DR. ALICE HAMMEL
Grammy Award Nominated music educator, Dr. Alice Hammel, was the 2023 National Association for Music Education (NAfME) Lowell Mason Fellow, Virginia Music Educator Association Outstanding Educator (2018), and is the current Past-President of the Virginia Music Educators Association. She is a widely known music educator, author, and clinician whose experience in music is extraordinarily diverse. She is a member of the faculty of The University of Arkansas, and has many years of experience teaching instrumental and choral music in public and private schools. Dr. Hammel has put these varied experiences to great use while compiling a large body of scholarly work. She is a co-author for four texts: Teaching Music to Students with Differences and Disabilities: A Label-free Approach, Teaching Music to Students with Autism, Winding It Back: Teaching to Individual Differences in Music Classroom and Ensemble Settings, and Teaching Music to Students with Differences and Disabilities: A Practical Resource. Dr. Hammel is Past-President of the Council for Exceptional Children – Division forVisual and Performing Arts Education and was recently awarded their Past President Award for Excellence. Dr. Hammel has served NAfME as a member of the National Executive Board, The Equity Committee, and The Music Teacher Initiative. She is a proponent of Music Will and the Modern Band movement.
REBECCA LAKES
Rebecca Lakes is an Assistant Choral Director at Eisenhower Middle School in North East ISD in San Antonio, TX. Rebecca taught elementary music for 23 years and served as the Lead Elementary Coordinator for NEISAD for eight years. She is also the Past-President of the Kodály Educators of Texas and the Director of the Preparatory and Prelude Choirs for the Children's Chorus of San Antonio. Rebecca serves on and has chaired numerous committees for the Organization of American Kodály Educators. She has presented workshops at TMEA, OAKE, KET, and for numerous school districts across the nation. Rebecca has a Bachelor of Arts in Flute Performance and a Bachelor of Music Education from Cedarville University in Cedarville, Ohio. She has a Master of Music in Pedagogy from Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee. She completed all of her Kodály levels at Texas State University and all of her Orff levels at Trinity University and her Principal's Certification at Schreiner University. Rebecca serves as a Kodály pedagogy and folk music materials teacher in the Midwestern State University Kodály Institute.
DR. SUSAN HARVEY
Dr. Harvey is Professor of Music at MSU. She teaches music education courses, ear training, and has directed the Oratorio Chorus. Prior to teaching at MSU, she taught instrumental and choral music for 20 years in public schools. Dr. Harvey presents sessions at state, national, and international music education conferences and at educator in-services. Topics for presentations have focused on the use of Kodály-inspired curriculum in the instrumental classroom, intonation in instrumental ensembles (band and orchestra), and teaching practice strategies in the ensemble rehearsal. Dr. Harvey is Music Director of the New Hope Presbyterian Church Choir, and previously Music Director and Conductor of the Wichita Falls Youth Symphony Orchestra for nine years.
BERTA YEE
Berta Yee has enjoyed a long career as an elementary general music teacher, most recently in the Halifax Area School District in Halifax, PA. She is co-editor and co-author of Winding It Back: Teaching to Individual Differences in Music Classrooms and Ensemble Settings, and recently completed her PhD from the University at Buffalo. She continues to learn from self-reflection, her students, and her colleagues. Berta has shared ideas on improvisation, creative movement, singing games, folk dancing, and differentiation at numerous conferences, workshops, and courses, and hopes some of the ideas and materials have inspired others to incorporate active music-making into their classrooms.
NICK HOLLAND-GARCIA
Nick Holland-Garcia has taught elementary general music for 17 years in Seattle, San Antonio, Baltimore, and currently teaches at Brown Elementary in Lubbock, TX. He earned a BM in Vocal Performance from Pacific Lutheran University, a MM in Voice Performance from The University of Michigan, and his Kodály Certification from Texas State University. His areas of interest and research include vocal pedagogy and LGBTQ+ issues in music education. Nick has presented workshops on topics of DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion), classroom pedagogy, and technology at regional, state, and national music education conferences. His work in integrating Kodály pedagogy with the interactive white board led to his contribution for a chapter in the second edition of Kodály Today: A Cognitive Approach to Music Education by Micheal Houlahan and Philip Tacka.
ROBERT LEE
Robert Lee is a classically trained pianist and educator with a keen interest in music education and collaborative piano. Robert holds a Bachelor of Music degree in piano performance from the University of Calgary and a Master of Music degree in Music Education with Kodály Emphasis from Holy Names University (HNU). Having lived in the San Francisco Bay Area for over a decade, Robert enjoyed building close connections within the music community. He has taught undergraduate, graduate, and continuing education classes at HNU, and taught musicianship classes, conducted and accompanied the San Francisco Boys Chorus. Robert is an active board member for organizations supporting music education, including the Northern California Association of Kodály Educators, the Organization of American Kodály Educators, and the Kodály Foundation for Music Education. Robert is excited to join the MSU Kodály team this summer!
TAYLOR WALKUP-AMOS
Taylor Walkup-Amos is the music teacher at Yorktown Elementary School and the Choristers Director of the Virginia Children’s Chorus. She is passionate about integrating creative and innovative approaches in the music classroom to increase accessibility and joy in music making for all students. Taylor is the author of Creating Inclusive Music Classrooms Through Peer-Assisted Learning Strategies (TEACHING Exceptional Children, 2020) and a contributing author for Aligning Music to STEM (GIA Publications, 2020), Winding it Back: Teaching to Individual Differences in Music Classroom and Ensemble Settings (Oxford University Press, 2016), and Teaching Music to Students with Special Needs: A Practical Resource (Oxford University Press, 2017). She is a 2024 CMA Foundation Music Teacher of Excellence, serves as the Chair of the Council for Creativity and Innovation for the Virginia Music Educators Association, and serves on the board of the Virginia Organization of Kodály Educators. Taylor completed her Kodály certification at Midwestern State University and Early Childhood Level I Certification from the Gordon Institute for Music Learning at Temple University. She holds the degrees of Master of Arts in Teaching and Bachelor of Music from Christopher Newport University and an Advanced Graduate Certificate in Music Learning Theory from the University at Buffalo.