Diego Becerra is a Music Program Manager with over a decade of experience in education, cultural projects, and nonprofit arts administration. Passionate about fostering innovative artistic initiatives, he currently serves as the Music Program Manager for Sinfonía por el Perú, a social music program inspired by the El Sistema model. Concurrently, he oversees the organization’s…
Dr. Ahmad Naser Sarmast is an internationally recognized music educator, ethnomusicologist, and the founder of the Afghanistan National Institute of Music (ANIM). A trumpet player and the son of renowned Afghan composer Ustad Mohammad Salim Sarmast, he fled Afghanistan in the 1990s during the civil war and Taliban regime, when music was banned. In 2008,…
A member of the Abenaki Nation, Obomsawin was born near Lebanon, New Hampshire. In 1960, Obomsawin made her debut as a singer in New York. She went on to perform at venues including reserves, schools, prisons, museums, festivals, and on television. In concert she sang traditional aboriginal songs and other repertoire to her own accompaniment…
Andrea Unrau is the Director of Programming at the Sarah McLachlan School of Music, where she leads the design and delivery of inclusive and zero-cost community-based music programs serving over 1000 children and youth across Western Canadian cities. Through years of program expansion and work with over 100 teaching artists, Andrea has developed models of…
Andrés David Ascanio Abreu is a celebrated Venezuelan conductor and trumpeter. As Conductor of the National Youth Orchestra of Venezuela, he led the ensemble in a notable performance in Vienna in 2018. He has served as Assistant Conductor to Maestro Gustavo Dudamel and has been a guest conductor for multiple youth orchestras and festivals. Ascanio…
Anne-Katherine (“A.K.”) Dionne holds a full-time faculty appointment in the Department of Music at Mount Allison University, Canada and is concurrently a PhD Candidate in music education at the University of Toronto. A.K.’s doctoral research draws on her ten years’ experience as a classroom choral music educator and her work as a lawyer called to…
Annie Kidder is the Executive Director and a founder of People for Education. Formerly a theatre director, Kidder became involved in public education in Ontario in the late 1990’s and since then has become an expert on education policy and funding. She regularly provides advice to policy-makers and government, and her writing on education has…
Annie Saumier is Director of Education and Community Engagement at the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal (OSM), where she develops programs that make symphonic music more accessible and deepen connections with diverse communities. With over 20 years of experience in cultural management, she has held leadership roles at McGill University, SAMS, and Jeunesses Musicales Canada. A…
Dr. Arla Good, PhD, is an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Psychology at Toronto Metropolitan University and the co-director and lead researcher of the SingWell Project, an international research initiative investigating the potential of group singing to support psychosocial wellbeing, communication, and health in older adults. She holds a PhD in Psychological Science from…