle music from that region.…
Cathy Fink
Cathy Fink is a GRAMMY Award winning multi-instrumentalist and co-artistic director of Strathmore’s UkeFest with Marcy Marxer. She loves teaching all levels and has created a series of courses on playing Clawhammer Ukulele, kin to the old-time banjo style. Cathy has taught at countless music camps including Puget Sound Guitar Workshop, Midwest Ukefest, The Augusta Workshops, and Palm Springs Ukefest.…
Luke Fleming
Viola, Pacifica Quartet guest
Praised by The Philadelphia Inquirer for his “glowing refinement,” violist Luke Fleming‘s performances have been described by The Strad as “confident and expressive…playing with uncanny precision,” and lauded by Gramophone for their “superlative technical and artistic execution.” Festival appearances include the Marlboro Music School and Festival, the Steans Institute at Ravinia, Perlman Music Program, the Norfolk and Great Lakes Chamber Music Festivals, the Melbourne Festival, Bravo!Vail, and Festival Mozaic.…
Mary Flower
Guitar
Mary Flower’s immense finger picking guitar and lap-slide prowess is soulful and meter-perfect, a deft blend of the inventive, the dexterous and the mesmerizing. Her supple honey-and-whiskey voice provides the perfect melodic accompaniment to each song’s story.
Danielle Fodor
Faculty
Danielle Fodor is a visual artist who works with the communities and individuals to create vibrant visions of today and tomorrow. She has worked with hundreds of volunteers to paint murals and public plazas, designed giant puppets and banners, and written and illustrated indie comics and zines. Her work transforms people and places by celebrating common ground, expressing unspoken emotions, and nourishing the connections between people, place, and the natural world.…
Foghorn String Band
The Foghorn Stringband is the present day gold standard for real-deal hard-hitting genuine old-time American string band music, with nine albums, thousands of shows, over 15 years of touring under their belts, and an entirely new generation of roots musicians following their lead.
Trevor Ford
Vocal Accompanist
Bass
Trevor is from Bend, Oregon where he grew up enjoying the outdoors, caring for the goats on his family farm, and honing his skills in the performing arts. He’s had a passion for music from a young age, and would fall asleep to the sound of his parents practicing cello and piano. Eventually, he picked up violin and cello to study classical music.…
Bruce Forman
Faculty
Guitar
Deep immersion in American culture inspires Forman to contribute to the traditions that he draws from. Reunion! (the newest project) revisits the famed Poll Winners sessions with cohorts John Clayton and Jeff Hamilton, playing instruments owned by Barney Kessel, Ray Brown and Shelly Manne; Formanism (his trio project); original works like The Red Guitar; his high-rated podcast, GuitarWank; Cow Bop and the “road challenges” down historic byways like Route 66; JazzMasters Workshop; Junkyard Duo; GrumpsTV (a fifty episode YouTube variety show during the lockdown), the popular ‘first chorus of the day’ series on Instagram…these are only the latest answers to the endless question that underlies Bruce Forman’s creativity. …
Preston Frank
with Kevin Wimmer
Louisiana
button accordion, fiddle
Preston Frank’s musical journey was deeply rooted in the intimate setting of his family’s home, where the rich sounds of Zydeco and Creole music filled the air. His early exposure to music, a tradition passed down through generations, came through his father and uncles, who were all musicians, forming the warm and traditional bedrock of his initial inspiration.…
Gwen Franz
Program Manager: Chamber Music, Choro and Jazz Port Townsend
Gwen Franz joined the Centrum team in 2023 as the Program Manager of Jazz, Chamber Music, and Brazilian Choro. She brings many years of experience as a classical violist, soloist, chamber musician, orchestral member, recording artist and concert producer. Gwen discovered Fiddle Tunes at Centrum in 2007, then became a regular attender of the Choro Workshop in 2010, and in 2019, participated in Jazz Port Townsend.…
Andrea Freed
STG DANCE This Manager
Andrea Freed, born and raised in the greater Seattle area in Washington state, started dancing ballet at the age of four and fell in love with it. In 2017, Andrea earned her Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) degree, magna cum laude from Cornish College of the Arts in Seattle, where she studied primarily ballet and modern dance.…
Ellika Frisell
Sweden
with Rafael Sida, percussion
Ellika Frisell was born 1953 and brought up in Stockholm. She later moved to Delsbo, a small village in the North of Sweden, where she cultivated vegetables and worked in a factory. It was during that time, in the middle of the 70´s, that Ellika began playing the fiddle and became village fiddler and dance musician.…
Bryan Fry
Afternoon Workshop Faculty, Creative Coordinator
Bryan Fry earned his MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Idaho. He is the cofounder of Blood Orange Review and currently teaches at Washington State University. His work has appeared in various publications, including Brevity, Front Porch, The South Dakota Review, and The Blue Mountain Review.
Stu Fuchs
Past Faculty
Stu Fuchs is a heart centered, award winning musician and teaching artist. His passion is helping others learn to play music with greater ease, freedom and joy. Over a 25 year career, Stu has played music across the globe: Django Reinhardt’s gypsy jazz with symphony orchestras, presenting workshops at ukulele festivals on three continents, facilitating drumming & music improvisation at yoga retreat centers for everyone from children to college music students, prison inmates to Fortune 500 CEOs.…
CMarie Fuhrman
Past Faculty
CMarie Fuhrman is the author of Camped Beneath the Dam: Poems (Floodgate 2020) and co-editor of Native Voices: Indigenous Poetry, Craft, and Conversations (Tupelo 2019).
Tia Fuller
Faculty
When Grammy-nominated Mack Avenue recording artist, composer, and bandleader Tia Fuller picks up her saxophone, something amazing happens. Blending technical brilliance, melodic creativity, and the performing precision drawn from both her academic and stage experience, Fuller is a force to be reckoned with in the worlds of jazz, pop, R&B, and more.
Tess Gallagher
Past Faculty
Tess Gallagher’s eleventh volume of poetry, Is, Is Not, was published May 2019 by Graywolf Press. Midnight Lantern: New and Selected Poems, also from Graywolf, is the most comprehensive offering of her poems to date.
Tess Gallagher
Morning Workshop Faculty
Tess Gallagher, the author of eleven books of poetry, lives and writes in her hometown of Port Angeles, Washington, and in her cottage in Co. Sligo, Ireland. She is the only American to have been honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award for her poetry from the Foundation of Rome, which she received in 2023. Her most recent poetry collection Is, Is Not, published by Graywolf press, won the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Award. …
Roberta Gamberini
Faculty
Vocal
Born and raised in Turin, Italy, to music loving parents (who had actually first met at a jazz concert), Roberta Gambarini grew up constantly listening to her father’s record collection.
Her first vocal inspiration was Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald , but she soon discovered Sarah Vaughan, Billie Holiday, and Carmen McRae, as well as gospel and blues artists such as Mahalia Jackson and Bessie Smith.…
Simin Ganatra
Violin, Pacifica Quartet
Simin Ganatra, a Grammy-award winning violinist, has won wide recognition for her performances throughout the United States and abroad. She has been described by critics as an “excellent and unique violinist” and heralded for “creating a miraculous sense of flow and otherworldly beauty.” She has performed in such prestigious venues as Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall, the Corcoran Gallery, and Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall.…
Luna Garcia
Faculty
Luna Garcia started dancing Folklorico at age seven with the dance group Joyas Mestizas. In 2007, she started teaching with Joyas Mestizas, and she started dancing with Bailadores de Bronce. Dancing and teaching with both organizations, she has been able to promote and present the beauty of Folklorico throughout the Seattle area. She has taken classes and workshops with renowned Folklorico teachers such as Jose Tena from New Mexico State University and Samuel Cortez from Los Lupeños, San Jose.
Sara Gazarek
Faculty
Vocalist
Born and raised in Seattle, WA, GRAMMY Award® winning jazz vocalist Sara Gazarek reigns as one of the most creative voices of her generation, and one “who may well turn out to be the next important jazz singer” (Los Angeles Times). Collaborating with jazz legends Fred Hersch, Billy Childs, Kurt Elling, and more, and with 6 critically-acclaimed albums under her belt at the age of 40, Gazarek often tours internationally as a soloist/band leader, and as a co-founder of the vocal collective, säje, whose debut album earned a GRAMMY Award® for Best Arrangement Instruments and Vocals.…
Alice Gerrard
North Carolina
Simply put, Alice Gerrard is a talent of legendary status. In a career spanning some 50 years, she has known, learned from, and performed with many of the old-time and bluegrass greats and has in turn earned worldwide respect for her own important contributions to the music. Alice is particularly known for her groundbreaking collaboration with Appalachian singer Hazel Dickens during the 1960s and ’70s.…
Joshua Gindele
Cello, Miró Quartet
Cellist Joshua Gindele, a founding member of the Miró Quartet, began his cello studies at the age of 3 playing a viola his teacher had fitted with an endpin. As cellist for the Miró, Josh has taken first prizes at several national and international competitions including the Banff International String Quartet Competition and the Naumburg Chamber Music Competition.…
Jennifer Givhan
Morning Workshop Faculty
Jennifer Givhan is a Mexican-American and Indigenous poet and novelist from the Southwestern desert and the recipient of poetry fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and PEN/Rosenthal Emerging Voices.
She is the author of five full-length poetry collections and three novels, most recently Belly to the Brutal (Wesleyan University Press) and novel River Woman, River Demon (Blackstone Publishing) which draw from her practice of brujería.…
Michael Glynn
Faculty
Bass
Born in Seattle, Michael Glynn began playing bass at the age of 11. Beginning his jazz studies with former Count Basie and Louis Armstrong bassist Buddy Catlett, Michael starting working professionally while still a student at Garfield High School, where he played for four years in that school’s renowned jazz band. After two years in engineering school at Columbia University in New York City, Michael returned to Seattle where he graduated summa cum laude in 2001 with a Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Music in Jazz Studies from the University of Washington, where he studied under Doug Miller and Barry Lieberman.…
Justin Golden
Faculty
With roots in the Mississippi Delta, Chicago, and the Piedmont of Virginia, Richmond-based guitarist and songwriter Justin Golden’s origins are deeply vested in the blues.
Rick Good
Faculty
One of the founders of the famous string band, The Hotmud Family, Rick Good is an accomplished guitarist, banjo player, singer and songwriter. A performer of traditional and original music, Good’s career has spanned nearly four decades.
Katy Goodman
Senior Director of Development
Katy Goodman (Senior Director of Development) has spent her career as a passionate advocate for the power of the arts, working to create meaningful community connections and celebrate diversity and beauty through cultural expression. After graduating from Oberlin College, she spent two decades as a non-profit leader and fundraiser in Houston, Texas, where she co-founded and was director of the creative youth development organization Workshop Houston.…
Wycliffe Gordon
Faculty
Trombone
Wycliffe Gordon’s busy schedule encompasses performing, composing, arranging and recording. He is the recipient of many awards: He has been named him “Trombonist of the Year” 12 times The Jazz Journalists Association, and “Best Trombone” five of the past six years by the Downbeat Critics Poll.
In addition to his solo career, Wycliffe tours regularly leading his quintet.…
Eric Greenwell
Program Manager for Writing
Eric Greenwell (he/him) has worked for many years with talented teams to preserve both natural and cultural spaces across the Intermountain and Pacific Northwest so communities in these regions can thrive. Community in this context means communities of people, artists, plants, and wildlife, and he carries a particular affinity for writing as a medium that makes community stronger, for its potential to convey honestly and unflinchingly diverse perspectives.…
David Grisman
Special Guest Instructor
In the course of a career that has spanned more than six decades, David Grisman has had an immeasurable impact on American acoustic music. A trail-blazing instrumentalist, composer, bandleader, and creator of a living musical genre, David has influenced contemporary string players from Bluegrass to Pop and Jazz. We are delighted that he will be joining us on Saturday May 17th to present a workshop on arranging, and to participate in a moderated conversation about his music and his vital work as a conservator of string traditions.…
Zoe Guigueno
Upright Bass
Zoe Guigueno (GIG-an-oh) is a bassist and songwriter headquartered in New York City. While jazz trained, she can also often be found playing klezmer, Americana, or indie-rock. She has performed with Steve Martin, busked in a pink gorilla costume, and played upright bass while whitewater rafting. Her most recent solo album, We Were Radar Stations, came out on Fiddlehead Records in October 2022.
Randy Halberstadt
Vocal Accompanist and Music Theory
Piano
Randy Halberstadt has been a major figure on the Pacific Northwest jazz scene for many years. A pianist, arranger, composer, lyricist, and author, Randy enjoys an international performing career playing with musicians at the top of their game, including Herb Ellis, Terry Gibbs, Buddy de Franco, Matt Wilson, Pete Christlieb, Bobby Shew, Joe LaBarbera, and many others.…
Jon Hamar
Faculty
Bass
Jon Hamar is a versatile bassist who is comfortable in virtually any musical situation. Born in Kennewick, Washington he earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Classical Double Bass Performance from Eastern Washington University and a Master’s degree in Jazz and Contemporary Media from the Eastman School of Music.
In 2001 Jon relocated to Seattle and was busy as a freelance bassist.…
Jeff Hamilton
Faculty
Drums
Versatile drummer Jeff Hamilton brings originality to every group he performs with, and it’s one of the things that makes him constantly in demand, whether for recording, performing with his trio, or co-leading the Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra. In addition to his many recordings with Ray Brown, Jeff has been on nearly 200 recordings with artists such as Natalie Cole, Diana Krall, Milt Jackson, Rosemary Clooney, Barbara Streisand, Mel Torme, John Pizzarelli, and Benny Carter.…
John Hansen
Vocal Accompaniment
Piano
John Hansen is one of the most in-demand jazz pianists in the Northwest. A studied and musical ensemble player with a strong melodic vocabulary, John has always been recognizable for a unique personal voice. His performance history includes top US venues as well as tours in France, Japan, Korea, Eastern Europe, Central Asia, Russia, and Central America.…
Tatiana Hargreaves
Faculty
Over the past decade, Tatiana Hargreaves has been on the forefront of an up and coming generation of old time, bluegrass and new acoustic musicians. From placing first at the Clifftop Appalachian Fiddle Contest, to her bluegrass fiddling on Laurie Lewis’ GRAMMY-nominated album The Hazel And Alice Sessions, Hargreaves shows a musical fluency that flows between old time and bluegrass worlds with ease.
Derrick Harriell
Past Faculty
Derrick Harriell is the Ottilie Schillig Associate Professor of English and African American Studies at the University of Mississippi.
Austin Hartman
Violin, Pacifica Quartet
Grammy-award winning violinist, Austin Hartman, has distinguished himself as a chamber musician, soloist and educator with performances throughout the United States and abroad that critics have hailed as a “top flight…masterclass in chamber music.” His performances have been featured in venues throughout North America, Europe, Asia and Africa that include Alice Tully Hall, Carnegie Hall, the Library of Congress, the Kennedy Center, Wigmore Hall, Jazz at Lincoln Center, and the Baroque Art Hall in Seoul.…
Terrance Hayes
Morning Workshop Faculty
Terrance Hayes’ publications, So To Speak, a collection of poems, and Watch Your Language, a collection of visual and lyric essays, were concurrently released in 2023. His honors include the National Book Award for poetry, the Poetry Foundation Pegasus Award for Poetry Criticism and fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the MacArthur Foundation. He is a distinguished Silver Professor at New York University.
John Haywood
Kentucky
banjo and fiddle
John Haywood is a banjo-playing tattoo and folk artist in Whitesburg, Kentucky. He owns and operates the Parlor Room Tattoo and Art Gallery – a tattoo shop that draws visitors from all over the world to Letcher County into the far southeastern corner of Kentucky. “Many come for a tattoo, and some to experience a little bit of our culture,” Haywood says of his shop.…
Savannah Hensel
Program Assistant: Youth
As an enrolled Haida tribal member, mother of three, wife, and golden doodle mamma Savannah is a verified NW boss lady. She grew up between Port Townsend, where her dad’s family lived since the 1960s, and Seattle’s Native Alaskan diaspora on Capitol Hill. Over the past 20 years in PT she has managed restaurants, worked in healthcare, run for county office on a substantive progressive platform, and was sponsored by the local Democrats as a fellow in a state democratic leadership program.…
Trey Hensley
Guitar
Trey Hensley is a GRAMMY®-nominated musician and singer/songwriter who was voted the 2023 Guitar Player of the Year by the International Bluegrass Music Association. He has been referred to as “Nashville’s hottest young player” by Acoustic Guitar magazine. In addition to a storied solo career and a duo career with award-winning resophonic guitarist Rob Ickes (NPR has called them “two musical phenoms”), Trey has worked with a diverse list of artists including Johnny Cash, June Carter Cash, Marty Stuart, Earl Scruggs, Dolly Parton, Taj Mahal, Tommy Emmanuel, Rodney Crowell, Old Crow Medicine Show, Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Little Feat, Leftover Salmon and REO Speedwagon.…
DaShawn and Wendy Hickman
Wendy and DaShawn Hickman are a married couple of sweetheart musicians, rooted in gospel roots and soulful tradition. They share a home in Mt. Airy, North Carolina.
DaShawn is one of today’s foremost players of Sacred Steel, a blues-gospel tradition started in the Pentecostal-Holiness churches of the 1930s. He grew up hearing the pedal steel in the tiny House of God church his family attended in Mt.…
Avery Hill
Avery Hill is a life-long musician, trained educator, and performing singer-songwriter. She began teaching music in 2013, and quickly became a staple instructor of the Portland (OR) ‘ukulele community. Over the years, she has led ‘ukulele classes, workshops, and jams that focus on building valuable skills, deepening oneʻs sense of musicality, and appreciating the place of music within our greater culture and history.…
Rich Hill
Rich Hill is from Wyoming. He began learning Gaelic when he was seven years old from a Scottish immigrant who had come to the Rocky Mountains. He met a “new family,” the Gaels of Vancouver, in 1989. He has been heavily immersed in Gaelic since that time, teaching and singing in Scottish Gaelic. He is a founder of Slighe nan Gaidheal and Féis Seattle, and is also well-known in Seattle’s early music scene.
The Tennessee Hillbuddies
Tennessee
fiddle, banjo, guitar, singing
The Tennessee Hillbuddies like their stringband music in the traditional style: rhythmic, rowdy, and all but refined. They are about good music and good times, and their performances are known for causing hats to fly. The band is comprised of Henry Barnes, Conner Vlietstra, and Trevor Holder.
Henry Barnes, originally from Washington Courthouse, OH, is now residing in Carter County, TN.…
Mary Hilts
Program Manager: Red Hot Strings, Acoustic Blues, Development
Mary Hilts (Program Manager, Red Hot Strings, Acoustic Blues, Development) joined the Centrum staff in 2003. Mary manages Red Hot Strings and the Acoustic Blues programs; and assists with resource development and the Board of Directors. A graduate of Washington State University, Mary also completed Jazz Studies at Shoreline Community College, and Los Angeles Harbor College.…
Daniel Ho
Past Faculty
From his simple beginnings in Honolulu to his life amid the hustle and bustle of Los Angeles, Daniel Ho has worked over the years as a musician, producer, singer/songwriter, arranger, composer, engineer, and record company owner. The most compelling of these roles has been as a six-time GRAMMY Award winning producer, featured slack key guitarist, and artist in the “Best Hawaiian Music Album,” “Best Pop Instrumental Album,” and “Best World Music Album” categories.
Gary Hobbs
Vocal Accompaniment
Drums
Drummer Gary Hobbs is a native of the Pacific Northwest and lives in Vancouver, WA. He has played professionally for over 4 decades and appears on over 60 recordings. Gary played with The Stan Kenton Orchestra from 1975 through 1977. Through the years Gary has played with Randy Brecker, Bud Shank, George Cables, Ken Peplowski, Pete Christlieb, Greta Matassa, Anita O’Day, Dan Siegel, Glen Moore, The New York Voices, Eddie Harris and many more.…
Brandon Hobson
Faculty
Dr. Brandon Hobson is a 2022 Guggenheim Fellow. He received his Ph.D from Oklahoma State University. His novel, Where The Dead Sit Talking, was a finalist for the National Book Award, winner of the Reading The West Award, and longlisted for the Dublin Literary Award, among other distinctions.
Jayy Hopp
Guitar, Percussion
Jayy Hopp was born in Lagrange and started playing music with Gospel (drumming at first, until his cousin formally introduced him to the guitar). Gospel and R&B music was very influential in his formative years. The guitar grooves and distinctive sounds always caught his ear. As he aged, Jayy Hopp expanded his musical vocabulary. He started listening closely to Jimi Hendrix playing style, which led him to Buddy Guy, Albert Collins, Jimmy Dawkins, Johnny “Guitar” Watson, Son Seals, Hubert Sumlin, Robert Ward (his uncle) and Ike Turner.…
Ravi Howard
Past Faculty
Ravi Howard is the author of two novels, Like, Trees, Walking and Driving the King (HarperCollins). In addition to being selected as a finalist for the Hemingway Foundation/PEN Award, Like, Trees, Walking won the Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence.
Stephen Hull
Support Guitar
Born in 1999, a native of Racine, Wisconsin, Stephen Hull started playing blues at age 14 and never stopped, taking cues from Albert King and B.B. King as he developed his sweet, soulful guitar sound. Balancing that with his absolutely stellar lead vocals and infectiously buoyant personality, Stephen has been rising fast in the blues clubs of Chicago and venues across southeastern Wisconsin.…
Tessa Hulls
Morning Workshop Faculty
Tessa Hulls is an artist, writer, and adventurer who is equally likely to disappear into the backcountry or a research library. Her work has appeared in The Washington Post, Atlas Obscura, Adventure Journal, and others, and she received the 2021 Washington Artist Trust Arts Innovator Award. Her debut graphic memoir, Feeding Ghosts, traces three generations of women in her family against a backdrop of Chinese history and diaspora to explore the complex ways that mothers and daughters both damage and save one another.…
Kathryn Hunt
Afternoon Workshop Faculty
Kathryn Hunt is a poet and writer and makes her home in Port Townsend, Washington on the coast of the Salish Sea. She is author of two poetry collections, Long Way Through Ruin and Seed Wheel and two chapbooks, The Country I Come From and She Who Walks the Earth.…
Benjamin Hunter
Mandolin
Benjamin Hunter is an award-winning multi-instrumentalist, composer, community activist, social entrepreneur, and educator. Benjamin’s work explores the intersections of music & art, community, policy, and culture.
Judy Hyman
New York State
with Jeff Claus, guitar and banjo uke
From Ithaca, NY, land of lakes, gorges, waterfalls and colleges, Judy is a co-founding member of the alt-trad band, The Horse Flies, who toured extensively throughout the U.S., Canada, and Europe (including appearances on eTown, Prairie Home Companion, All Things Considered, World Café, and Mountain Stage), and recorded many albums, including releases on MCA and Rounder Records.…
Jourdan Imani Keith
Past Faculty
Jourdan Imani Keith is Seattle’s 2019- 2022 Civic Poet. Featured in Forbes and on NPR, her Orion Magazine essays, Desegregating Wilderness and At Risk appear in the Best American Science and Nature Writing Anthology, as well as text books.…
Tyler Jackson
Tenor Banjo
Tyler Jackson is a world renown tenor banjoist and upright bassist. Under the tutelage of Buddy Griffin, Tyler quickly learned the ukulele, tenor banjo, and electric bass. Tyler went on to study the double bass at the University of North Texas under Lynn Seaton and began to fine-tune his skills as a professional bassist.
Jaime Jaynes
Marketing & Communications Director
Jaime Jaynes (Marketing & Communications Director) was born and raised in Port Townsend, attended Centrum’s Youth Art Camps as a high school student, and played the string bass in Port Townsend High School’s Chamber & Symphony Orchestras. She has a bachelor’s degree in fine art from the School at the Art Institute of Chicago. For the past ten years, she has been working at Nike as a Brand Marketing Director focusing on the omnichannel growth of their women’s business.…
Hubby Jenkins
Banjo
Hubby Jenkins is a talented multi-instrumentalist who endeavors to share his love and knowledge of old-time American music.
Christine Jensen
Faculty, Big Band Director
Saxophone
Canadian Saxophonist and composer Christine Jensen has led a distinct voice to the creative jazz scene for the last twenty-five years with her large and small ensembles. She is set to release her third jazz orchestra album Harbour (2024) on Justin-Time Records. It features her Montreal-based orchestra, along with guest soloists NY-based Ingrid Jensen on trumpet and electronics, Gary Versace on piano, Chet Doxas on tenor saxophone, Jon Wikan on drums, and and Montreal-based Steve Raegele on guitar.…
Toni Jensen
Morning Workshop Faculty
Toni Jensen is the author of Carry: A Memoir of Survival on Stolen Land, a Dayton Peace Prize finalist and a New York Times Editors’ Choice book. Jensen’s essays have appeared in journals and magazines such as Orion, Catapult and Ecotone. She also is the author of the story collection From the Hilltop.…
Alejandro Jimenez
Faculty
ALEJANDRO JIMENEZ is a nationally and internationally recognized poet from Colima, Mexico. He was featured in TIME Magazine as one of 80 Mexican artists shaping contemporary Mexican culture. His work, and story, are the subject of a short documentary for the PBS series, American Masters: In The Making, which highlights emerging cultural icons.…
Lakota John
Slide Guitar
Lakota John is a musician, producer and songwriter from Southeastern, North Carolina. Influenced by his dads music collection, he picked up the guitar at 7 years old and learned to play left-handed as well as slide guitar in standard tuning. Lakota John blends styles of Folk, Blues, Rock & Jazz with various instruments while mixing in part of his Indigenous heritage with sounds of the Native American flute.…
Matt Jones
Program Assistant: Chamber Music, Choro, Jazz Port Townsend
A passionate advocate for music, Matt has been a lifelong avid listener, collector, and radio host. A former salmon and herring fishery biologist and longtime Alaska resident, he has worked for the National Park Service, the US Forest Service, and the State of Alaska across a large swath of the northern state. Studying geology at UMass Amherst during a long tenure as a New England resident, and later in the northwest as a WWU graduate student, Matt caught the infectious Alaskan daydream lurking in Bellingham, Washington and made his way north.…
Rhys Jones
Virginia
fiddle
Rhys Jones has been playing traditional Appalachian, French-Canadian and Irish fiddle music for 30 years. Born in Chicago, he began his fiddling at age 7 in the fertile environment of the Chicago Barn Dance Company. Soon after, his family moved to southern West Virginia where he learned from the older generation of fiddlers, including Ernie Carpenter, Melvin Wine, Glen Smith and Wilson Douglas.…
Reverend Robert Jones
Guitar
Rev. Robert Jones, Sr. is a native Detroiter and an inspirational storyteller and musician celebrating the history, humor and power of American Roots music. His deep love for traditional African American and American traditional music is shared in live performances that interweave timeless stories with original and traditional songs.
Bettina Judd
Morning Workshop Faculty
Bettina Judd is an interdisciplinary writer, artist and performer whose research focus is on Black women’s creative production and use of visual art, literature, and music to develop feminist thought. Her book Feelin: Creative Practice, Pleasure, and Black Feminist Thought (Northwestern University Press, December 2022) argues that Black women’s creative production is feminist knowledge production produced by registers of affect she calls “feelin.” She is currently Associate Professor of Gender, Women, and Sexuality Studies at the University of Washington.…
Aiden Kane
American violist Aiden Kane has performed in North America, Europe, and Asia as a current member of the Viano Quartet, First Prize Laureates of the 2019 Banff International String Quartet Competition.
After leaving violin for the dark side, Aiden first studied viola with Daniel Foster through the National Symphony Orchestra’s Youth Fellowship Program.…
Shari Kane
Guitar
Shari started playing guitar at the age of five. By the early 1970’s she had become a devoted blues fan, and learned how to play fingerstyle blues on the acoustic guitar.
Mara Kaye
Faculty
Referred to by Jazz Lives as “one of New York’s great gifts to the world,” blues and jazz vocalist Mara Kaye is “like some lost pocket of the blues that had never been explored in the old days, all wrapped up in a ball of 21st-century Brooklyn-bred attitude.” For over a decade she has traveled internationally and throughout the US, sharing legendary stages with champions of the genre, singing beloved songs of the past with a deep passion and respect for its original storytellers.
Aaron and Nicole Keim
Co-Artistic Directors
The Quiet American is husband and wife duo, Aaron and Nicole Keim. In Hood River, Oregon, they live an artistic life: making music, building musical instruments, teaching music, writing books, crafting folk art,and raising their 10-year-old son Henry. Their connection to folk tradition is undeniable, even as they find new ways to sing old songs and incorporate music and art into their teaching and performing.…
Johnaye Kendrick
Faculty
Vocalist
Johnaye Kendrick is a 2-time Grammy® Award-winning vocalist, arranger, composer, orchestrator, and multi-instrumentalist whose work bridges innovation and tradition. With a Master of Music from Loyola University and an Artist Diploma from the Herbie Hancock Institute, Johnaye brings her dynamic artistry to both original compositions and reimagined jazz classics. A committed educator, she serves as Professor of Music at Cornish College of the Arts in Seattle.…
Bridge Hill Kennedy
Faculty
Dr. Kennedy (he/him/his), attended his first Sacred Harp singing in June of 2002. This life changing event came about when he was invited to accompany his sister-in-law to a singing for a commissioned painting (“All Day Singing and Dinner on the Grounds” by Bethanne Hill, 2003, commissioned by Max Berueffy).
Raymond Kennedy
Finance Manager
Raymond Kennedy (Finance Manager) joined Centrum in 2020, having served as a senior finance executive in companies large and small, including Procter & Gamble, Fidelity Investments, and more recently Senior Services of Island County. Ray has a Bachelor of Science degree in Accounting from Binghamton University in New York. He moved to the Pacific Northwest in 2016 and now resides in Port Townsend Washington.
Rachel Kessler
Faculty
Rachel Kessler is a writer, artist, and educator in dᶻidᶻəlalič. She co-founded interactive poetry collaborations Typing Explosion and Vis-à-Vis Society, and collective Wa Na Wari, a residential reclamation project centering Black art and media in Seattle’s Central District. …
Junah King
Operations Associate/Assistant Registrar
As Assistant Registrar for Centrum, Junah combines her passion for the arts with her strong organizational skills to support Centrum programs. Known for her attention to detail and approachable demeanor, Junah strives for a seamless experience for participants by managing registrations and program logistics with care.
Outside of her role, Junah is an aspiring event coordinator with a love for designing and meaningful experiences.…
Rex Kinney
STG Associate Director of Education
Rex Kinney (he/him) is the Associate Director of Education overseeing education initiatives and productions at Seattle Theatre Group. He is a dance educator, producer, choreographer and teaching artist. His goals are to be able to highlight the vibrant stories of our artists and provide a space that all learners can discover an environment that is surrounded by community, imagination and creativity.…
Valerie Kirchhoff
Voice
Valerie Kirchhoff (aka “Miss Jubilee”) is a vocalist and bandleader born and raised in St. Louis. Valerie grew up singing in church and school choirs, and discovered a passion for early jazz and blues while in her teens. She formed her first band in 2007 and has been a staple of the St. Louis music scene ever since.…
Caleb Klauder
Faculty
Raised on Orcas Island, WA, then on to college and the 30 years to follow in Oregon, and then back to Washington again, Caleb is a true north-westerner. Yet
his maternal family roots lay in East Tennessee. These deep family roots contribute to his music through old memories, bringing you the strong singing and spirited attitude that gives his music a cutting and sweet edge. Caleb has written many songs, some that are performed by others and some that are becoming standards at jam sessions in the bluegrass scenes across the US, Canada, and in Europe.
Wolfram Koessel
Cello, American String Quartet
Since his Carnegie Hall debut in 1994, Wolfram Koessel (cello) has performed as a chamber musician, recitalist and soloist throughout the world. The Strad praised his “exceptionally attractive cello playing.” As a soloist he has performed concertos throughout the United States as well as with Japan’s Osaka Symphony Orchestra and orchestras in Germany and South America.…
Victoria Kolasinski
Victoria “Viggy” Kolasinski is a fingerstyle ukulele player/teacher born and raised on Long Island, New York. Under the username @jiggywithviggy, Viggy makes fun and kinetic ukulele tutorials on her social media pages and has grown a cumulative audience of over 300k followers! She’s been playing the uke for 10 years and teaching private lessons, workshops, live shows, and online for four of those years, bringing with her a youthful energy and her silly stage presence.…
Steve Kovalcheck
Faculty
Guitar
Guitarist/composer/educator Steve Kovalcheck has a diverse musical background. Hailing from Nashville, Tennessee, Kovalcheck grew up in a rich musical environment. While his roots are in hard rock, he became interested in jazz in his late teens, and has gone on to work with well known artists including Jeff Hamilton, Joey DeFrancesco, Terrell Stafford, Grammy Award winner Howard Levy, Jeff Coffin, Pat Bianchi, Lewis Nash, Danny Gottlieb, Adam Nussbaum, Chris Potter, Nicholas Payton, and Ingrid Jensen, to name a few.…
Austin Krieg
Lead Production Technician
Austin Krieg is a lifelong Port Townsend local who first started working at Centrum in his senior year of high school. Austin has worked professionally in many different roles both on stage and backstage between Key City Public Theatre, Port Townsend Highschool, and a few shows in Seattle with the Production Alliance. You may catch Austin at Centrum doing anything from lights and sound to video and stage building.…
Tom Krueger
New York
Social dance (with Caitlin Romtvedt)
Tom Krueger (aka TK) is a filmmaker and fiddler living in New York’s Hudson Valley. Currently the executive director of Tempo Kingston Performing Arts Center. His love for all styles of music and dance runs deep, evident by the fact that he’s often one of the last stragglers out on the dance floor.
Abe Lagrimas, Jr.
Past Faculty
Abe Lagrimas, Jr. is a musician, composer, educator, and author who plays the drums, vibraphone, ukulele, and studied at Berklee College of Music. He competed in the highly prestigious Thelonious Monk International Jazz Drums Competition and has worked with many different artists such as Eric Marienthal, Eric Reed, Kamasi Washington, Katisse Buckingham, Lalo Schifrin, Barbara Morrison, Michelle Coltrane, Jake Shimabukuro, Kenny Endo, and continues to be an in-demand session musician.…
Stephanie Land
Afternoon Workshop Faculty
Stephanie Land is the New York Times bestselling author of “MAID: Hard Work, Low Pay, and a Mother’s Will to Survive,” called “a testimony…worth listening to,” by the New York Times and inspiration for the Netflix series “Maid,” and its sequel “CLASS: A Memoir of Motherhood, Hunger, and Higher Education.” Her work has been featured in The New York Times, The Guardian, The Atlantic, and many other outlets.…
Susan Landgraf
Afternoon Workshop Faculty
Susan Landgraf is a poet and journalist. She has published more than 400 poems, essays, and articles in numerous journals and magazines. Most recently her poems have appeared, or are forthcoming, in Prairie Schooner, Poet Lore, Nimrod, Calyx, The Bellingham Review, Literary Mama, Kestrel, Margie, and The Sow’s Ear. She is the author of What We Bury Changes the Ground (Tebot Bach, 2017) as well as The Inspired Poet (Two Sylvias Press, 2019), a book of writing exercises.…
Sasha LaPointe
Morning Workshop Faculty
Sasha LaPointe is from the Upper Skagit and Nooksack Indian Tribe. Native to the Pacific Northwest, she draws inspiration from her coastal heritage as well as her life in the city.
Judy LaPrade
Piano
Judy LaPrade is a life-long musician and teacher. She grew up in West Virginia where she played and sang in church. By junior high school she led and accompanied the patient choir at the local state mental hospital, then as an adult took the Blues into schools and music therapy groups for people with developmental challenges.…
John Largess
Viola, Miró Quartet
Violist John Largess began his studies in Boston at age 12 in the public schools, studying with Michael Zaretsky of the Boston Symphony, and later as a student of Michael Tree at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. In 1995, he graduated from Yale University to join the Colorado String Quartet as interim violist with whom he toured the United States and Canada teaching and concertizing.…
Nathan Gourley and Laura Feddersen
Massachusetts
fiddle, guitar
Laura and Nathan are two of America’s most highly regarded young players of traditional Irish music. Their playing is steeped in lifelong study of the Irish tradition, and is at same time colored by their American roots. They have developed a unique style of twin fiddling, sometimes playing in taut unison, sometimes exploring chordal harmonies and rhythmic and melodic variations.…
Chaz Leary
Washboard
Though comfortable in all forms of our diverse American musical heritage, Washboard Chaz Leary has achieved dominance and international recognition in acoustic country blues.
Kate Lebo
Morning Workshop Faculty
Kate Lebo’s first collection of nonfiction, The Book of Difficult Fruit (FSG), won the 2022 Washington State Book Award and was named a best book of the year by NPR, The Atlantic, New York magazine, Electric Literature, and The Globe and Mail. She is the author of the cookbook Pie School (Sasquatch Books), the poetry chapbook Seven Prayers to Cathy McMorris Rodgers (Entre Rios Books), and co-editor with Samuel Ligon of Pie & Whiskey: Writers Under the Influence of Butter and Booze (Sasquatch Books).…
Jeff Lederer
Faculty
Saxophone
Jeff Lederer is a Saxophonist/clarinetist/composer who has been included in the Downbeat Critics’ and Readers’ poll each year since 2014. He leads ensembles including the “Shakers n’ Bakers”, “Sunwatcher Quartet” and “Brooklyn Blowhards” and is the founder and director of the Visionary Youth Orchestra. Mr. Lederer also plays in the groups of Matt Wilson, Bobby Sanabria, Allison Miller, Jimmy Bosch and many others. …
Corey Ledet
Faculty
Corey Ledet was born and raised in Houston, Texas, but spent his summers in Parks, Louisiana immersed at all times in the Creole culture. He learned everything he could so he could incorporate the culture in all areas of his life – the traditions, the food, and most importantly, the music. His love for the Creole/Zydeco music was instant and hard for him to ignore.…
Bryan Lee
Violin, Dover Quartet
Bryan Lee is a violinist with the Dover Quartet, the Penelope P. Watkins Ensemble in Residence at the Curtis Institute of Music. Mr. Lee has performed as a soloist with the Philadelphia Orchestra and the Delaware, Lansdowne, and Temple University symphony orchestras, among others. He was awarded the bronze medal at the 2005 Stulberg International String Competition and won second prize at the 2004 Kingsville Young Performers Competition.…
Julianne Lee
Viola, Dover Quartet
Julianne Lee joins the Dover Quartet, the Penelope P. Watkins Ensemble in Residence at the Curtis Institute of Music, as its violist in September 2023. She has forged a remarkable career as both a violinist and violist, frequently appearing as a soloist, chamber musician, and orchestral player. She holds the position of assistant principal second violinist at the Boston Symphony Orchestra and has been a member of the BSO violin section since 2006, serving as acting assistant concertmaster from 2013 to 2015.…
Ethan Leinwand
Piano
Barrelhouse blues pianist and preservationist based in St. Louis, MO, and a student of the music’s rich history and varied regional styles, Ethan Leinwand presents personal interpretations of many of the great (and forgotten) old-time masters.
Osiris Ramsés Caballero León
Veracruz, Mexico
with Canto a Mi Tierra: Bernabe Hernandez Orozco on quinta huapanguera guitar, and Fernando Hernandez Orozco on jarana huasteca.
Featuring Osíris Ramsés Caballero León – fiddle. Son Huasteco is a traditional Mexican musical style originating in the six states of Northeastern Mexico, typically performed by a trio of violin, jarana huasteca and quinta huapanguera.…
Laurie Lewis
with George Guthrie (bio coming)
California
fiddle
For nearly four decades, Laurie Lewis has gathered fans and honors for her powerful and emotive voice and her versatile, dynamic songwriting. And she is an inspiration and a ground-breaker – across genres, across geography and across gender barriers. Laurie has shown us how a woman can blend into any part of the classic bluegrass singing trio, and she showed us how a great voice could move fluidly between bluegrass and other types of music.…
Dennis Lichtman
Mandolin
Dennis Lichtman is a multi-instrumentalist (clarinet, mandolin, fiddle, and more) who has
been living, performing, composing, and teaching in New York City since 2002. He is a
Selmer Paris Artist as an endorser of their Signature Clarinet. His music was recently
used in director David Simon’s The Plot Against America (HBO) and he has appeared this
year as a clarinetist on Succession (HBO) and The Blacklist (NBC).…
Sam Ligon
Afternoon Workshop Faculty
Sam Ligon’s most recent novel — Miller Cane: A True & Exact History — was serialized for a year in Spokane’s weekly newspaper, The Inlander, as well as on Spokane Public Radio.
Joel Link
Violin, Dover Quartet
Joel Link is a violinist with the Dover Quartet, the Penelope P. Watkins Ensemble in Residence at the Curtis Institute of Music. Mr. Link is an active soloist and chamber musician; and has been a top prize winner of numerous competitions including the Johansen International Competition in Washington, D.C. and the Yehudi Menuhin International Violin Competition in England, for which he was featured in The Strad magazine.…
Alexandre Lora
Percussion/Pandeiro
Alexandre Lora moves easily within different styles of Brazilian popular music, performing as a drummer and percussionist. He has been on the faculty of Centrum’s Choro Workshop since 2012. He has performed extensively in Europe including Amsterdam, Rotterdam and a tour of 33 cities in Spain. With Trio Brasileiro he has performed in major US cities such as New York, Chicago, Boston, Seattle, Miami and Portland.…
Douglas Lora
Artistic Director, Choro
Three-time Grammy nominee guitarist and composer Douglas Lora moves with versatility through the worlds of Classical and Popular Music, and has established himself as one of the most prominent artists of his generation.
With his wide musical repertoire, Douglas has collaborated with renowned artists such as YoYo Ma, Paquito d’Rivera, Assad Brothers, Anat Cohen, Marco Pereira, Jovino Santos Neto, Ney Rosauro, Marina Piccinini, Paulo Bellinati, among others.…
Grace Love
Faculty
Singer songwriter Grace Love is the Olympic Peninsula’s shining jewel of grit, beauty and power – think Etta James and Betty Wright meet Mahalia Jackson. She grew up in Tacoma, just a stone’s throw from Seattle, which infused her R&B melodies with fortitude and grunge.
Casey MacGill
Faculty
Casey MacGill plays music that swings. Nat “King” Cole Trio meets the Mills Brothers. Fats Waller meets Fats Domino. Slim Galliard meets Fred Astaire. It is American music of many decades and no decade in particular, all happening at the same time, woven into a seamless, beautiful whole. At the core of his sound are his band’s sometimes sweet, sometimes rough-hewn three-part harmony vocals.…
Troy MacGillivray
Nova Scotia
fiddle, piano, dance
Troy MacGillivray is from Lanark, a small community on the north-eastern shore of Nova Scotia. Troy’s commitment to music has spanned 30 years and includes both practical and academic accomplishments, most recently an M.A. in Ethnomusicology from the University of Limerick in Ireland. From as young as six years old, Troy impressed audiences with his step dancing and soon after, fiddle and piano skills.…
Kelby MacNayr
Vocal Accompanist
Drums
Drummer / composer / band-leader Kelby MacNayr performs groundbreaking original music, soulful swinging jazz, reaching contemporary music and traditional music from around the world. A dynamic and creative musician MacNayr performs in Canada and abroad with leading musicians from New York, Seattle, Portland, Vancouver, Montreal, Toronto & Europe. A faculty member of the renowned Jazz Port Townsend Festival under director John Clayton, staff at the Lionel Hampton International Jazz Festival, Kelby follows his passion to create and collaborate, teach and learn.
Linda Madison
Human Resources Consultant
Linda is a dynamic change agent with a track record of innovative leadership in transformational operations. With extensive proficiency in non-profit fiscal forecasting, cash management, budgeting, ad hoc reporting, and financial dashboarding of key performance indicators, she consistently delivers pristine financial reports, tailor-made for diverse audiences.
Beyond her financial acumen, Linda’s holistic approach to business extends to overseeing critical support functions like HR, Risk, IT, and Facilities management.…
Debra Magpie Earling
Morning Workshop Faculty
Debra Magpie Earling is the author of the novels Perma Red and The Lost Journals of Sacajewea and is currently working on a novel about witches. She is the recipient of the Montana Governor’s Arts Award and has received both a Guggenheim and NEA fellowship. Other awards include the American Book Award, the WILLA Award, the Mountains and Plains Bookseller Association Award, the Spur Award, Montana Book Award, and the Pacific Northwest Bookseller Award.…
Dudu Maia
Bandolim
Dudu Maia brings a lifetime of research and study of Brazil’s greatest musical traditions to his work. A virtuoso of the bandolim (a Portuguese version of the mandolin), Dudu served for five years as the bandolim professor of Brazil’s most respected Choro school, the Escola Brasileira de Choro Raphael Rabello in Brasília. He is known for his soulful style, unique touch and his mastery of the 10-stringed bandolim, which has two more strings than the standard bandolim, expanding its musical range and harmonic possibilities.…
Lightnin Malcolm
Guitar
Cutting edge Mississippi Bluesman Lightnin’ Malcolm, a charismatic and energetic guitarslinger with a deep soulful voice, has taken his irresistible dance grooves from Juke Joint teen years to World Stages with mainstream artists such as Robert Plant, Jimmy Buffett, Robert Cray, The Black Keys, Widespread Panic, Big Head Todd, North Mississippi Allstars, Lucero and Gary Clark Jr.…
Ivan Malespin
Faculty
Trombone
Ivan Malespin is a Grammy winning trombonist and electric bassist residing in Los Angeles, California. He is a member of the Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra, and has worked with Herb Alpert, Kanye West, Damian Marley, and Philip Bailey, among others. Ivan also co-leads an artist project alongside his wife, Alexis Malespin. Together they compose, record, and perform original music under the moniker, Eumajia.
Max Malone
A life in music is practically unavoidable when you’re born into a family of musicians. Max Malone was weaned on country music in the rural wilds of Ontario, through both the radio and his mother’s work as a background vocalist on the Tommy Hunter show. By the age of twelve he was performing as a singer and bassist with his family band on a weekly gig in Toronto’s Cabbagetown.…
Rachel Manke
Past Faculty
Rachel Manke has been playing the ukulele for over 20 years. It’s the passion that has fueled adventure and friendships in her life. She is a skilled player in a vaudeville vein who has taken flourish and technique from that stage into various genres.
Rodrigo Mantovani
Bass
Born and raised in Brazil, Rodrigo has always had a deep love for American blues and roots music from a very young age. Rodrigo has been a member of some of the first ground breaking Blues bands in Brazil and because of his deep knowledge regarding the Traditional Blues, expertise and feel for the Blues, he has also been a first call bassist for many of the premier American Blues acts touring and recording with heavy weights of the Blues scene
Rene Marie
In a span of two decades, René Marie has cemented her reputation not only as a singer but also as a composer, arranger, actress and educator. Guided and tempered by powerful life lessons and rooted in jazz traditions laid down by icons of past generations, this two-time Grammy Nominee melds jazz with elements of spirituals, folk, R&B, classical and even country to create a captivating hybrid style.…
Marlon Martinez
Faculty
Hailing from Los Angeles, Marlon Martinez is a young virtuoso bassist and composer emerging at the center of the resurgent Los Angeles jazz scene. He has demonstrated his virtuosity while touring with a wide range of artists, from rock icon Stewart Copeland to classical trailblazers Quatuor Ebène.
Marcy Marxer
Marcy Marxer is a GRAMMY Award winning multi-instrumentalist who has been teaching ukulele since 1986. Her “Ukulele For Kids” online courses have brought up a few generations of young ukulele players. She has directed a seniors uke orchestra, taught at prominent Uke and Music Camps and is co-artistic director of Strathmore’s UkeFest. Marcy specializes in chord melody, swing and jazz uke, but plays a bit of everything!…
Meredith Massey
Finance Associate
Meredith Massey brings a passion for supporting artist craftsmanship and connection via associated finance roles in Port Townsend. A career path in assisting roles of administrative finance with a focus on logistics, ERP systems, and analytics. Meredith currently pursues a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, Accounting. Born and raised in Appalachia, Meredith settled into the Pacific Northwest in 2009.…
Bernadette Mata
Past Faculty
Bernadette is a music teacher with a master’s degree in education and a bachelor’s degree in music. She first developed her passion for music at the age of 10 when she joined her elementary school’s band and began playing the saxophone. Bernadette continued to hone her skills on the saxophone throughout her time at Cal Poly Pomona University.…
Tony Mates
Washington
Tony plays fiddle, guitar and bass, sings and calls dances, and has been a part of Fiddle Tunes for quite a long time. An enthusiastic performer, he loves to encourage others in their passion for music and dance. His choice of music reflects a love of dance music and lively, accessible tunes. For his performances, Tony will be joined by members of his band, Peckin’ Out Dough, including David Cahn, Catherine Alexander, Brigid Blume and Carmen Ficarra.…
Mikiya Matsuda
Steel Guitar
Mikiya Matsuda is a steel guitarist and sometimes string bassist living in San Francisco, CA. He is the leader of the Alcatraz Islanders, a swing-era Hawaiian group, and a regular sideman with various traditional jazz and western swing dance bands in the Bay Area.
Sebastian Matthews
Past Faculty
Sebastian Matthews’ latest books are a memoir in essays, Beyond Repair: Living in a Fractured State (Red Hen Press), and a hybrid collection of poetry and prose, Beginner’s Guide to a Head-on Collision (Red Hen Press), an Independent Publisher’s Book Award winner.
John “Greyhound” Maxwell
Slide Guitar
John “Greyhound” Maxwell brings his singular approach to slide guitar and mandolin, paying homage to the craft and tradition of the masters, while infusing the music with fresh energy. David Lindley is quoted as saying, “John is the best bottleneck player I’ve heard in a long time.” With an approach that is authentic and understated, Maxwell plays with the warmth and dexterity of someone who has loved the blues over a lifetime.…
Khari Wendell McClelland
Faculty
Khari Wendell McClelland is a diversely talented and ever-evolving artist. Originally from Detroit, Khari has become a darling on the Canadian music scene with reviewers lauding his performances as a clever mix of soul and gospel. Khari’s songwriting crosses genres and generations, joyfully invoking the spirit of his ancestors who straddled the US-Canadian border in efforts to escape slavery and discrimination.
Peter McCracken
Program Manager: Fiddle Tunes, Voice Works, Ukulele
Peter McCracken (Program Manager, Fiddle Tunes, Voice Works, Ukulele) has served at Centrum in various capacities, including Arts Program Director and Traditional Arts Program Manager. In 1992, he started the blues workshop and festival, bringing five National Heritage Award recipients to Fort Worden to perform and teach. McCracken led the initial curatorial project for Centrum’s Festival of American Fiddle Tunes Preservation and Stabilization project in 2000, producing Volume 1 of the Fiddle Tunes Archives.…
Margie McDonald
Faculty
Margie McDonald is the artistic director for the Port Townsend Wearable Art Show now heading into its sixth year.
Margie’s work in Wearable art and sculpture has been exhibited in the New Zealand World of Wearable Art Exhibition, Bainbridge Island Art Museum, Museum of Northwest Art, Northwind Arts Center and Simon Mace Gallery.
Darrell McKinney
Darrell McKinney is a Washington-based interdisciplinary artist. His practice explores the intersections across design, art, and architecture. The work speaks to how design can be utilized to explore the complexities of politics, race, and social infrastructure through the interconnectedness of history, people, and places.
He received a Master of Design from the School of the Art institute of Chicago.…
Eduardo Mendonça
Faculty
Eduardo Mendonça —musician, producer and composer—is a native of Salvador, Bahia, Brazil.
Eduardo received his degree in Arts Education from the Music Institute of the Catholic University of Salvador.
He is the Music Director for iBuildBridges Foundation, and is the Artistic Director for the international performance ensemble Show Brazil!
Jacqueline Mention
Box Office Manager
Originally from Los Angeles, Jacqueline moved to Port Townsend in 2010 and in quick succession began working with Centrum. Beginning her tenure as a Youth Program Assistant, she has since worn many hats with the organization—from Volunteer Coordinator, to overseeing the Artists in Residence, to managing the Centrum Print Collection. She now happily balances her work life between Centrum’s Operations Department and her décor business, Biquette Interiors, in Uptown Port Townsend. …
Camila Meza
Faculty
Guitar
Equally prized as a vocalist, guitarist and composer, Meza has uplifted audiences worldwide with her assured and beautiful singing, highly advanced guitar (both self-accompaniment and blistering solo work), and vivid, melodic songwriting that reveals complex layers with every listen. She’s been hailed by The New York Times for her “appealing combination of lightness and depth … singing in a bright, clear voice against the agile stir of a first-rate band.…
Mairéad Ní Mhaonaigh
Ireland
with Manus Lunny, bouzouki and guitar
Mairéad Ní Mhaonaigh’s name is synonymous with what’s good in the music and culture of her native County Donegal, Ireland. Born in the Gaeltacht area of Gaoth Dobhair, where Gaelic was her main language, she learned her songs and tunes from her family and neighbors.…
Kristen Millares Young
Afternoon Workshop Faculty
Kristen Millares Young is the author of the novel Subduction, named a staff pick by The Paris Review and called “whip-smart” by the Washington Post, “a brilliant debut” by the Seattle Times and “utterly unique and important” by Ms. Magazine.
Allison Miller
Faculty
Drums
A lauded drummer who’s mastered a vast array of musical settings–from guesting on late night TV, keeping time for some of today’s most beloved singer-songwriters, and being a renowned bandleader/composer in her own right–Allison Miller is always at the heart of the music. Her latest album, Rivers In Our Veins, is a 12-song cycle embracing the concept of flow and renewal, and dedicated to our nation’s crucial rivers, watersheds and the organizations devoted to reviving and protecting them.…
Emily Miller
Emily Miller is the Artistic Director of the Augusta Heritage Center, the string band director of the college’s Appalachian Ensemble, and a professional singer and fiddle player. At Augusta, Emily works with the director to oversee all programming and helps the theme week coordinators to execute a joint artistic vision. She received her BA in Anthropology-Linguistics from Brown University and her MS in Speech-Language Pathology from Vanderbilt University.…
Valerie Mindel
Val Mindel is a longtime musician, teacher and workshop leader, known for helping singers achieve the sound they want and have fun doing it. She teaches a wide range of harmony styles from the buzzy sound of American old-time and early country harmony to the weaving harmonies of songs from across the ocean. In the process she addresses such indefinables as tone, ornamentation and lead singing.…
Valerie Miner
Morning Workshop Faculty
Valerie Miner is the award winning writer of 9 novels, 5 story collections and 2 books of non-fiction. Her work has appeared in Ploughshares, The Georgia Review, Triquarterly, Salmagundi, New Letters, Prairie Schooner, The Gettysburg Review, over 60 anthologies, and on BBC Radio 4. Winner of a Distinguished Teaching Award, she been on the faculty at Stanford University, U.C.…
Valerie Miner
Afternoon Workshop Faculty
Valerie Miner is the award-winning author of 15 books. Her work has appeared in Ploughshares, The Georgia Review, Triquarterly, Salmagundi, New Letters, Prairie Schooner, The Gettysburg Review, over 60 anthologies, and on BBC Radio 4. Winner of a Distinguished Teaching Award, she has taught at Stanford University, U.C. Berkeley, University of Minnesota, Arizona State University, etc.…
Nia-Amina Minor
Faculty
Originally from Los Angeles, Nia-Amina Minor is a movement artist who resides in Seattle, WA. Her creative work converses with Black realities and investigates the intersection of movement, memory, and rhythm.Nia-Amina holds a MFA from UC Irvine and a BA from Stanford University. She has taught and guest lectured at University of Washington, Saddleback College, Cypress College, and UC Irvine.…
Tom Mitchell
Guitar
Tom Mitchell is a guitar player and singer rooted in the styles of the 1920’s and 30’s jazz, western swing, country blues and old-time music; he’s happily been both sideman and leader for a great variety of musical endeavors. In addition to singing and playing guitar, he’s played mandolin, banjo, tenor guitar or tiple when the need arose.…
Ayesha Mohyuddin
Ayesha Mohyuddin is a contemporary jewelry artist who explores identity, spirituality, and ways of knowing through body-related objects and performance. Ayesha is interested in capturing the complexities of home, history, and identity through material, ritual, performance, and eating. Her recent work uses food, cooking, and the tools of the kitchen to express the physicality of nostalgia, identity, and history.…
Bruce Molsky
New York State
Grammy-nominated Bruce Molsky transports audiences to another time and place, with his authentic and personal interpretations of rarities from the Southern Appalachian songbook and other musical traditions from around the globe. Best known for his work on the fiddle, Bruce’s banjo, guitar and his distinctive, powerful vocals also resonate with listeners.…
Sarah Kate Morgan
Tennessee
mountain dulcimer
Born of Appalachian soil in Sharps Chapel, Tennessee, Sarah Kate Morgan sings, plays, and writes like she’s been in these hills since the dawn of time. She’s had plenty of varied influences, beginning with hearing a classical music CD belonging to her family and going on to discover old time music through a dulcimer built by her grandfather.…
Dean Mueller
Band Lab
Dean’s journey from bass player to front man was an unexpected but powerful transformation. After years of performing with renowned bands and blues legends, he stepped into the spotlight with his debut solo album, Life Ain’t All Roses (2023). The album showcased his storytelling abilities and the rich blend of his blues roots with folk-inspired melodies. Based in Oregon since 1998, Dean has become a key figure in the state’s music scene, both as a performer and a promoter.…
Karla Mundy
Karla Mundy is a vibrant, soulful and diverse vocalist, pianist, arranger and choir leader. She grew up outside Calgary, Alberta and from a young age, was extremely passionate about piano, singing and dancing. She studied piano from the age of seven onwards, sang at all times and was introduced to many styles of music through her study of jazz, modern, flamenco, African and Latin dance as a teenager.…
Matt Munisteri
Artistic Director, Red Hot Strings
Guitarist, singer, songwriter, and Brooklyn native Matt Munisteri grew up with early interest in American folk music that led him from finger-style Country and Ragtime guitar, through Blues, to Tin Pan Alley and Jazz. His own compositions, and lauded guitar playing, accurately reflect this life-long immersion in the history of American Popular Song; linking rural and urban, long-gone with contemporary.
Lewis Nash
Faculty
Lewis Nash is one of jazz’s most recorded musicians, appearing on over 500 recordings including 10 Grammy winners and numerous Grammy nominees. In fact, Nash has the distinction of being the only musician in jazz history featured on the winners in both the “Best Jazz Vocal” and “Best Jazz Instrumental” album categories in two separate years: the 2004 Grammys with Nancy Wilson and McCoy Tyner, and again in 2010 with Dee Dee Bridgewater and James Moody.
Jim Nelson
Faculty
Jim Nelson is a veteran of the old-time music scene, having honed his guitar skills through many years of playing with senior dance fiddlers, especially Bob Holt of Ava, Missouri and Lotus Dickey of Paoli, Indiana, and by keeping a close eye on some of the older guitar players. He has been playing with Geoff Seitz for the past 40 years, and along with Geoff and Curt Buckhannon.
Sierra Nelson
Poet and essayist Sierra Nelson has taught creative writing at University of Washington’s Friday Harbor Marine Labs. has been writing, performing, and creating installations for over 15 years as co-founder of the literary performance groups “The Typing Explosion” and “Vis-à-Vis Society.”
Johnny Nicholas
Blues Songs
Time is a river and you can never step in the same river twice. It’s all gonna change, but what came before shapes what comes after. There are certain people who seem to be in both places at once. Johnny Nicholas has played music and rambled with some of the most original and artistically powerful individuals of the American 20th century.
Melissa O’Neil
Program Assistant: Artist Residencies
Melissa O’Neil is a mom, auntie, poet, and writer. She spends a lot of time building community, particularly with young people, and believes that the real magic happens when we connect with each other. Melissa loves spending time with her kids, being outdoors, dance parties, and color-sorting bookshelves. She has a BA in English and Creative Writing and an MS in Library and Information Sciences and just finished writing her first novel. …
Miles Okazaki
Faculty
Miles Okazaki is a NYC-based guitarist originally from Port Townsend, a small seaside town in Washington State. His approach to the guitar is described by the New York Times as “utterly contemporary, free from the expectations of what it means to play a guitar in a group setting — not just in jazz, but any kind.”
Matthew Olzmann
Morning Workshop Faculty
Matthew Olzmann is the author of Constellation Route as well as two previous collections of poetry: Mezzanines and Contradictions in the Design. A recipient of fellowships from Kundiman, MacDowell, and the National Endowment for the Arts, Olzmann’s poems have appeared in the New York Times, Best American Poetry, The Pushcart Prizes, Kenyon Review, and elsewhere. He is an assistant professor at Dartmouth College and also teaches in the MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College.
The Onlies
Artistic Directors: Fiddle Tunes
The Onlies are a young group of old friends who perform together in a stringband. They grew up playing fiddles, guitars, and banjos in their hometowns of Seattle, WA and Lexington, VA. With their latest self-titled recording, the band digs deep into performances of traditional American popular (old time) music. The music moves with a pulsating drive, sharp arrangements, and rich vibration — it resounds with the present.…
Ronnie Ontiveros
Ronnie Ontiveros lives in Hood River, Oregon and plays bass in about 8 different bands. He also plays guitar and uke and has appeared at many festivals, camps and musical happenings around the Northwest over the last several years. He is usually very serious and rigid about all things, however if you catch him in a good mood he may even smile and make a low key attempt at humor.…
Lisa Ornstein
Washington
with Sabin Jacques, button accordion, and Rachel Aucoin, piano
Fiddle virtuoso Lisa Ornstein is an outstanding interpreter of the traditional music of French Canada and Appalachia, blending compelling and inventive playing with impeccable tune choice. Befriended by North Carolina fiddle legend Tommy Jarrell while she was in her teens, Lisa quickly became an accomplished fiddler in the Round Peak style.…
Sarina Partridge
Sarina Partridge is a musician, song-leader, educator and activist based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She feels most alive when learning, creating and sharing songs — especially songs that grow out of time spent in wild places. Sarina sings with a wide variety of music projects: community song-leading of her own original songs; harmony-rich original music with folk trio Heartwood; performing and teaching vocal harmony folk music music she’s studied with master teachers around the world; and performing and teaching of Eastern European and Yiddish song – her own musical lineage.…
Erick “Spider” Paul
Faculty
With a goal of encouraging and motivating others, Erick “Spider” Paul brings a wide array of knowledge in the arts. He’s worked in the Los Angeles dance Industry for over 12 years and loves bringing his professional and versatile knowledge to each student he encounters.He and his wife Abby’s company Æ Creative produces stage shows, music videos, and routines for both the national and international stages.…
Jerron Paxton
Guitar
Jerron Paxton is a skilled interpreter of Black traditional music, having spent his life learning the multifaceted musical dialects of blues, old-time, ragtime, and Cajun music and playfully dressing them up in their brightest hues. He is an accomplished multi-instrumentalist, playing guitar, banjo, piano, fiddle and other instruments with deep histories and ties to Black American music — each with a master’s touch.…
Dawn Pemberton
Dawn Pemberton has deep musical roots that take her powerful voice from gospel and soul to jazz, funk and world music. She has become a staple of the Vancouver music scene and can often be found tearin’ it up as a vocalist, teacher, facilitator, choir director and “go to girl” for live performances and studio sessions.…
Nick Pence
Guitar
Nick Pence is a well-known guitar player from St. Louis. Nick plays with The Bottlesnakes, The Dust Covers or The New Missouri Fox Hunters. These two have worked together in the past, including forming a gospel group The Houndsteeth.
Nicole Persun
Afternoon Workshop Faculty
Nicole J. Persun is an award-winning and internationally bestselling novelist with a master’s degree in creative writing and instruction. She writes in many genres, most notably contemporary fiction under the pen name Jennifer Gold. Nicole has taught writers as a keynote speaker, in large-scale class settings, intimate workshops, and one-on-one coaching for over twelve years. For more information, visit nicolejpersun.com or jennifergoldauthor.com.
Phil and Russ Tanner
Gid Tanner was a farmer in Dacula, Georgia, and played the fiddle on the side. By 1926, he and other musicians such as Clayton McMichen on fiddle and Riley Puckett on guitar, created a group called Gid Tanner and the Skillet Lickers
Dawn Pichon Barron
Afternoon Workshop Faculty
Dawn Pichón Barron is currently the academic director/faculty of the undergraduate interdisciplinary Native Pathways Program at the Evergreen State College. She writes across borders and genres, while dreaming of ripe lemon sunrays at the southern tip of the Salish Sea–on the lands of the Medicine Creek treaty tribes and bands—with her wingman and Chihuahuas. Her chapbook, ESCAPE GIRL BLUES, was published by Finishing Line Press, 2018.…
Dawn Pichón Barron
Afternoon Workshop Faculty
Dawn Pichón Barron (she/her) is a mixt-blood Indigi-Euro writer & scholar born in Southern California and primarily raised in rural Spokane. She is the academic director of the Native Pathways Program and member of the Faculty at The Evergreen State College. Dawn is thrilled to participate in state-wide artist promotion and sustainment as an Artist Trust Board Member.…
Karin Plato
Canadian vocalist and composer Karin Plato came to jazz almost by accident. The music she heard in her formative years was the rock and pop music of the day and the classical music she studied from a young age. She didn’t get the “jazz bug” until she was in her early 30’s and that’s when her music career really began when she made the move from central Canada to the West Coast.
Jessica Plumb
Jessica Plumb is an award-winning filmmaker, writer, and interdisciplinary artist who crafts nonfiction stories infused with wonder and a strong sense of place; she is best known in Jefferson County for the feature documentary Return of the River, the story of the Elwha River dam removal.
Jessica Plumb
Jessica Plumb is an award-winning filmmaker and writer, as well as the principal and creative director of Plumb Productions, a multi-media storytelling company specializing in short films focused on the environment, people, and place.
Jessica is the Producer and Co-Director of Return of the River, a feature documentary about the largest dam removal in history, which occurred on the Elwha river.…
Randy Porter
Faculty
Jazz pianist Randy Porter has a refined understanding of improvisation and the spontaneous communication between musicians. As a Steinway Artist, Randy Porter draws from a rich palette of sonorities found within his imagination and the depths of the piano.
Ed Poullard
Texas
with Cedric Watson, button accordion
Ed Poullard is regarded as the most significant Creole fiddler of his generation, and he has brought his unique and captivating style of music across the world. Born in Eunice, LA in 1952, the Poullard family relocated to east Texas in search of better work when Ed was still a baby.…
Maxwell Poulos
Mandolin
Maxwell Poulos is a New Orleans-based, internationally recognized multi-instrumentalist performer and music teacher. Specializing in mandolin and banjo, Maxwell began his training in California and then spent several years busking professionally in New Orleans’ city streets and night clubs, integrating himself into a rich and diverse array of musical styles including jug band, ragtime, jazz and little-known catalogue of traditional Italian mandolin music.…
Libby Pratt
Program Manager: Artist Residencies
Libby Pratt earned her Master of Fine Arts at the International Center of Photography at Bard College and served as Director of Baxter Street at The Camera Club of New York from 2014 to 2019, a 138-year-old nonprofit art organization in executing diverse programming including Exhibitions, Workspace Residency, Conversation series, Critiques, and Photo Book Fair. Raised on the Olympic Peninsula, she moved back to Port Townsend during the pandemic and has been an Adjunct Professor of Photography at Seattle Central College.…
Evan Price
Violin
Evan Price is a versatile violinist and composer best known for his work with the paradigm-shifting chamber ensemble, The Turtle Island Quartet, and with The Hot Club of San Francisco, the most venerable gypsy jazz band in North America. A native of Detroit, Michigan, he grew up studying classical violin while mixing with folk and jazz musicians of all stripes, learning to fiddle and improvise in various styles as well as teaching himself to play numerous folk instruments.…
Luke Price
Oregon
Luke Price is a multi-instrumentalist performer, composer, and studio musician based in Portland, Oregon. He has his roots in American fiddling and swing traditions, which have influenced his rhythm, taste, and style as they have spread into Soul, Jazz, Pop, and Americana. Luke brings a unique voice to any music he plays, whether he’s on the fiddle, electric guitar, or singing.…
Rachael Price
Rachael grew up in a musical environment in Portland, OR. At an early age Rachael began taking voice lessons and singing in local choirs and discovered that she wanted to sing professionally. She attended Berklee College of Music on scholarship as a vocalist. Rachael graduated with a degree in Professional Music with an emphasis in Songwriting from Berklee in 2010 and has been pursuing music ever since, recording albums and touring nationally.…
Rena Priest
Morning Workshop Faculty
Rena Priest is a member of the Lhaq’temish (Lummi) Nation. She is the incumbent Washington State Poet Laureate and Maxine Cushing Gray Distinguished Writing Fellow. Priest is also the recipient of an Allied Arts Foundation Professional Poets Award and fellowships from Indigenous Nations Poets and the Vadon Foundation.
Mark Puryear
Improv
Mark Puryear is a musician, ethnomusicologist, and curator. For the Smithsonian Folklife Festival, he curated the 2011 Rhythm and Blues: Tell It Like It Is program as well as the Freedom Sounds event that celebrated the opening of the National Museum of African American History and Culture.
Anna Quinn
Morning Workshop Faculty
Anna Quinn is the author of two novels, The Night Child (Blackstone, 2018) listed as #1 Best Real Psychological Fiction on Goodreads, and Angeline (Blackstone 2023), a Foreword Review Winner and nominated for a Washington State Book Award. Her work has garnered praise from Luis Alberto Urrea, Dorothy Allison, Bill Ransom, Pam Houston, Melissa Febos, Lidia Yuknavitch, Library Journal, and more.…
Anna Quinn
Past Faculty
Anna Quinn is the author of The Night Child, (Blackstone) listed as #1 Best Real Psychological Fiction on Goodreads, and Ingram’s 2018 Best Book Club Book. Her second novel, Angeline, (Blackstone) will be released Feb. 7th, 2023.
Peter Quinn
Afternoon Workshop Faculty
A graduate of Lewis and Clark College, Peter studied with poets Vern Rutsala, Tony Ostroff and William Stafford. In 1976 he received an Academy of American Poets Award. His first book of poetry, Painting Circles on Straight Highways, was published by Irenicon Press in 2012. His second book of poetry, small things (Turning Point Press), Will be released in March, 2023.…
Sue Randolph
Finance Associate
In addition to being skilled in keeping the books tight, Sue is an avid gardener who grows her own food. Her knowledge of plants and how to transplant, graft, feed, grow huge and harvest is profound. Her kind gentle nature is unwavering and her positive “can do” attitude keeps the wheels at Centrum turning without a squeak.
Mairi Rankin
Nova Scotia
fiddle
Born in Mabou, Mairi Rankin is a fiddler and step dancer who has been influenced by some of the best Cape Breton traditional musicians and instructors on the island. She has developed her own unique style by being immersed in this rich musical culture, pulling from her native Cape Breton and her strong Scottish roots from North Uist.…
Ella Ray
Ella Ray is a sister, friend, and an auntie based in Portland, Oregon. From 9 am to 5 pm she works as an arts writer and editor, art historian, and library worker. Through a critical writing and research practice guided by black feminist frameworks and homegrown archival methodologies, Ray seeks to honor black femme communication patterns and their corresponding visual and sonic representations.…
Laura Read
Morning Workshop Faculty
Laura Read is the author of But She Is Also Jane (University of Massachusetts Press, 2023, winner of the Juniper Prize); Dresses from the Old Country (BOA Editions, 2018); Instructions for my Mother’s Funeral (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2012, winner of the AWP Donald Hall Prize for Poetry, selected by Dorianne Laux), and The Chewbacca on Hollywood Boulevard Reminds Me of You (winner of the Floating Bridge Press Chapbook Award, 2011).…
Molly Reeves
Guitar
Raconteur of song Molly Reeves is a performer and adorer of early 20th-century American music. Molly is known globally for her enigmatic approach to rhythm guitar and her ability to invoke the idiomatic tone and language of 1920s and 30s acoustic guitar players. A crooner by nature, her dynamic and warm vocal stylings echo popular singers and storytellers of yesteryear.…
Liette Remon
Faculty
Liette grew up in the Gaspesie region of Quebec in a small municipality called Petit-Pabos. Music happened only at home, when her father’s fiddler friends would drop by, and at family get-togethers, once or twice a week, where music (along with a glass of gin and food) was the focus. They’d mainly sing popular songs, with traditional songs and fiddle tunes mixed in among them.
Anastacia Reneé
Past Faculty
Anastacia Reneé is an award-winning cross-genre writer, educator, interdisciplinary artist, TEDX speaker and podcaster.
Del Rey
Faculty
Del Rey started playing guitar when she was four years old. At thirteen, she was immersed in the world of folk music, via the San Diego Folk Festival. She has tried to get a whole band onto her solo instrument from the beginning. This gives her music an interesting complexity, especially when applied to the ukulele.
Jason Ricci
Harmonica
Jason Ricci born in Portland Maine USA is an award winning and decorated american singer and harmonica player. In his youth, Jason’s mother brought him to many live Blues shows in his early teens to witness performances of James Cotton, Charlie Musslewhite, Eddie Clearwater, Rod Piazza, Buckwheat Zydeco, Marcia Ball and many more.
In 1995 Ricci moved to Memphis Tennessee to be near and informally study with Johnny Winter sideman, harmonica player and singer Pat Ramsey.…
Jonathan Rizzardi
Faculty
Jonathan M. Rizzardi (they/he) is a Seattle-area performing artist and theatre historian. After moving from Washington, D.C. to complete their PhD in Theatre History and Theory at the University of Washington School of Drama, Jonathan has continued to teach youth theatre, act, facilitate arts educator training programs, and develop social activist-focused curriculum here in the PNW.…
George Rodriguez
Faculty
George Rodriguez received a BFA in ceramics from the University of Texas El Paso and an MFA from the University of Washington. As a recipient of a Bonderman Travel Fellowship he traveled the world through most of 2010 visiting 26 countries in the span of 10 months. The Museum of Northwest Art recently recognized him as an Emerging Artist Luminary.…
Michelle J. Rodriguez
Michelle J. Rodriguez is an artist who performs and writes in the worlds of music and theater. Raised in the Pacific Northwest and Kentucky by her Puerto Rican parents, Ms. Rodriguez was raised in Vermont, Chicago and NYC by her communities, inspiring her to explore kids-of-immigrants stories, divine femininity, intuition, healing and spaces in-between. Her music project MICHA became a finalist for NPR’s 2018 Tiny Desk Contest with her song “Nena Nena Nena,” praised for a “bilingual set spanning laid-back southern soul and Latin pop flare” (NPR).
Pharis Romero
Artistic Director, Voice Works
Pharis has been singing and playing music her whole life. An early student of classical and country, she grew up performing with her family’s band and learning the songs and stories that made her want to dig deeper. These days she performs mostly with her husband Jason, and is equally at home disappearing into an old-time jam as she is singing on stage or teaching the joy of song and sound.
Caitlin Romtvedt
Wyoming
Social Dance (with Tom Krueger)
Caitlin Romtvedt is a musician and dancer from Wyoming currently living in the Basque Country. She is a PhD candidate in ethnomusicology at the University of California, Berkeley studying and writing about the intersections of music, dance, and language use.
Reuben Roqueñi
Reuben is a nationally respected arts administrator with over 20 years in progressive program development, management, artist-centric support systems and grantmaking experience. He is currently Executive Director at Portland Institute for Contemporary’s (PICA) whose programming supports the experiments of the most vital and provocative artists of our time. Previously, he was Director of Transformative Change Programs at Native Arts and Cultures Foundation, serving Indigenous artists across the US.…
Marisol Rosa-Shapiro
Faculty
Marisol Rosa-Shapiro is a New York and Seattle-based performer, director, teaching artist, and creator of original works of theater. She is a graduate of Princeton University and of Giovanni Fusetti’s Lecoq-based Helikos School of Theatre Creation in Florence, Italy. Her specialties include mask theater, mime, clown, commedia dell’arte, improvisation, physical comedy, movement-and ensemble-based creation and more.…
Gerald Ross
Faculty
Gerald Ross is a musician specializing in American Roots Music – Swing, Early Jazz, Western Swing, Hawaiian, Ragtime and Blues. Playing the guitar, lap steel guitar and ukulele he has performed throughout the USA and Europe and has recorded seven solo CDs. Ross is one of the finest instrumentalists on the scene today and his music expresses a sense of rhythm and melody that is rare in contemporary music.…
Anisha Rush
Faculty
Saxophone
Born and raised in Colorado Springs, CO, saxophonist, composer, and educator Anisha Rush began playing the saxophone at the age of 10 and went on to study music and psychology, earning a BM in Jazz Studies from the Thompson Jazz Studies Program and a BA in Psychology from the University of Colorado at Boulder.…
Bobby Rush
Faculty
Bobby Rush was born Emmett Ellis, Jr. outside Homer, Louisiana, in 1933. He twanged a diddley bow before picking up a guitar around age 11, and his preacher father knew enough about a harmonica to pass along a few riffs to his progeny. The family relocated to Pine Bluff, Arkansas, in 1948.
While still a teenager, Rush became a professional blues musician, adopting his stage name so as not to disrespect his devout dad.…
Sadie LeDonna and Shawn Kellogg
Sadie LeDonna and Shawn Kellogg have been teaching and performing together for over 7 years. They have organized festivals, summer camps, and workshops together and have created and performed in several independent full-length shows as well as with their own acts for a variety of events.
Sadie and Shawn founded Pop-Up Movement in 2019. Throughout the pandemic, they designed and built their gym in the Port Townsend area.…
Sadaf Sadri
Sadaf Sadri is an Iranian new media artist based in Seattle. The focal point of their work revolves around the concept of interruption. Their interest in disruption lies in the void that emerges in the wake of the discontinuation of the established power systems. This void, they believe, offers a space to imagine alternative narratives that might otherwise remain unexplored.…
David Sanchez
Faculty
Latin Grammy Award winner David Sánchez is being hailed as “the most profound young tenor saxophonist working today. Born in Guaynabo, Puerto Rico, Sánchez began playing percussion and drums at age 8 before migrating to tenor saxophone four years later.
Ellie Sandstrom
Modern Dance
Ellie Sandstrom, a Seattle Magazine “Spotlight Award Winner” and a Velocity Dance Center “Dance Champion”, is originally from Minneapolis, where she began her movement training with Minnesota Dance Theater and later, BalletArts Minnesota. She has studied various forms of dance technique, body conditioning, composition, improvisation and performance at dance festivals and schools across the country including Cornish College of the Arts, where she received her Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Dance.…
Jovino Santos Neto
Piano
Three-time Latin Grammy nominee Jovino Santos Neto is a master pianist, flutist, composer, arranger, conductor and educator from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. After 15 years as a member of the legendary Hermeto Pascoal Group, he moved to Seattle in 1993. Since then, Jovino has established himself as a charismatic performer, whether playing solo piano, leading his Trio, his award-winning Quinteto, or in guest appearances with ensembles and orchestras worldwide.…
Ann Savoy
Faculty
Ann Savoy is a musician, an author, a record producer, and a photographer. Her most recent endeavor is the acclaimed newly released “Adieu False Heart”, a CD of duets with the legendary Linda Ronstadt. As a musician she, has played guitar, fiddle, and accordion and traveled throughout the world with her husband accordionist Marc Savoy and fiddler Michael Doucet in the Savoy Doucet Cajun Band, with her all-woman band The Magnolia Sisters. and with Marc and their talented sons in the Savoy Family Band.
Joel Savoy
Artistic Director
Son of Cajun music icons Marc and Ann, Joel Savoy is best described as an instigator. He has been at the forefront of the Louisiana music revival of the last 20 years and as a result he has become a highly visible figure in the American roots music community, placing him onstage alongside folks like John Fogerty, Linda Ronstadt, Steve Earle, and T-Bone Burnett.…
Wilson Savoy
Faculty
Wilson was born into a musical family in Eunice, Louisiana, and grew up surrounded by Cajun music among other styles. As a teenager, under the spell of Jerry Lee Lewis and Ray Charles, Wilson fell in love with rock n’ roll and blues piano, and taught himself to play. A little later, he picked up one of his dad’s accordions, and later still, Cajun fiddle.
Fin’es Scott
Fin’es Scott is a Seattle-based textile artist that explores themes of Black joy, rest, Afrofuturism, and environmentalism. Her work is the antithesis of Black trauma, which is often exploited in art and media. Her process involves creating artwork by combining traditional craft with modern digital tools.
She studied design in New York City and has been sewing and illustrating for over 20 years.
Eva Scow
Faculty
Eva Scow is an American mandolinist and violinist from Fresno, California. She began studying music at a young age, starting on the piano and violin at age 4, and later adding the mandolin at age 8. Growing up she played in Classical orchestras and bands, exploring different kinds of music from Bluegrass to Brazilian Jazz.
Halehaku Seabury
Halehaku Seabury is a Grammy nominated and multi Nā Hōkū Hanohano Award winning guitarist/multi instrumentalist, composer, arranger, educator, and vocalist from Kāneʻohe, Oʻahu. Halehaku developed an early passion for music from his parents growing up in Kāneʻohe, Oʻahu. His formative musical education began assisting his father in the KCCN 1420 AM Radio station studios as a young child.…
Geoff Seitz
Faculty
Geoff Seitz has been playing music since age eight and has been playing fiddle for over 45 years. Throughout his years of fiddling, Geoff sought out traditional master fiddlers and learned tunes in the old time style. Although Geoff has spent many hours with the Missouri Valley and Ozark fiddlers, he also learned from Appalachian fiddlers as well as fiddlers
Camden Shaw
Cello, Dover Quartet
Camden Shaw is the cellist of the Dover Quartet, the Penelope P. Watkins Ensemble in Residence at the Curtis Institute of Music. He has appeared with the ensemble in performances all over the world to great acclaim. Mr. Shaw has collaborated in chamber music with such renowned artists as Daniel Hope, Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, and the late Leon Fleischer, and maintains an active career as a soloist.…
Lauren Sheehan
Band Lab
Lauren Sheehan brings her down-home music uptown, mixing old blues, early jazz and roots of country for a bluesbilly-good-time sound. Dubbed “Portland String Queen” by The Oregonian for her multi-instrumental prowess, Lauren is also known for her unforgettable voice and sings like “an angel with horns”, (Charlie Rowley, fan). She tours, teaches at Pacific University, and has recorded 5 CDs played on radio world-wide, including BBC, NPR, and BB King’s Bluesville.…
Omid Shekari
Omid Shekari is a visual artist from Tehran currently living in Pittsburgh. He employs various approaches and methods of artmaking to explore his visual language within 2D and 3D spaces. His objects are attempts to understand and give forms to our complex social relations, specifically the relationship between repressed and repressor that has existed in our society and has been normalized under capitalism.…
Katie Shore
Faculty
Like many fiddlers, Katie was inspired at a young age by her grandfather. At six years old she told her parents she wanted to “play music you can clap your hands and stomp your feet to”. Hailing from Ft. Worth “Cowtown”, Tx, Katie grew up playing in a world of strong fiddle traditions, attending fiddle contests, music camps such as Mark O’Connor’s and Johnny Gimble’s, and with some classical training, was part of the Ft Worth Youth Orchestra
The Chapin Sisters
The Chapin Sisters carry on a proud family musical legacy: Father Tom Chapin is a Grammy-winning singer/songwriter, legendary late uncle Harry Chapin was an artist and activist best known for his #1 hit “Cat’s in the Cradle”, and grandfather Jim Chapin literally wrote the book on how to play the drumkit. For nearly 20 years these masters of blood harmony have garnered critical acclaim by forging a distinctive musical imprint by blending dynamically complex vocal harmonies and folk-influenced melodies with dark, wryly sarcastic lyrical content.…
Anna Skutley
Anna Skutley is an independent curator and researcher currently based in Seattle. While pursuing her postgraduate education in the UK, she facilitated various URL and AFK projects for art organizations and festivals, exploring the possibilities of gaming, servers and digital archives as community art spaces. Her PhD research proposes feminist worlding as a methodology for digital curating, with a specific interest in the Digital Commons, feminist technologies and Feminist Science-Fiction writing.…
Moira Smiley
Faculty
Her clarion voice and joyous, embodied performances have carried Moira and her songs around the planet and inspired millions of harmony singers to sing her songs. She’s immersed herself in early American, Irish and East European vocal traditions and seeks to honor the many powerful, cultural roles of singing beyond stage and microphone
Shirley Smith
Gospel Choir
Shirley Smith is a Detroit native who studied under the tutelage of one of Detroit’s premier harpists and vocal instructors, Patricia Terry-Ross, who was her teacher at Detroit’s Cass Technical High School. Shirley studied voice, piano, and harp under Mrs. Ross.
Whit Smith
Guitar
Whit Smith is a guitarist, singer, songwriter and founding member of the highly acclaimed Western swing trio, The Hot Club of Cowtown. He is known by guitarists for his driving rhythmic style, and for his ability to move through chord progressions employing endlessly creative variety harmonies. After nearly 30 years of vigorous touring, performing and recording, Whit has arrived at a style that pays clear homage to a variety of influential guitarists from the 1930’s and 40’s, while serving as the perfect vehicle for his own bracingly original ideas.…
Gary Smulyan
Faculty
Baritone Sax
Baritone saxophonist Gary Smulyan was born April 4, 1956, in Bethpage, New York. The gifted multi-instrumentalist started his music career by first learning alto saxophone during his teenage years on Long Island. Today he is critically acclaimed across-the-board and recognized as the major voice on the baritone saxophone. His playing is marked by an aggressive rhythmic sense, an intelligent and creative harmonic approach — and perhaps most importantly – a strong and incisive wit.…
Daniela Spielmann
Saxophone & Flute
Daniela Spielmann has been part of the Brazilian Choro scene since 1998 as a saxophonist, flutist, composer and arranger. Her music is current and at the same time respectful of the great Brazilian composers of the past. Her first CD as a member of the Choro ensemble Rabo de Lagartixa (Gecko´s Tail) was given a critics’ award for the best instrumental CD of the year and in 2002 her first solo album, Brazilian Breath, was nominated for a Latin Grammy.…
Terell Stafford
Faculty
Trumpet
Acclaimed New York–based trumpet player Terell Stafford has been hailed as “one of the great players of our time” by piano legend McCoy Tyner. Stafford combines a deep love of melody with his own brand of spirited and adventurous lyricism. Since the mid-90s Stafford has performed with groups such as Benny Golson’s Sextet, McCoy Tyner’s Sextet, Kenny Barron Quintet, Frank Wess Quintet, and Dizzy Gillespie All-Star Alumni Band.…
David Steele
Guitar
Dave began performing as a barroom acoustic solo guitarist and singer while attending Allegheny College in Northwest Pennsylvania in the 1970’s. During the 80’s, Steele expanded his interest to electric blues, as a founding member of the Zipper City Blues Band.
Daniel Steinberg
Faculty
Daniel has been a musical performer and teacher for over 45 years, with a particular fascination with the traditional music and dance from diverse cultures around the world. He plays piano and flute with the contra dance band Hillbillies from Mars and with New England fiddler Rodney Miller, and has performed with many luminaries of the fiddle music scene, as well as several Latin American and African ensembles.
Don Stiernberg
Faculty
Don Stiernberg has been a professional musician for nearly 50 years. Along the way he has been involved in performing, writing, recording, producing, and teaching but is best known for his mandolin playing. His path was set very early on as he grew up north of Chicago. Emulating his older brother, he experimented with playing various stringed instruments, finally landing on the mandolin.
Damon Stone
Blues Dance
Damon has been dancing his entire life, starting with vernacular Jazz/Blues first taught to him at the tender age of six by his grandmother. After nearly a decade of learning at the heels of his elders, he went on and eventually studied numerous dance forms until coming full circle in 1995 to focus primarily on the history and styles of partner dances as his family danced them with a special focus on the Southern Blues styles from the Mississippi Delta region.…
Kelsy Lynn Stone
Blues Dance
Kelsy brings her lifetime of dance training, a passion for vernacular dance, and a sharp eye for technique to the Blues dance world. She has brought her joy and knowledge of Blues idiom dances to some of the most important and high-profile events in the USA and across five continents, including but not limited to: bluesSHOUT!, The Experiment, Muse, Hearken the Blues, and Seoul Blues Dance Festival-serving as faculty, mentor, competition coordinator, and judge.…
Jonathan Stout
Guitar
Los Angeles-based guitarist and bandleader Jonathan Stout is well-known to swing dancers everywhere for the wonderful dance orchestra he leads, but any fan of swing guitar currently stalking the internet knows him for the beautiful touch he brings to relaxed swinging versions of standards played chord-melody style on an array of prized old archtop guitars
Robert Stubblefield
Afternoon Workshop Faculty
Robert Stubblefield has published fiction and personal essays in Dreamers and Desperadoes: Contemporary Short Fiction of the American West, Best Stories of the American West, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Left Bank, The Clackamas Literary Review, Cascadia Times, Oregon Humanities, Oregon Salmon: Essays on the State of the Fish at the Turn of the Millennium, Open Spaces, basalt, High Desert Journal, and The Whitefish Review among others.…
Alexandre Cadarso Suárez
with Kevin Carr
Galicia, Spain
fiddle, gaita, percussion, culture
Alexandre Cadarso Suárez was born in Compostela in 1961. He holds a PhD in Sports Sciences, Physical Education and Healthy Physical Activity from the University of A Coruña. He currently works in the Sports Area of the University of Santiago de Compostela.
Alexandre began his musical training in 1977, learning to play the bagpipes with Maestro Bartolo and later with Manuel Miramontes.…
Kweku Sumbry
Faculty
Drums
Grounded in the traditions of the Djembe Orchestra, Kweku Sumbry is a multi-percussionist from Washington, DC. With the djembe, drumset, and a multitude of West African Percussion instruments, Kweku is bringing forth a new sound to the jazz world. He began his studies as a toddler under the tutelage of Mahiri Fadjimba Keita, Mamady Keita, and Djiali Djimo Kouyate.
Helen Sung
Faculty
Piano
Helen Sung is an acclaimed jazz pianist and composer, and a 2021 Guggenheim Fellow. A native of Houston, Texas, and graduate of its High School for the Performing and Visual Arts (HSPVA), she eschewed her classical piano upbringing after a jazz epiphany during undergraduate studies at the University of Texas at Austin.…
Janu Sung
House
Janu (yah-nū) is a dancer, educator, and performing artist in Seattle, WA. He founded Hustle and Soul in 2022 and has been part of the Club & Street Dance Community since 2016. His earliest movement practices are based in martial arts and his “student-first” mentality has led him to explore and study numerous movement/dance styles. His main style is House dance: a culture and philosophy he loves and feels blessed to know.
Clay Swafford
Piano
Firmly rooted in the blues tradition, Clay Swafford was raised in the small rural community of Providence, Alabama. Born into a musical family; he was immersed in the sounds of Baptist Hymnals, Country and Bluegrass. He took interest in the piano at an early age and, after hearing the music of B.B King and Bobby Blue Bland at age 15, Clay was hooked on the blues.…
Heidi Swedberg
When she was 5 years old Heidi received her first ukulele from the Hawaiian Easter bunny while living in Kailua, HI. She has fond memories of teaching herself chords and writing songs in her room in Albuquerque NM, the place she thinks of as home. She picked the instrument up again in 1992 in Hollywood, CA while playing a singer-songwriter for a network TV pilot. Now life imitates art, and she plays music full time.
Chris Symer
Vocal Accompanist
Bass
Born and raised in Southern California, bassist relocated to the Northwest in 2002 where he continues to make his living as a freelance musician. Equally comfortable in the classroom, stage or recording studio, Chris has stayed busy doing everything from teaching to playing on feature films. Notable projects have included recordings with Bill Anschell (“Rumbler” 2017), Johnaye Kendrick (“Here” 2014), James Knapp (“Scrape” 2013), and Nelda Swiggett (“Stringtet” 2014) as well as tours to South America with Anschell (2012, 2014) and Kendrick (2013).…
Angie Tabor
Faculty
Angie Tabor (they/them) is a performing musician, music educator and composer based in Port Townsend, WA. They are known for being highly versatile, performing with jazz ensembles, symphony orchestras, music theater productions, and Top 40 & tribute acts. They can also be heard performing on steelpans with their Caribbean-infused trio, Caribe. As a music educator, they have taught grades K-12 and college.…
Jo-ey Tang
Jo-ey Tang is an artist, writer, and curator who experiments with the formats of versions, repetitions, and iterations as an ongoing engagement with time and its potential. As an artist, he has exhibited at Kunsthalle Zürich; Musée d’art contemporain de la Haute-Vienne; IAC – Institut d’art contemporain, Villeurbanne / Rhône-Alpes. His writing on art has appeared in Brooklyn Rail, Flash Art, Paper Monument, and artforum.com, and for exhibitions and publications at Centre Pompidou, Wexner Center for the Arts, and Baxter Street / Camera Club of New York.…
Miss Tess
Miss Tess has always been known for creating an eclectic array of vintage blues, country, and jazz sounds. Currently residing in Nashville, she finds no shortage of inspiration in the roots scene there. However varied Tess’ music can be, front and center sits her voice that has been described as “alternately seductive and sexy, and a pure joy to listen to” (Pop Matters).…
Katie Thiroux
Faculty
Bass
Los Angeles-based bassist and vocalist Katie Thiroux has clearly established herself as one of the most exciting and in demand musicians today. Thiroux’s unique gift of simultaneously balancing sultry vocals and virtuosic bass playing leaves audiences worldwide in awe. Her most recent album, “Off Beat,” was awarded a “Best Album Of 2018” by Downbeat Magazine as well as “Rising Star” 2018 & 2019.…
Jay Thomas
Faculty
Trumpet & Sax
Jay Thomas is a multi-instrumentalist, appearing on more than 60 recordings that run the gamut from hip-hop to acid-jazz, rock, Latin, and big band. Jay has performed in concert with numerous prominent musicians, including Mel Lewis, John Clayton and Jeff Hamilton, Maria Schneider, Bill Holman, Bob Florence, and Frank Wess. He has also played at the Wolf Trap, Aspen, and duMaurier Jazz Festivals.…
Elizabeth Thorpe
Editing Workshop Faculty
Elizabeth Thorpe teaches writing at Drexel University and Olympic College. She earned an MFA in Fiction from Goddard College, and is a literary editor for freelance clients and a proofreader for design company 160over90. Her short fiction collection, Cities, was published by Texture Press in 2015. Her short stories, poems, and essays have appeared in Per Contra, escarp, Kahini, Painted Bride Quarterly, and The Maine Review, among others.…
Bryan Tolentino
‘Ukulele player, Bryan Tolentino has been known for the past forty plus years as an accompanist and soloist who has performed locally and abroad with some of Hawaiʻi’s most well known and accomplished music artists. Bryan’s recorded on over 60 CD’s for other artists as well as compilations adding his unique “fairy dusting”, as he calls it.…
Meghan Trainor
Meghan Elizabeth Trainor is a Seattle-based artist, writer, lecturer, performer and curator. Trainor’s practice centers her scholarship in the throughlines between computer science, technology, and esoterica. She frames this through storytelling around bogs, logic and digital witchcraft, and the use and histories of electronics and electricity. Trainor is the Curator of the M. Rosetta Hunter Art Gallery at Seattle Central College.…
Teeny Tucker
Voice
Although Teeny was born into blues royalty, (daughter of Tommy “Hi-Heel Sneakers” Tucker), one need only to hear Teeny to know that she has cultivated and developed her “gifts” into her very own uniquely compelling world-class package. As a child, this Dayton Ohio native began singing in the church choir. This experience, like so many other soulful success stories, undoubtedly began to chart the course of Teeny’s music career.…
Yoseff Tucker
Yoseff’s early life exposure to traditional bluegrass and American roots music came courtesy of his grandfather who moved to Central California from the Ozarks in the early 20th century. His first guitar came to him while he was still in diapers and an appreciation for music laid a great foundation in his life.
Brandon Vamos
Cello, Pacifica Quartet
Brandon Vamos is professor of practice (cello) at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music and a member of the Pacifica Quartet, the school’s quartet-in-residence.
He has appeared as soloist with orchestras worldwide and has collaborated with many distinguished artists, including Paul Katz, Michael Tree, Yo-Yo Ma, Menahem Pressler, and the Emerson Quartet, and has recorded for Cedille, Naxos, and Cacophony Records.…
Niki Van Duren
Data and Donor Relations Manager
Niki Van Duren (Data and Donor Relations Manager) comes to us with much experience in leave programs, recruitment, HRIS systems, and administrative generalist duties. Most recently hailing from Portland, Niki has been in Port Townsend since early 2020. She is drawn to Centrum’s art programs, particularly the writer’s programs.
Grace Van’t Hof
Michigan native Grace van’t Hof has taken their unique shade of ukulele playing across the United States and overseas with such groups as Bill and the Belles, Aaron Jonah Lewis’ Ragtime Banjo Revival, and Chris Jones & the Night Drivers. Driven by inspiration from 1920s and 30s country and popular music, Grace thoughtfully incorporates their uke stylings into all sorts of genres from Bluegrass to Spanish Baroque music.…
Sachal Vasandani
Faculty
Sachal Vasandani is recognized for his singular voice, with a tone and unique phrasing that mark him as one of the most compelling artists on the scene today.
Craig Ventresco
Guitar
Craig Ventresco is a San Francisco-based guitarist and revivalist of early 20th Century jazz, pop, and folk material. He grew up in Maine, but established himself as a guitarist specializing in older styles of American popular music by playing on the street every day for tips in San Francisco, beginning in the late 1980’s.…
Eric Verlinde
Vocal Accompanist
Piano
Eric Verlinde is a highly trained piano accompanist in the Pacific Northwest. You are always in good hands with Eric at the keys. Specializing in multiple genres including jazz, Latin, blues, gospel and R&B. He also has a classical background and can play written music as well. He is an alumni of Berklee College of music.…
Shawn Vestal
Past Faculty
Shawn Vestal’s debut novel, Daredevils, was published in spring 2016 by Penguin Press. His collection of short stories, Godforsaken Idaho, published by New Harvest in April 2013, was named the winner of the PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize.
Hannah Viano
Faculty
Hannah Viano is an adventurous artist, educator, and mother living and creating in the Pacific Northwest. Her artwork is done in a variety of media, all starting from sketch studies in the field and then moving to the studio, using simple tools to create graphic images and capture the essential lines of a place or subject.…
Victoria Vox
Faculty
Victoria Davitt, better known as Victoria Vox, is an award-winning, ukulele-toting, performing songwriter. With a passion for writing songs since she was 10 years old, she went on to graduate with a degree in Songwriting from the Berklee College of Music (Boston, MA).
Lisa Waipio Werner
Director of Operations
Lisa Waipio Werner (Director of Operations) is alumni of the University of California at Irvine and has owned and managed a variety of successful businesses. In 2008, she came to Port Townsend from Kapa’au, Hawai’i to work as volunteer coordinator and residency program manager at Centrum. Raised in a family of musicians and ocean sports enthusiasts, her hobbies include playing flute and guitar and racing outrigger canoes.…
Jeremy Wakefield
Steel Guitar
Jeremy Wakefield is a steel guitarist and composer living and working in Portland, Oregon. He first discovered the sound of the steel guitar coming out of a thing called a radio, on the kitchen table of his grandparents’ South Dakota home. Jeremy has recorded and performed live with a multitude of Western Swing, Country and Lounge artists , but is probably most known for his background compositions in the SpongeBob SquarePants series. He also enjoys writing descriptions of himself in the third person.
Melody Walker
Melody Walker is a songwriter, producer, performer, and fervent believer that songs can change the world. Best known for her writing with Molly Tuttle, Sierra Ferrell, Della Mae and her own band Front Country, Melody’s post-pandemic recalibration has found her setting real roots down in her home of Nashville, co-writing with her talented neighbors, and hosting her weekly writers’ round, Writers’ Kitchen.…
Chris Wallace
Gospel Choir
Chris Wallace, hailing from the small town of West Point, Georgia, has been immersed in music for as long as he can remember. Starting out at just 11 years old, Chris began playing music for churches, and it’s been his passion ever since. Currently, he serves as the Minister of Music at The Friendship Baptist Church in Columbus, GA, with past roles at Spirit Filled Ministries, Bethlehem Baptist Church, Asbury United Methodist Church, and Sightseeing Road Chapel at Fort Benning.…
JD Walter
Faculty
Vocal
Vocalist and songwriter JD Walter is considered by many in the jazz world to be the among the very best jazz singers, known for his immediately recognizable smokey sound, his virtuosic talent for improvisation, his compelling original songs, and his ability to reinvent standards.
Over the decades, Walter has performed as a featured artist at numerous American jazz clubs and festivals in the U.S., Europe, the Middle East, and Central America as well as over 80 tours in Russia.…
Ian B Walters
Faculty
Ian B. Walters plays spirited, updated blues and standards as well as contemporary tunes. Known for his unique piano sound, dripping with soul vocals, and all-around good vibes, Ian’s inventive interpretations of great old songs make them new again.
Daniel Ward
Daniel Ward is an accomplished musician, composer and educator, who has become one of the country’s top clinicians and performers on the ‘ukulele circuit’. He is known for his command of Latin styles and teaches right hand techniques, adapting his style and knowledge from the classical and flamenco guitar.
Daniel Ward
Daniel Ward’s polymath approach is born from his passion and appetite for the diversity of music. Born in Los Alamos, NM to a nuclear chemist/conductor, he holds degrees in classical guitar and composition from the University of New Mexico. As a performer and composer, his work spans a wide ranging gamut: flamenco guitar, heavy metal, virtuosic ukulele, classical string quartets and four-hands piano pieces, kid’s music, jazz, commercial jingles, film soundtracks… he has what musicians call “big ears”.…
Matt Weiner
Big tone and solid rhythm have made Matt Weiner one of the busiest bass players in the Northwest. Inspired by the “prebop” bass players and their music, he’s slapping out a syncopated jazz feel on one tune, on another bowing a folksy melody.
Lightnin’ Wells
Mike Lightnin’ Wells hails from North Carolina and has had a long time interest and fascination with the ukulele. His main interest is in the mainland style of uke which was made popular during the jazz age during the 1920s and he has a repertoire of over one hundred pieces originating from this era. He owns a family of at least a dozen vintage ukuleles of various sizes and shapes including banjo ukes and a tiple.…
Ben Wendel
Faculty
Sax
Grammy nominated saxophonist Ben Wendel was born in Vancouver, Canada and raised in Los Angeles, CA. Currently living in Brooklyn, NY, he has enjoyed a varied career as a performer, composer and producer. Highlights include tours, performances and/or recordings with artists such as Tigran Hamasyan, Bill Frisell, Terence Blanchard, Antonio Sanchez, Gerald Clayton, Taylor Eigsti, Linda May Han Oh, Moonchild, Louis Cole, Daedelus, Snoop Dogg and the artist formerly known as Prince.…
April Werle
April Werle (she/her) is a narrative painter, whose works investigate how culture is internalized and negotiated as a mixed-race person. Influenced by her Filipino heritage and multicultural upbringing, Werle’s works explore themes of mixed-race identity, family, and belonging. She reimagines memories and shared family stories, skillfully capturing the nuances of body language, particularly through the expressive use of hands.…
Eli West
Faculty
It’s always illuminating to ask an artist how they understand music, but Eli West’s perspective is nothing short of ground-breaking. A trained designer, he sees music architecturally, visualizing his compositions spatially. It’s a highly unusual way to think about music, tied to his verdant natural world of the Pacific Northwest.
Wes Westmoreland
Texas
Wes Westmoreland III was born into a family whose musical history goes back many decades. His granddad, H. D. Westmoreland Sr., an accomplished fiddler, began teaching Wes to play at age nine. The fiddle tunes Wes had heard all his life came easy to him and he began to play in contests all over the state of Texas.…
Jiggs Whigham
Faculty
Trombone
Jiggs Whigham is an internationally acclaimed trombonist, band leader and educator. This versatile performer, born Oliver Haydn Whigham III (the nickname Jiggs was given by his grandfather) in Cleveland Ohio on 20 August 1943, first came to the attention of critics and fans at 17, as featured soloist and first trombonist with the Glenn Miller Orchestra, directed by Ray McKinley.…
Alasdair White
Faculty
Alasdair White is an exceptional exponent of west coast Scottish music and is widely regarded as one of the foremost Scottish fiddler players of his generation. He was born and brought up on the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides, a chain of islands of singular importance to Gaelic Scotland’s musical heritage and is perhaps best known as having been a member of Scotland’s seminal Battlefield Band for over 16 years.
Earl White
Virginia
with Mark Olitsky – banjo, Adrienne Davis – guitar, and Joseph DeJarnette – bass.
Fiddling Earl White has been a mainstay in the old-time, folk and dance community for more than 45 years. An original and founding member of the famed Green Grass Cloggers, he is one of few Black Americans preserving and playing Appalachian old time string band music, which was an intricate part of Black communities and formed the foundation of American music of today. …
Jim White
Faculty
Drums
Drummer Jim White is an active performer and educator. His first musical experiences took place in his hometown of Atlanta, Georgia, where he studied percussion with Paul Yancinch, Mike Cebulski, Sonny Emory, and Jeff Sipe. He holds a Master of Arts degree in Jazz Studies/Composition from Middle Tennessee State University, and a Bachelor of Music degree from the University of North Texas.…
Lisbeth White
Residency & Artist Projects Program Assistant
Lisbeth is a writer and ritualist born and raised in the Pacific Northwest. With a background in creative writing and expressive arts therapy, she is dedicated to creating and supporting communities that uplift artists and cultural creators. She is the author of the poetry collection American Sycamore, and co-editor of the anthology Poetry as Spellcasting: Poems, Essays, and Prompts for Manifesting Liberation and Reclaiming Power.…
Michael White Hayes
Director of Production
Michael White Hayes (Director of Production) embodies the jack-of-all-trades archetype for the arts. Having graduated from NYU with a degree in filmmaking he’s gone on to work in that industry as a Cinematographer and Lighting Director to Sound Designer and Sound Mixer. He’s toured the world with New York Harlem Production’s official Gershwin production of the opera Porgy and Bess, won awards for Sound Design, composed music for television shows that have appeared on the Discovery Channel, and helped create several Youtube indie shows.…
Phil Wiggins
Faculty
Phil Wiggins is a versatile traditional harmonica player, continuing the Piedmont blues tradition, a gentle and melodic blues style of the mid-Atlantic region. He plays the diatonic ten-hole harmonica in the country blues style, cupping both hands around the instrument and playing acoustically.
Buster Williams
Faculty
Bass
Buster Williams is a prodigious artist whose playing knows no limits. He has played, recorded and collaborated with jazz giants such as Art Blakey, Betty Carter, Carmen McRae, Chet Baker, Chick Corea, Dexter Gordon, Jimmy Heath, Branford Marsalis, Wynton Marsalis, Gene Ammons, Sonny Stitt, Herbie Hancock, Larry Coryell, Lee Konitz, McCoy Tyner, Illinois Jacquet, Nancy Wilson, Elvin Jones, Miles Davis, the Jazz Crusaders, Ron Carter, Woody Shaw, Sarah Vaughan, Benny Golson, Mary Lou Williams, Hank Jones, Lee Morgan, Jimmy Rowles, Hampton Hawes, Cedar Walton, Bobby Hutcherson, Billy Taylor, Sonny Rollins, Count Basie, Errol Garner, Kenny Barron, Charlie Rouse, Dakota Staton, Kenny Dorham, and Freddie Hubbard, to name a few.…
Jontavious Willis
Artistic Director, Acoustic Blues
Blues musician and multi-instrumentalist, Jontavious Willis, from Georgia, has been named Centrum’s Artistic Director for Acoustic Blues beginning in 2020.
Reeb Willms
Faculty
Reeb Willms has been singing and playing guitar since 2001 and is widely regarded as one of the best rhythm guitar players in old time music. She hails from the windswept Central Washington farmlands of Douglas County, and was heavily influenced as a child by her musical father and uncles, who performed locally as the Willms Brothers. Her warm, tender vocals and driving rhythms are a living testament to this musical tradition, which she brought to the stage in her early 20s.
George Wilson
Faculty
George has performed and recorded with the popular “Fennig’s All-Star String Band”, featuring Bill Spence on hammered dulcimer, since 1975. He has performed and recorded with the “Whippersnappers” (Wilson, Peter Davis and Frank Orsini) since 1976.
Matt Wilson
Faculty
Drums
Grammy nominee Matt Wilson leads the Matt Wilson Quartet, Arts and Crafts, Christmas Tree-O, and the Carl Sandburg Project. He is an integral part of bands led by Joe Lovano, John Scofield, Charlie Haden, Lee Konitz, Bob Stewart, Denny Zeitlin, Ron Miles, Marty Ehrlich, Ted Nash, Jane Ira Bloom, and Dena DeRose among others.…
Martin Wind
Faculty
Bassist and composer Martin Wind was born in Flensburg, Germany in 1968 and has been living in the New York City area since 1996.He earned a diploma as Orchestra Musician at the Cologne Conservatory and completed his master’s degree in jazz composition and performance at NYU.
Peter Winograd
Violin, American String Quartet
Peter Winograd (violin) joined the American String Quartet in 1990. He gave his first solo public performance at the age of 11, and at age 17 he was accepted as a scholarship student of Dorothy DeLay at The Juilliard School. Recognized early as an exceptionally promising young artist, Winograd was a top prize winner in the 1988 Naumburg International Violin Competition.…
Carolyn Woods
Faculty
Carolyn Woods is the Education Coordinator at the Port Townsend Marine Science Center. In her many different roles at the Marine Science Center she has led education programs on a variety of Salish Sea marine biology topics from plankton to sea birds, in addition to responding to the occasional stranded seal pup or diving deep into dissecting a beached gray whale.…
Linzay Young
Faculty
Fiddle, Louisiana. Linzay is a versatile fiddler, soulful singer and a talented songwriter. A founding member of the notorious Red Stick Ramblers of Louisiana, he is a true link in the chain of Cajun Music and Culture whether he’s wielding a fiddle bow, playing his accordion or cooking in a blackpot.
Alvin Youngblood Hart
Guitar
The cosmic American love child of Howlin’ Wolf and Link Wray… Known as a “musician’s musician,” Alvin Youngblood Hart’s praises have been sung by everyone from Bob Dylan to guitar gods Gary Moore & Mick Taylor. “Alvin Youngblood Hart is as good as you’ll ever hear ” – Bob Dylan 2022 from his book The Philosophy of Modern Song.…