Pamela Mindell
Pamela Mindell is Music Director of the Cambridge Community Chorus and Artistic Director of the Worcester Children’s Chorus, where she conducts the two oldest ensembles, Bel Canto and Cantare. She has worked with a number of children’s choirs, including the Litchfield County Children’s Choir in CT and the Paradise City Children’s Choir in Northampton, MA. Pamela served as Artistic Director of the Hotchkiss Summer Portals Vocal Chamber Program (CT) for high school singers for ten years.
Pamela was Director of Choral Programs at College of the Holy Cross for several years. Under her direction, the Holy Cross choirs traveled to Italy and Spain, as well as throughout the Northeastern United States, singing in such venues as Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome and Saint Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City. Other performance highlights include a concert of Sacred Latin American music with renowned soprano Dawn Upshaw, Vaughan Williams’ Dona Nobis Pacem, and Osvaldo Golijov’s Pasion segun San Marco, as part of the Mostly Mozart Festival at Lincoln Center.
Prior to her work at Holy Cross, Pamela taught at Smith College and spent a year in Sydney, Australia, conducting and singing professionally. As a soprano, Pamela has performed in several recitals with mezzo-soprano Justina Golden. She has sung with The Boston Secession and Emmanuel Music in Boston. Pamela received her doctorate in Choral Conducting from Yale University, where she studied with Marguerite Brooks and David Connell. She holds a master’s degree in Music Education with Kodàly Certification from The Hartt School as well as a bachelor’s degree in Psychology from Princeton University.
Jane Money
Jane Money founded Boston City Singers in 1995 as a division of Pro Musica. In 2003, Boston City Singers became a separate music and youth development program with headquarters in Boston’s Dorchester neighborhood.
Jane holds master’s degrees in music from Auckland University in New Zealand; in music education from Trinity College of Music in London; and in engineering (MS) from Boston University. In addition to founding Boston City Singers, Jane is the Founding Artistic Director of Children’s Voices of Ireland, a program which united singers in cross border programming. She is a former instructor with the Metropolitan Opera’s Urban Voices program in Boston, and for eight years was the Director of Youth Choirs at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church in Wellesley, MA. She cofounded the annual youth choir festivals “The Big Sing,” and is a frequent workshop presenter and adjudicator. A native of New Zealand, Jane has lived and worked in the Dorchester community for nearly 30 years and has over 20 years experience teaching children to sing.
Susan Radner
Susan Radner holds a BA in Music from Westfield State College, and an AM in Music from Smith College, in addition to a post graduate certification in music from the University of Connecticut. She has taught music to children for over 30 years: in Springfield Public Schools for 30 years and Enfield Public Schools for one year.
Becky Rosendahl Isaacson
Becky Rosendahl Isaacson is the Director of Music, Organist, and Carillonneur at Trinity United Methodist Church in Springfield, Massachusetts, a position she has held for over 29 years. At Trinity she oversees a music program consisting of 7 choirs of all ages – 5 vocal and 2 handbell – involving over 100 people. She is also the music director for the church’s annual Boar’s Head Festival and plans the summer music series, “A Little Night Music.” Prior to her appointment at Trinity, Becky held similar positions at Westminster Presbyterian Church in West Hartford, Connecticut and Simsbury United Methodist Church in Simsbury, Connecticut.
Becky earned a Master of Music degree in Performance and Literature from the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York where she also pursued coarse work toward a Doctorate of Musical Arts. Her undergraduate degree is from the State University of New York at Fredonia where she achieved a Bachelor of Music in Education, cum laude. Additional studies include coarse work at the Hartt School of Music and Westminster Choir College.
A winner of the American Guild of Organists Region II Student Competition Becky performed in the National Organists Competition in Dallas, Texas. She is a member of Pi Kappa Lambda (honorary music fraternity) and Kappa Delta Pi (honorary education fraternity.) She is a workshop leader for Children’s, Youth, and Handbell Choir and has been the director for many Choral Festivals. Becky is a member and frequent performer for the Tuesday Morning Music Club.
Ellen Shanahan
Ellen Cooper Shanahan, Ph.D. is professor of music, music program advisor and department chair of Fine and Performing Arts at Berkshire Community College in Pittsfield, MA. She has directed the BCC choral groups since 1984 and also has served as musical director for over 50 high school, college and community musical theatre productions while serving at BCC. An organist as well as choir director, she has served at many churches in western Massachusetts and Connecticut. She toured Europe with the Smith College Chamber Singers, under the direction of Iva Dee Hiatt, while pursuing her bachelor’s and master’s degrees at Smith, and she also worked with the Harvard University Summer Chorus, directed by Jameson Marvin. She earned a PhD in Leadership for Higher Education at Capella University in 2013. She resides in Great Barrington, MA with her husband and many four-legged “kids”.
John Thomas
John Thomas has been the bass/baritone soloist at First Church of Christ in Longmeadow for the past two decades. He has performed with the Springfield Symphony Orchestra where the review of those performances described him as a “warm, luminous baritone with impeccable diction”. John has also appeared with the SSO as Benoit and Alcindoro in their production of Puccini’s La Boheme.He originated the roles of Baumfree and of Frederick Douglass, the abolitionist and orator in the world premiere of TRUTH, based on the life of Sojourner Truth and presented by Old Deerfield Productions. John has recently appeared as a soloist at the Majestic Theatre (West Springfield), Quadrangle Quartet’s Broadway Benefit (Longmeadow), Mozart’s Requiem (Northampton), Handel’s Messiah (Northampton and New Jersey’s Baroque Chorale) and in the Boar’s Head Festival (Springfield). John performed Elijah with Lyndon Woodside, Director of the Oratorio Society of New York as well as having performed the same work with the Springfield (VT) Community Chorus. He’s performed with the Longmeadow Chamber Society, New Britain Opera, Springfield Community Chorus (VT), Brattleboro Messiah Sing, Dartmouth College’s Handel Society, Concertato Singers, Gospel Choir, SummerSing and Chamber Singers.
