Ashley Danyew, Steve Danyew

Co-Artistic Directors, Westminster Chamber Music Workshop

Monday, March 19, 2012
8:00pm eastern

Presenting Concerts in Your Local Community – Creative Ideas for Making Concerts Happen Anywhere

As musicians, we love to put on concerts, perform for others, showcase our friends, and share our passion for music with all kinds of audiences. Organizing a concert or a series of events can seem daunting, and we often make excuses why it's not possible or won't be successful. In this webinar, we will discuss how we made music happen in our community – from finding sources of funding, to finding performers and venues, to building a local audience base, and more! We will use the Westminster Chamber Music Workshop (WCMW), a chamber music series based in a small New England town as a case study for thinking about creative ways to make music happen in any community – large or small. This webinar will give you the tools to create your own opportunities for music-making and presenting. There is always a way to make it happen - we just need to be creative!

Ashley Danyew
Pianist Ashley Danyew is active as a collaborator, chamber musician, and studio teacher. A James M. Barnett Jr., Foundation Scholar, Ashley received her B.A. in Music, cum laude from the Hugh Hodgson School of Music at the University of Georgia. She recently completed an M.M. in Music Education at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York and received the Certificate in Arts Leadership from Eastman's Institute for Music Leadership. Currently, Ashley is the Director of Music at the First Congregational Church of Westminster, Adjunct Faculty at Fitchburg State University, and Co-Artistic Director of the Westminster Chamber Music Workshop. Ashley's interests include studio teaching, chamber music performance, community music education, and innovative concert programming.

Steve Danyew
Steve Danyew's music has been hailed as "startlingly beautiful" and "undeniably well crafted and communicative" by the Miami Herald, and has been praised as possessing "sensitivity, skill and tremendous sophistication" by the Kansas City Independent. He is the recipient of numerous national and international awards from organizations including BMI, ASCAP, SCI, CBDNA, Octarium, the Shoreline Chorale, the Delaware Valley Chorale, Ithaca College, Austin Peay State University, Keene State College, and more. Danyew received his B.M. from the Frost School of Music at the University of Miami and holds and M.M. and Certificate in Arts Leadership from the Eastman School of Music. Additionally, Danyew has served as a composer fellow at the Wellesley Composers Conference and the Yale Summer Music School at Norfolk.

SteveDanyew.com
AshleyMorganArts.com
WestminsterChamberMusic.org

Krista Lang Blackwood

Artistic Director, Octarium

Monday, April 16, 2012
8:00pm eastern

The Changing Face of Choral Recording and Distribution

As iPods, iPhones and other popular devices become more populated with apps designed to make recording engineers out of anyone who has a finger to press "record," it becomes increasingly important that producers of classical choral recordings pay even more attention to processes, quality-control and logical distribution paths. Octarium has recorded four CDs and is in the midst of their fifth. Each CD has presented challenges and each CD has been produced with different equipment and a different recording philosophy. Each CD has also been distributed in different ways. This webinar is designed to present the basics of the recording process, as well as highlight questions of recording style, recording philosophy and mixing and editing of choral sound. It will also delve into the issues of obtaining mechanical rights and digital rights and present good options for distribution of both the physical CD product and the digital product.

Krista Lang Blackwood
Octarium's Artistic Director Dr. Krista Lang Blackwood brings a diversity of education and experience to her conducting that helps make Octarium one of the freshest vocal sounds in American choral music. Octarium's philosophy is more one of chamber musicians than traditional choral singers, exemplifying the concept of "musical synergy," and singing with such combined artistry that phrasing, breath, nuance, and dynamics all happen spontaneously. The eight singers become so connected that they think and sing as one, and the results are "breathless unity, polish and meticulously crafted balance" (Paul Horsley, Kansas City Star). Blackwood has been a professional singer since 1987 and has toured internationally as a soloist and performing a wide range of musical genres from opera to musical theatre, choral music and oratorio. She graduated cum laude from Texas Christian University in 1992 with a Bachelor's degree in All-level Vocal Music Education. She completed her Master's degree in Vocal Performance in 2000, her Master's degree in Musicology in 2002, and her DMA degree in Voice in 2003, all from the University of Kansas. While at the University of Kansas, Blackwood sang under the baton of Simon Carrington, founding member of the Kings Singers. This experience was the culmination of a choral education garnered through the years under such choral directors as Ronald Shirey, Larry Palmer, Jing Ling Tam, Gordon Nelson, Craig Jessop, Z. Randall Stroope, Almeda Berkey, and Charles Bruffy. Blackwood has produced all of Octairum's recording releases, including the award-winning self-titled debut album.

Octarium.org