Song Village Collaborators
Song Circle Leader/Collaborators for 2023 are listed below. Our 2024 line up will be added to this page as we get closer to the event.
Song Village is a “gathering” not a workshop. That means we are open to proposals from skilled songleaders who would like to lead a song circle. Leading a song circle does not earn you you credit on the registration fee, but it is a fun way to be a part of the community. A large percentage of our participants are themselves songleaders. Song Village is particularly popular for songleaders, as an opportunity to network and share material. Thus, even great songleaders must register as paid participants. To propose a Song Circle, please fill out this form.
Karly Loveling
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2024
Karly Loveling, creator of Singing Heart Harmonies in Eugene, Oregon, brings songs to life in her heart and community, honoring the pleasure and the pain; encouraging breath, connection, healing, and expression through songwriting, community stewardship, and the uplifting gift of harmony. Karly’s songs are heartfelt layered songs that are well-loved by Community Songleaders as catchy, accessible, well-written songs with clear and beautiful messages. Website
Amanda West
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2024
Maggie Wheeler
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2023
Maggie Wheeler is a passionate singer, prolific songwriter, choir director and workshop facilitator. She has been teaching her vocal workshop “Singing In The Stream”for over 30 years, creating interpersonal harmony and internal harmony through the powerful act of creating vocal harmony. Maggie directs the 100-voice Golden Bridge Community Choir in Hollywood, an inter-generational, non-auditioned choir now in its 17th year. While Maggie is known internationally for her work as an actress it is her song leading that feeds her soul. website.
Aimee Ringle
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2023
Aimée (Port Townsend) is a musician, song-leader and storyteller. She has an invigorating teaching style, and “got pocket” percussion and guitar skills. Aimée’s work as a song-leading and storyteller have woven her into an ever widening community of cultural shifters around the country in the realms of sustainable agriculture, alternative education, community living, healing, creativity, and spiritual exploration – all of which are reflected in the songs that she carries. As a song-leader, Aimée has been an integral part of the Singing Alive! gatherings and often co-leads with Laurence Cole. Facebook Page.
Steven Walters
Songleader Confirmed for 2023
With a playful simplicity Steven Walters invokes the most tender feeling level of the heart, moving you deeply — to joy and laughter one moment, unabashed tears the next. With deftly woven lyrics and masterful guitar work, his songs are offerings of humor, spirit and sweetness — serious music for the lighthearted soul.
Trevor Justice
Song Circle Leader, Confirmed for 2023
Trevor is an award-winning songwriter who lifts spirits, heals hearts, and inspires courage. He’s collaborated with hit songwriters, appeared on cable TV, and inspired congregations around the country with his positive message songs. The music video of his song “Love Yourself” received over 100,000 views on FB and the video of his song “Yes We Can” received over 50,000 views on Youtube. Trevor leads retreats that will liberate you from the costs of not fully loving and respecting yourself…. such as compromising your self-respect to please your partner, or settling for relationships that frustrate or disappoint you. Website.
Amy Cooper
Song Village Co-Founder Confirmed for 2024
Amy (Santa Cruz) is lead singer for the band, Just Love, and co-creator of Song Village. You can hear Amy sing at JustLoveBand.com
Victoria Angel Heart
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2023
Victoria Angel Heart stands in the power of her name as a messenger of love through meditation, sacred music, and embodied intimacy work. She holds space as a conduit of love and instrument of grace, and catches and shares meditations and songs of the heart. She regularly facilitates sold-out events in the Bay Area, and has recently launched the Hearts In Harmony Song Circle.
Heather Houston
Song Circle Leader . Confirmed for 2024
Rooted deeply in Santa Cruz, CA, Heather has devoted her life to revealing the essence of Love through singing. She is a spirited chant and song circle leader, renowned vocal coach, acclaimed songwriter and recording artist known for her soulful voice and passion for community building. Website.
Kira Seto
Song Circle Leader, Confirmed for 2024
Kira has been songleading since 2017, ever since she experienced deep liberation with her own voice through aural-tradition community singing. She believes deeply in the unifying and healing experience of singing beautiful songs together. She brings a wellspring of powerful songs with heart and passion. She is a graduate of Littlebird’s Songleader Flight School (2020) and currently leads Open Hub Singing, a drop-in weekly singing group in Bend, OR. Website.
Kaitie Ty Warren
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2024
Kaitie Ty Warren is a songleader, teacher, writer and performer. Passionate about waking people up to their joyful potential in body, voice and harmony, Kaitie is dedicated to creating safe, communal spaces for humans of all ages to play and get silly together while creating beautiful music. She teaches speech for people with Parkinson’s, directs The Living Room Choir, teaches voice lessons, and writes, records and performs music, prose, and audiobooks. website
Yuri Woodstock
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2024
Yuri Woodstock wants life to become more of a musical. A teacher of simple back-pocket songs, as well as complex layered polyphonic compositions, there is always a right song for the moment, and for the group. The goal is to maximize enjoyment and interconnectivity for the singers in the experience of vocal harmony. Yuri Leads the Hark! Community Choir in Asheville, NC, and attended the Community Choir Leadership Training in Victoria., BC. Website.
Debbie Nargi-Brown
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2024
Debbie Nargi-Brown (Santa Cruz) relies upon drumming, dancing, singing, and the creation of a safe place to ignite joy, passion, and a sense of community in her workshops. She embraces and embodies the healing and sacredness of the songs and dances. She writes songs for the heart, for healing, for transformation, for love, for grief, all those things that connect us as human beings. Website.
Mo Washburn
Song Circle Leader, Confirmed for 2024
i am a listener, a song, body, plant and community tender. one who savors each day and the connections, ups downs and all arounds within them~knowing that the next day is never a given. trying to do my part in tending the seeds of a future i pray for. website
Heather Pierson
Song Circle Leader, Confirmed for 2023
Marv Zauderer
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2024
Marv (he/they) leads two weekly song circles on unceded Coast Miwok land in Marin County, CA, and a monthly circle online at SingOnline.org. He’s passionate about the unique power of singing together to connect us more deeply within, to each other, and to something larger than ourselves. He loves sharing songs that can accompany us in our full range of aliveness – love, sadness, shame, surprise, anger, fear, and joy. website
Juliana Murphy
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2023
Juliana Murphy is here to be delighted. As a human on this planet, she seeks to cultivate the delight that is our collective birthright. As a singer/songwriter, and songleader, she delights in the power of song to reweave connection, culture, bodies, and beings. As a seeker and child of many cultures, Juliana is learning to delight in the paradoxical weaving of the lineages carried in her blood, bones, and heart. Website.
Jessi Radovich & Yam
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2023
Yam & Jessi have been singing together wholeheartedly since 2017. Their unique style of soulful songs bottle the medicine of everyday life and serve it up with levity and groove. The duo currently resides on unceded Lummi territory (Bellingham, WA), producing and cohosting a podcast together about community singing called Bliss Is Ordinary, and are the founding members of the song collective Earth Practice. Website.
Laura Sera
Song Circle Leader, Confirmed for 2023
Laura Sera is passionately committed to the healing and transformative power of song — it has beautifully awakened and expanded her life, and her greatest wish is for it to awaken and expand your life, too! She is the founder of Voices of the Heart singing circles, where she holds space for singers to free their creative voices and uncover the truths of their own hearts. She writes songs that restore our connection to ourselves, to each other, to nature, and to love. Website.
Roberta Kirn
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2023
Roberta Kirn is a song leader, percussionist, and dancer who has been leading community singing for over 20 years. She is the founder of BeWellSing, through which she brings singing in community to as many people as she can. Her most important teachers have been Ysaye Barnwell and Bobby McFerrin. Roberta has traveled to Haiti, Africa, and Europe as part of her Song Exchange Project, teaching and collecting songs to share at home and wherever she travels. Website.
Dodie Whitaker
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2024
Dodie Whitaker, a multifaceted performing artist, activist and educator, brings infectious enthusiasm and over 40 years of musical experience to strengthen and empower communities and create lasting systemic change. Based in Wisconsin’s Driftless Region, Dodie combines music, social justice, and community building to foster inclusivity and racial equity through education, advocacy and collaborative singing. Website
Kele Nitoto
Song Circle Leader, Drummer. Confirmed for 2024
Kele Nitoto is a second generation African-American percussionist and singer. Born and raised in the Oakland Dance Culture, Kele Has studied with Masters of many styles, becoming proficient in West-African, Congolese, Afro-Cuban, Afro-Peruvian, and Afro-Haitian traditional musics. Over the last 25 years, Kele has performed throughout the country in dance companies, bands, and teaching workshops and classes, summer camps, spiritual and workplace retreats, and for countless ceremonies and celebrations.
Shireen Amini
Song Circle Leader, Confirmed for 2023
Shireen Amini (she/elle) is a queer, second-generation Puerto Rican-Iranian-American, Earth-loving, social justice-oriented musician based on the original territory of the Confederated Tribes of Grande Ronde, otherwise known as Portland, Oregon. She recently released a socially-conscious pop record called “Break Myself Free” and also serves her community as a teaching artist, songleader, and facilitator through her project Shireen Amini Music Medicine. Website.
alinahh cedar tigre ever
Song Circle Leader, Confirmed for 2024
alinahh cedar tigre ever (ki/ker) grew up singing (& dancing) in community at home and in synagogue. Ki leads the Meadowlark Community Chorus, a new youth chorus, monthly Songcircles, and Nigun Circles (Jewish wordless chants). Founder of the Faerie Kin (stilt-walking eco-theatre musical faerie troupe), and Singing Alive Appalachia/Earth Song Rising (communal song gatherings). Ki is a cloth weaver, natural dyer, earth craftsperson, visual artist, singer, songwriter, puppeteer, avid forager of original Earth garden food, bird lover, flower kisser, queer gender-free wild child. Currently, ki lives on Catawba & Cherokee (Tsalagee) land, aka Earthaven Ecovillage in the southern Appalachian mountains of western north carolina. In the past, ki lived in the bay area and was the co-founder of two ritual (and mostly song-based) communities: Queer Minyan and Pardes Rimonim (a Jewish feminist Earth-based multicultural community).
Lilianna Parker
Song Circle Leader, Confirmed for 2023
Lilianna has been teaching music for 25 years in grades K-8. Lilianna has played piano, Gamelans, the nay (a wooden flute), and Western silver flute. She also traveled to both South Africa and Ghana to study music with teachers she met and worked with in the states.
Laura Knutson
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2023
Laura is a Song Leader, Yoga Therapist, mother, and nature loving song-bird at heart who has been self-soothing with song since she can remember. She is on a healing journey of self-love, higher guidance, and empowerment, and has a passion for cultivating spaces of safety and belonging where people feel supported and celebrated to come as they are, using mediums of embodiment, intention, sound and song to more fully connect with themselves and with community on a soulful level. website.
atreya
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2023
atreya, from maui, is passionate about caring for Mother Earth, and models and encourages mindfulness and action in service of this deep love. He appreciates and is passionate about the Hawaiian Islands and weaves and shares his knowledge in between songs and within the songs themselves. At the end of a song circle with atreya, you leave feeling better about yourself and your place in the world! He is a talented, charismatic musician and a kind and conscientious leader; highly sensitive, honest and accountable. He shows up with values-driven authenticity and possesses the rare quality of being a man who holds genuinely safe space for women. His deep, potent presence stands out and enriches the whole community.
Laurence Cole
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2024
Laurence Cole (Port Townsend, WA) has been leading song circles at various song gatherings and festivals for many years across North America. He is an advocate for the reclaiming of our natural right to sing together as a most basic and primal technology of belonging and connection. In a wounded culture of separation, we can regain the enlivening power of group singing using only what we came in with; our hearts, our souls, our voices, our love. Website.
Sarah MacEwan
Song Village Organizer 2024
Sarah MacEwan (she/her), aka The Singing Therapist, is on a mission to heal and be healed through creative self-expression. As a psychotherapist, singer, storyteller and grief-tender, Sarah brings her open heart and emotional expertise to every circle she facilitates. Sing with her in Santa Cruz at her Singing Heals Song Circles. Website
Laura Lockwood
Volunteer Coordinator 2024
Laura Lockwood (she/her) first discovered Song Village in 2021 when she attended with her sister Sarah MacEwan, and she has been hooked on community singing ever sense. This year, Laura is looking forward to moving into a supportive role so that Song Village can continue to be a place where all people feel welcome to sing and gather in community. When she’s not singing, she spends most of her time working in wildlife rescue, dancing, and is also in the (slow going) process of teaching herself how to play the ukulele and the banjo.
Ahlay Blakely
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2023
Valerie Byrne
Song Circle Leader, Confirmed for 2023
Val Byrne brings years of practice as a therapist to her circles, recognizing the power of self expression through song as a magical tool for transformation and healing. The simplicity of circle singing allows for participants of all levels, and this inclusivity is Val’s highest priority. Her musical background includes years of study and performance in college and in Heather Houston’s choir Yala Lati as a soloist and section leader. She has performed in Spiritual Centers, and has been part of numerous recording projects. She lives in Santa Cruz in a happy and cozy home near the beach, where the music and creativity are always flowing. Website
Gretchen Sleicher & Ruth Warner Carillo
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2023
Gretchen Sleicher is a singer/songwriter and longtime songleader living in Port Townsend. She’s worked extensively with Joanna Macy, and loves weaving group singing and harmony-making into Work That Reconnects practices.
Ruth Warner Carrillo is a musician and singer living in Albuquerque. Influenced by harmonizing with family, years in Latin America and social change activism, she cofounded the group Lasotras, which plays folk and social justice music from throughout the Americas.. Website.
Tim Hartnett
Song Village Co-Founder Confirmed for 2024
Tim (Santa Cruz) is a songwriter and original instigator of Song Village. His band, Just Love, has recorded four CDs of sweet/vulnerable/spiritual songs. You can hear some at the Just Love website.
Kjersten Hallin
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2023
Kjersten Hallin is an Earth lover, mother, artist, musician, and visionary of Swedish/Norwegian ancestry, born near the Great Lakes, on Anishnabe, Lakhota, Dakhota land. From there, she has “troubadoured” far and wide for the past 20 years, raising her children and performing original music as a live-looping songstress known as Magic Mama, Eco-edutainer. She has recorded 3 full-length albums of singer-songwriter style music and is now in the process of capturing her original catches for a group-singing style collection. Kjersten leads CommUnity BlesSings song circles on Kalapuyan land, in and around the Willamette Valley of so-called Oregon, in humble gratitude and deep bows to the Altar of Love. website.
Suzanne Lerner
Song Workshop Leader Confirmed for 2023
As a Transformational Psychologist and Sound Priestess, Suzanne is dedicated to Improvisation>>learning to release “monkey mind” & drop into this Eternal Wellspring of Intuition, Joy, Wisdom & Sacred Wonder. This “inner guidance” has literally saved her life and she is forever grateful and eager to help others reclaim this birthright of the innate knowing revealed, as we learn to follow the “sacred thread” of Spontaneous Sound, Breath & Movement. Suzanne received the Grand Prize in 2021 for her “Spontaneous Prayer Songs w/ the Waters.” Website.
Caitlyn Wild
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2023
I trained w Lisa little bird for the last several years and have a collection of songs I’m ready to bring to the world. I have lead several song circles in Santa Cruz and in addition to my work leading groups of womxn outdoors and camping, I lead group tours foraging and mushroom hunting. I have decades of facilitation experience and I’m excited to step into a bigger container of leadership at this point. website.
Laura Sandage
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2021
Laura Sandage (Davis) is a songwriter, performer, and ancestral healing practitioner. Director of the Free Range Singers and arts-in-community leader for 20+ years, she has the power to invoke the magical potency of song-as-ritual, as well as the presence and humor to invite singers into intimate connection with self and other through song and celebration. Website
Samara Jade
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2022
Samara Jade is a modern folk troubadour – a writer, performer and leader of soul-centered songs that ride the crest of the unknown and are medicine for personal and collective transformation. A touring songwriter and composer, Samara has been catching, weaving, and/or midwifing singalong song beings, many of which are well crafted rounds and multi-layered parts with intricate harmonies and rhythms that invite singers to lean in to the subtleties of deeper listening and are seriously satisfying to sing together in community. Website.
Mark Growden
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2021
Mark Growden is a composer, multi-instrumentalist, singer, music educator, visual artist, and the founder and artistic director of SF SingFest, The Chromatic Community Music Center, The Calling All Choir, and The San Francisco Jaw Harp Choir. He has been facilitating community sings in North America and abroad for over 25 years. Mark has devoted his life to making music for other people and to helping other people make music for themselves. website
Melanie DeMore
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2022
Melanie DeMore is Grammy nominated singer/composer, choral conductor, music director and vocal activist who believes in the power of voices raised together. In her presentations, DeMore beautifully brings her participants together through her music and commentary. DeMore facilitates vocal and stick pounding workshops and directs numerous choral organizations in the Bay Area. Her involvements include: SpeakOut!-The Institute for Social and Cultural Change, Linda Tillery and the Cultural Heritage Choir, Obeah Opera in the Luminato Festival in 2019, and Kate Munger’s Threshold Choirs. She conducts song circles with an emphasis on the voice as a vessel for healing. Website.
Alan Sternik
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2020
Alan is a stumbling but sincere student of Love, and a long time practitioner of the Native American and Tibetan Buddhist ceremonial traditions. He has been blessed to open hearts to the Heart through song and music. He is a singer-songwriter and recording artist and core member of “Acoustic Medicine”. He founded the band, “Shabda” which precipitated the album “Dakini’s Playground” featuring Alan’s original devotional songs.
Michael Santa Cruz
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for June 2019
Michael Santa Cruz has been playing guitar and being a singer songwriter for 40 years in many different styles and environments both as a performing artist and facilitating singing circles with chants and songs that are perfect for building group energy.
Alexa Sunshine Rose
Song Circle Leader Confirmed 2018
Alexa Sunshine Rose (Port Townsend) is a singer-songwriter, mystic, mother and artist. She holds a healing vibration with her original sacred songs, which are born from and for the Heart. Her songs bridge worlds; the inner and outer, the mind and heart, chaos and calm. Website.
Rob Tobias
Song Circle Leader
Rob (Eugene) offers music formed from his experience as a song leader at Singing Alive (since its inception), as well as with Jewish Renewal services and Eugene Playback Theatre improv group. Rob is a Singer-Songwriter, band leader of the Northwest Express, event creator, Jewish Renewal leader, video producer and recording studio owner.
Amanda Rose Loveland
Kirtan Leader
In Love’s music takes you on a journey as we discover together how love is the most transforming force in the cosmos. Amanda dives to the core of her heart to conjure luminous lyricism with a touch of vocal and flute improvisation. She engages life as stage with a spirit of play, magic, and myth mysteriously weaving elements in the musings of the Now. Michael engages the soul in unity through his heart opening voice, lyrics and guitar stylings. Together their soulful harmonies and classic melodies will uplift your heart in All Ways.
Megan Jacobsmeyer
Song Circle Leader
Katie Hicks
Children's Music Leader Confirmed for 2018
Katie (Santa Cruz) grew up in Southern Indiana singing with Malcolm Dalglish, Moira Smiley, and Evie Ladin–her first mentors in music that showed her that singing happened with the whole body! She currently leads family music classes in Santa Cruz, California for parents and their young ones and absolutely loves the relationships she’s made through these classes. Katie loves to write her own songs, too, and specializes in creating & facilitating music that deepens connections to nature as well as always incorporating spontaneity & play.
MaMuse
Song Circle Leaders Confirmed for 2022
Sarah Nutting and Karisha Longaker (Sonoma County) are MaMuse: Ma as in Mamma ~ Muse as in the One who inspires. With deep roots in the folk and gospel traditions, and their hearts in the present, MaMuse creates uplifting music for the next seven generations to thrive on. Interweaving brilliant and haunting harmony with lyrics born of honed emotional intelligence, MaMuse invokes a musical presence that inspires the opening of the heart. Website.
Claudia Cuentas
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2021
Claudia Cuentas, (MA, SEP, MFTI) is an artist, educator, somatic practitioner and researcher. She has been singing and dancing since birth, inspired by sound, the healing arts and the ability of the human spirit to overcome difficulty and transform it into new life. Claudia comes from an Andean lineage of Peru, and for the last 15 years has combined her traditional healing practices with western approaches to work creatively with individuals, couples, families and groups. She offers one on one sessions and group work with elements of Andean sound healing, creative movement and voice embodiment. She has a trauma inform, social justice and cultural awareness approach. She is committed to working and supporting her BIPOC communities into health. Website.
Eric James DeAratanha
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2021
Eric James DeAratanha is a composer and music educator primarily based in the Santa Cruz mountains. Eric’s music is hopeful and inspiring while grounded in deep life experience… sometimes delving into dark places to being rays of light and beauty.
Lakshmi DelSesto
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2021
Lakshmi (Fairfax) is an ecstatic multi-instrumentalist, songwriter and kirtan leader. She performs original and sacred world music regularly at festivals such as Bhaktifest, Shaktifest and Earthdance. She has performed with Jai Uttal, Krishna Das, Karnamrita, Geoffrey Gordon, Suzanne Sterling & more. She also teaches Vocal Sound Healing workshops and individual lessons. Website.
Ari Moshe Wolfe
Song Circle Leader . Confirmed for June 2019
Yari Mander
Music Circle Leader Confirmed for June 2019
Yari Mander is a drummer and rhythm facilitator, and also a K-8 music teacher, who has studied in countries in Africa and Latin America, who loves exploring the integration of voice, rhythm and movement to create connected and fun embodied musical experiences. website
Glen Phillips
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2018
Glen (Santa Barbara) is the lead singer/songwriter for Toad the Wet Sprocket and solo acoustic performer, touring for 30 years. I discovered community singing three years ago and in 2017 started my own circle, which has now expanded to two other towns. I have loved evolving my musical expression from performance to participation, from a spectator sport to an inclusive, immersive experience. Website.
Craig Green & Cleo Keller
Song Circle Leaders
Facilitators Craig Green and Cleo Keller are partners in propagating contemplayful communities. Craig is author of The Contemplayful Songbook. They are co-founders of Woodfolk House of Song, an intentional community and musical sanctuary in Charlottesville, VA. Website
Anthony Parker
Song Circle Leader
Anthony (Marin) is a local musician and guitar teacher. He currently teaches groups of kids to play guitar in Marin county. In addition, he plays lead guitar and sings in the Gypsy Jazz Quartet, The Dukes of Manouche.
Pollyanna Bush
Song Circle Leader
Michael Chorvat
Song Circle leader
Michael (Santa Cruz) writes music for the soul that is meant to inspire and transform. After the sudden passing of his mother a few years ago, he started searching for meaning in his existence. The age old questions of, “why am I here?” and “what’s my purpose in life?” consumed him and so his spiritual journey began. His songs are meant to serve as positive affirmations to awaken the listener to the universe within. In February 2017, Michael embarked on a year long adventure of releasing one song a week for the next year. Facebook Page
Kate Munger & The Threshold Choir
Song Circle Leader
Kate (Inverness) has been leading community singing for over 40 years. On March 21st, 2000, she founded the first Threshold Choir. Since that time she has facilitated the creation of a network of generous, bighearted singers and the collection of a huge repertoire of original songs that are offered at many kinds of thresholds; songs of spirit, inclusivity and truth. Retired now, Kate gets to sing even more at bedsides, jails, hospitals, political rallies and marches, community sings, song baths, airports, retreats and conferences. Website.
Lyndsey Scott
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2022
Lyndsey Scott is an artist and ritual-maker devoted to priestesSing the Heartland, (literal and figurative). She catches and weaves sacred music to empower earth-based spiritual consciousness, and gathers soul circles that use Song and sacred listening to decompose oppressive scripts that get in the way of freely living the Love we are. Website.
Copperwoman
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2022
Copperwoman was born to sing! Her most passion-filled moments are when she finds herself surrounded by a group of people singing with her. She “catches” songs that emerge out of the energy and common experiences of our growing beings. They inspire us with wisdom and insights and rise from a place of core connection. She has been gathering people to sing for decades, around campfires and singing gatherings that she calls CircleSong. Website.
Sara Stutz
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2021
Sara Stutz grew up singing in a musical family, studied music in college and eventually became a pediatric physical therapist, using song and dance to engage and encourage clients. Along the way, Sara has performed and co-directed musical theater, light opera, and garage bands and is currently thrilled to sing and help co-lead songs in The Living Room Choir, an Ubuntu choir directed by Katie Ty Warren in El Cerrito, CA. website
Ian Carrick
Song Circle Leaders Confirmed for 2022
Ian Carrick’s teenage bandmates said he couldn’t sing. So, it is a miracle that today he gets to help folks enjoy singing. Ian co-directs Open Hub Singing in Central Oregon and leads singing for students, corporate groups, and recovering addicts.
Ian’s songs center on strong grooves and shimmery harmonies that go beyond major triads. He is falling in love with Irish music and hopes to weave it into songleading. Website.
Allison Jeanne Faust
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for June 2019
Allison Jeanne Faust believes your authentic singing voice is the mouthpiece of your soul, and that everyone can sing. She is a classically trained musician, vocalist and songwriter who has studied and sang with Bobby McFerrin and Rhiannon. She has led song circles at Spirit Rock , Omega and in community centers and performance halls around Northern California. She directs the improvisational vocal choir Valley Voicestra in San Geronimo.
Jennifer Berezan
Song Circle Leader . Confirmed for 2018
Jennifer (Berkeley) is a unique blend of singer/ songwriter, producer, and activist. Over the course of ten albums, she has developed and explored recurring themes with a rare wisdom. Her lifelong involvement in environmental, women’s, and other justice movements as well as an interest in Buddhism and earth-based spirituality are at the heart of her songwriting. Website.
Aaron Johnson
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2022
Aaron Johnson is a song leader, earth builder, cofounder of Holistic Resistance, and firm believer in the power of music. He has been building community around music for 25 years. Aaron has been a member of his family group, Fivacious, since childhood. Aaron enters music thinking about how to dismantle oppressive systems and remember we are human. Aaron teaches singing and song circles that work on noticing that music is our birthright. Website.
Michelle Namasya Carpenter
Children's Music Leader Confirmed for 2018
Michelle Namasya Carpenter is a lover of life and of all things Spirit. She is currently a Kindergartner teacher at Tara Redwood School. Namasya focuses on teaching mindfulness, peace eduction, and empowering children to make a difference in the world. Namasya is also a professional percussionist. Namasya likes to incorporate yoga, movement, percussion, and song into her classes. Her love for children, passion for Peace, and joy of song help to keep children engaged and excited to learn.
Sarina Partridge
Song Circle Leader
Sarina Partridge is a musician, song-leader and educator in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She feels most alive when learning, creating and sharing songs. Sarina performs, teaches, and tours with a wide variety of music projects – Eastern European and Yiddish song, old-time music, opera, community song-leading… and everything in between. She leads a community choir in Minneapolis, and has a passion for connecting people with their own creativity and with community. Website.
Lisa Littlebird
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2022
Lisa facilitates group singing circles as a transformational personal practice, healing art and to build community. Her Flight School songleading course has helped more than 400 people around the world to share song in their communities with confidence and joy. She has directed the 175-member Wholehearted Chorus in Big Sur & Monterey, and has been on the faculty at Esalen Institute for more than 15 years. Website.
Tonya Abernathy
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2021
Tonya Abernathy has been involved with community healing work and voice embodiment all her life. Passionate about people and joy, she accesses plant allies, sound, music, touch, intuition to lovingly doula individuals healing. Tonya teaches individuals and groups about how to embody their voice for health and well being. She also is a professional singer and has toured for the last years, throughout the country, with Taina Asili and Climbing Poetree. Feeling called to move specifically in grief settings, in groups, she has spent the last few years nurturing that new passion. She has a trauma inform, social justice and cultural awareness approach. She is committed to working and supporting her BIPOC communities into health. Website.
Briony Greenhill
Improvisation Circle Leader Confirmed for 2018
Briony Greenhill teaches Collaborative Vocal Improvisation internationally. Students call her the “Rolls Royce of voice teachers,” a “master” whose work is “life changing.” Website
Katie Sontag
Song Circle Leader Probable for 2021
Katie Sontag, a truth teller and emotional explorer, writes songs that burst forth from her internal experience. A singer/songwriter living in Eugene, OR, she draws from the natural world as well as the complexity of human relationship as her inspiration. Her trainings in Gestalt Therapy and in Process Work are infused into her work. To her, singing and songwriting are methods of opening the heart and healing the soul. Website.
Rachel Anne Goodman
Song Circle Leader Confirmed for 2022
Rachel sings and plays Celtic and folk music on guitar and mandolin with her husband, Steve Coulter, and plays in a couple of local bands, “Boss Tim and the Laylows” and “The ‘Dooners”. She has taught singing workshops at Redwood Music Camp, Lark in the Morning and Puget Sound Guitar Workshop. She also writes songs in the mountain tradition. Website.
Tembre de Carteret
Song Circle Leader, Hopeful for 2024
Tembre de Carteret is a song leader/song writer from Ireland for 20 years. She is the creator of We May Sing & Gathering Hearts online singing communities collaborating with artists such as Brendan Taaffe, Helen Yeomans, Penny Stone plus many more. Led at healing Camps Earthsong & Family Constellations Camp Ireland & trainings in Ireland and the UK. Tembre is a community choir leader/musician, mentor and performer. Originally from the UK, she lives with her partner and their daughters Amelia & Aurora in County Clare. Website
Ben Gould & Britta Gudmunson
Song Circle Leaders Confirmed for 2018
Benjamin Gould & Britta Gudmunson (Santa Barbara) share from the heart and facilitate song in the oral song tradition. They believe music truly is medicine, and it is also every human being’s birthright. It is their mission to bring community together in a spirit of courageous, musical expression and activism while exploring the connective instrument of voice. Members of the Ubuntu Choir Network, Ben and Britta lead Santa Barbara’s inCourage Chorus and have a deep connection to the ways song can mend the heart, mind and creative spirit. Website.
Lydia Harutoonian
Song Circle Leader confirmed for 2022
Lydia is also an Iranian-Armenian-American multi-instrumentalist weaving together Southern blues, American roots, and Iranian folk music traditions. She founded and runs The School for The Great Turning, an organization that provides online and in-person education that fosters personal empowerment and planetary care. Website.
Moshe Vilozny
Song Circle Leader Maybe for 2024
Moshe Vilozny has lived in Portland, Santa Cruz, Israel and Latin America. His original songs are steeped in American Roots Music & sprinkled with influences from his world travels. His love for singing began with singing Hebrew prayers with his multi-cultural musical family. Moshe has performed internationally with his award winning world music group Universal Language, with songs in English, Spanish, and Hebrew. Moshe has been Circle Singing since 2014 when he attended his first workshop retreat with Bobby McFerrin. Website.
Leora Nesson
Song Circle Leader Maybe for 2023
Leora (Ashland) had a religious Jewish upbringing as a Rabbi’s daughter, which shaped her love for devotional, communal singing. When she discovered Singing Alive 13 years ago, the flame of sacred song was rekindled and her path as a song carrier was illuminated. There she learned the art of song leading and refined her skills through much dedication and practice. Holding and sharing songs is the greatest honor to Leora and her favorite way to serve community. She has an encyclopedic memory for songs and a song for every moment. When she’s not singing, she pours her love into cacao and runs her own small chocolate business, Leora’s Chocolates LLC.