Andrea Markowitz Gantte

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Award-winning Stage Director, Producer, Administrator, and Educator Scott Skiba has led 100+ new productions for professional companies, international festivals, and graduate and undergraduate institutions and continues to earn recognition for his imaginative stage direction and dynamic physical approach to storytelling that is “masterful…ingenious…first-rate…vivid and emotionally charged.” Skiba’s work is recognized with numerous awards from Opera America, The American Prize and The National Opera Association, and he has raised more than $1,000,000 in funds to support excellence in opera, the arts, and arts education.
Skiba serves as Executive Artistic Director of Cleveland Opera Theater where his new production of La Traviata was named “the best professional opera production Cleveland has seen in years” and La Bohème – hailed as “Ingenious and talent rich” by the Plain Dealer. Skiba is the recently appointed Production Director for Opera Western Reserve, and has made multiple company debuts in recent years including an award-winning production of Jake Heggie’s Two Remain (Lyric Opera of Orange County) Sweeney Todd (Helena Symphony Orchestra), Don Giovanni (Indianapolis Opera), Roméo et Juliette (Pensacola Opera), Macbeth (Opera Tampa), The Ballad of Baby Doe (Toledo Opera), Faust and Il Barbiere di Siviglia (Natchez Festival of Music), The Student Prince (Opera Grand Rapids), Carmen (Opera Western Reserve), Suor Angelica and La Bohème (Mobile Opera), Don Giovanni, Carmen, Orpheus in The Underworld, Into The Woods, and L’incoronazione di Poppea (Hawaii Performing Arts Festival).
A proponent of developing new works, Skiba launched {NOW} Fest, an annual festival to create, develop, and produce new opera currently in residence with Cleveland Opera Theater. He serves on the Chamber Opera Composition Committee for the National Opera Association (NOA), and he has collaborated on the development of 18 new operas and counting!
Skiba lobbied for the 2020 NOA national conference to be held in Cleveland, OH and then served as the local host for the 2020 Convention “Opera Rocks” where and directed the Cleveland premiere of Evan Mack and Joshua McGuire’s The Ghosts of Gatsby for The National Opera Association in a co-production between Cleveland Opera Theater, Baldwin Wallace Conservatory, and The Music Box Supper Club, and organized other collaborations throughout the city including events at The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame!
A pioneer in exploring contemporary approaches to producing opera, Skiba’s work includes directing and producing interdisciplinary collaborations in alternative and site-specific venues to promote immersive gateway experiences to engage the community and new audiences. Other projects include the professional premiere of Griffin Candey’s Sweets By Kate, which was produced by Marble City Opera and performed in Sugar Mama’s Bakery in downtown Knoxville, Tennessee. Skiba directed “The New Opera Project,” which developed and premiered six Micro-Operas in collaboration with Interlochen Arts Academy, Parallel 45 Theatre Company, and Inside Out Gallery in Traverse City, Michigan. Skiba envisioned and led the iLyric project – an installation of nine different operas throughout the historic piazze of Arezzo, Italy in collaboration with the Oberlin Conservatory, ICASTICA Festival, and the city of Arezzo, Italy. In June 2022 Skiba produced and directed the world Premiere production La Casa de Bernarda Alba, the new opera by Griffin Candey with libretto by OBIE-Award-winner Caridad Svich. Based on Garcia Lorca’s last play of the same name, this opera with an all-female cast and bi-lingual Spanish/English libretto was a co-commission by Baldwin Wallace and Cleveland Opera Theater that was spearheaded by Skiba in 2016.
A leader in innovative projects to continue artistic collaboration during the pandemic, Skiba devised and directed multiple projects that embraced the realities and intersections of remote collaboration, contemporary technology, and traditional artistic values including: stage direction, production, and live-simulcast direction for Händel’s Alcina outdoors on the steps of Baldwin Wallace Conservatory; Opera ON DEMAND for the Curtis Institute of Music, incorporating green screen, video, and audio technology and remote collaboration; A Taste of Traviata a cinematic production adaptation of La Traviata filmed on site at the historic Stambaugh Auditorium in Youngstown, Ohio, and Romeo + Juliet, a reimagined telling of Shakespeare’s play and Gounod’s opera for Opera Western Reserve. The largest of these undertakings, Operas in Place won the 2022 Award for Digital Excellence in Opera from Opera America. This project commissioned nine new short-length “micro operas” in collaboration with Baldwin Wallace Conservatory, Cleveland Opera Theater, and On Site Opera in NYC. For this project, 17 World-renowned composers and librettists including Griffin Candey, Kermit Cole, David Cote, Lisa DeSpain, Jerre Dye, Jake Heggie, Sarah Labrie, Libby Larsen, Caroline V. McGraw, Nkeiru Okoye, Rachel Peters, Kamala Sankaram, Dawn Sonntag, Gene Scheer, Josh Schmidt, Michi Wiancko, and Royce Vavrek composed micro-operas for Baldwin Wallace Voice Performance Students that premiered in a virtual event February 2022 at BWVP.org.
An advocate of arts education, Skiba is a frequent guest master class and workshop teacher throughout the United States and in Europe. He serves currently as Interim Director of Opera for the University of Tennessee, and Director of Opera Studies for Baldwin Wallace Conservatory, where he has developed numerous collaborative partnerships in Greater Cleveland including Playhouse Square, The Cleveland Museum Of Art, The Cleveland Arcade, Red Space, The Music Box Supper Club, The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and The Maltz Center for Performing Arts, and directed numerous productions including the collegiate premiere of Kamala Sankaram and Jerre Dye’s Taking Up Serpents, Nkeiru Okoye and David Cote’s We’ve Got Our Eye On You (2023 NOA 1st Place Award Winer), Pelléas + Mélisande (Winner of The American Prize for Opera Performance, and The Charles Nelson Reilly Prize in Stage Direction), and The Dialogues of the Carmelites (1st Place NOA Collegiate Opera Production Competition). Additional university directing credits include Tobermory, Trouble in Tahiti, and Roman Fever for Oberlin Opera Theater, Serse and La finta giardiniera for Oberlin in Italy, The Crucible, and Falstaff for Martina Arroyo’s Role Preparation Program at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, La Finta Giardiniera with University of Tennessee Opera Theater, Carmen (in Spanish Language translation) for the University of Texas at Rio Grand Valley, The Dialogues of the Carmelites Penn State Opera Theatre, and The Pirates of Penzance, Dido & Aeneas, The Spider and Orpheus in The Underworld for Interlochen Opera Theater. An active National Opera Association (NOA) member since 2016, Skiba served as local host for the 2020 “Opera Rocks” National Conference in Cleveland, OH; assisted in overhauling the Collegiate Opera Competition process and created the Google-based form for transition to the online application protocol. He has presented in NOA plenary sessions and presentations at NOA conferences in Santa Barbara, Salt Lake City and Cleveland; has received multiple awards in the Collegiate Opera Competition; and serves on the Dominick Argento Chamber Opera Competition Committee.
Skiba serves as Assistant Artistic Director for Hawaii Performing Arts Festival, Movement & Acting Instructor for Music Across the Pond, Acting and Movement Teacher, Washington National Opera Institute, and Acting Coach for Jennifer Rowley’s Aria Boot Camp. Previous appointments include Executive Director of the Oberlin in Italy training program and Arezzo Opera Festival, Instructor of Voice and Opera Theater, Interlochen Arts Academy; Production Designer, East Carolina University Opera Theater; and Associate Instructor of Voice, Indiana University Jacobs School of Music.
Upcoming engagements include: The Cleveland Premiere of Michael Ching and Dean Anthony’s Speed Dating Tonight in collaboration with Baldwin Wallace Conservatory Opera and the Cleveland Museum of Art (February 2025), Dialogues of the Carmelites (University of Tennessee Opera Theatre April 2025), Le nozze di Figaro (Hawaii Performing Arts Festival July 2025), Faust (Opera Western reserve September 2025) Il Barbiere di Siviglia (Helena Symphony Orchestra May 2026).
Skiba is represented by Marvel Arts Management more info: www.SkibaSkiba.com
M.M., Oberlin Conservatory of Music
B.M., Oberlin Conservatory of Music
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Ryan Yamashiro is a graduate of the Cleveland Institute of Music, in Cleveland, Ohio, where he received a Master of Music Degree in 2019 studying with Barrick Stees. He received his Bachelor’s Degree of Art in Music Performance in the spring of 2017 from UCLA where he studied with John Steinmetz. Ryan has played with the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra, Toledo Symphony, Billings Symphony Orchestra, and Battle Creek Symphony. He was a chamber music fellow at the Kent Blossom Music Festival in 2018 and in 2017 performed as a concerto soloist with the UCLA Philharmonia Orchestra. Ryan has been engaged as a guest artist at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville College of Music and keeps his own private bassoon studio. When not playing the bassoon, Ryan enjoys roasting coffee, playing chess, and computer programming.
MM, Music Performance – Cleveland Institute of Music (2019)
BA, Music Performance – UCLA (2017)
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Jessica Wiseman is an experienced music educator. She taught for 13 years in the Ohio public schools in areas such as choir, band, and general music. Her students earned many honors and superior ratings at competitions and were selected to perform at the Ohio Music Education Association’s Professional Development Conference. They also participated in service projects such as a fundraiser for the USO and Paws for Patriots, the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, and an annual Go Light Your World challenge. During this time, she also had significant involvement in school and community theater and music programs. Jessica left Ohio to serve as the music director at Ranger College in Texas. She is excited to be now working with future educators.
Jessica earned her bachelor’s degree at Kent State University, her master’s degree and Kodaly certification at Capital University, and her Ph.D. at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Her dissertation focused on refugees’ perceptions of music participation and implications for the music education profession. Jessica is also passionate about exploring ways to meet the academically diverse needs often found in music classrooms.
Jessica has been an active member of NAFME and the Organization of American Kodaly Educators. She enjoys performing with her church’s worship team on piano, flute, voice, and bass guitar. When not teaching or making music, Jessica enjoys spending time with her Anatolian-Pyrenees, Nora Rose.
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Pianist Taber Gable from Knoxville Tennessee graduated from The Jackie McLean Institute of Jazz in Hartford (2010-2014), Connecticut and The Juilliard School (2016), Studied with Teachers Andy Laverne Steve Davis, Nat Reeves, Kenny Barron, Kenny Washington, Ben Wolfe, Wynton Marsalis and received his Masters in Jazz Performance and Jazz Studies. Taber has been called on to perform alongside many great musicians such as:
Marcus Strickland E.J.Strickland, Gregory Tardy, Terrace Martin, Ben Williams, Jaleel Shaw, Jimmy Greene, Myron Walden, Abraham Burton, Trevor Lawrence, Jonathan Barber, Braxton Cook, Lakecia Benjamin, Jesse Palter and many more.
Gable is a highly sought after musician in the New York music scene as well as internationally known and called on for his cross-genre abilities and captivating live performance style.
Gable has Recorded on more than 30 albums and in fall 2020 Gable released his first solo album “Hidden Driveways”. With a new Record on the way to be released in fall 2024!
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Mehrenegar Rostami is an ethnomusicologist with interdisciplinary research interests in anthropology and political philosophy. She received her PhD in ethnomusicology from UCLA in 2023. Her research engages with the dynamics of human mobility, socio-economic developments, and politico-cultural identity formations in inter-and multicultural environments. She has conducted extensive fieldwork research on international music festivals in Iran, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Austria, Germany, and the United States. Focusing on traditional and popular musics of Central Asia and the Middle East, she examines in her dissertation the modern manifestations of the Silk Road phenomenon and the ways in which this phenomenon has influenced the formation of international music festivals in the age of globalization and neoliberal capitalism. In 2017, she published “Silent City: A Commemoration of the Halabja’s Tragedy” in Music and Politics. Her translational essays have appeared in Māhname Honar-e Musiqi [The Art of Music] and she has presented her research at national and international conferences throughout North America, Europe, Iran, and Central Asia. She has also served as a reviews editor of Ethnomusicology Review. As a santur (hammered dulcimer) player, she has worked in Iranian, European, and North American scenes.
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Dr. Salamone serves as a Lecturer of Music Theory at UT’s College of Music. She has authored several articles on creative pedagogy, and is always seeking out new and relevant ways to captivate the classroom. With a current research thread focused on utilizing culturally relevant music in therapeutic settings for substance abuse, Dr. Salamone is excited to settle into the Appalachian region to deepen her work with bluegrass music and opioid abatement.
Previously, Dr. Salamone served on the faculty of Florida Gulf Coast University and the Oberlin College Conservatory. She holds degrees in music theory from the University of Kentucky and a degree in voice from The Hartt School. Her personal interests include running, baking, furniture restoration, and befriending all of the neighborhood dogs.
PhD, Music Theory – University of Kentucky (2017)
MA, Music Theory – University of Kentucky (2012)
BM, Voice – University of Hartford—The Hartt School (2010)
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Latin music was a very natural gravitation for JCQ when he first picked up the guitar at age eight: “No matter what style I ever played in, I always came back to my heritage. Music from Colombia crosses so many boundaries and its ability to seduce while celebrating life has always moved me. Colombian rhythms are so majestic, they have a strong natural appeal to me. This music seems to show up every time I compose or perform, I can’t help it! A few years before I picked up the guitar, I remember being mesmerized by a band that played in a high school next door to my elementary school in Brussels. They were a cover band playing Latin music and I was convinced, ‘Those are the guys from the radio!’ I was hooked from then on.”
JCQ was particularly inspired by masters like Quincy Jones, Gato Barbieri, Cal Tjader, Miles, Tito Puente, Antonio Carlos Jobim, Jeff Beck and Carlos Santana, but he felt that Chick Corea, Eddie Palmieri, Gato Barbieri and Gary Burton best brought out the excitement of bridging melodic improvisation with composition. JCQ took this lead both attending Berklee College of Music in the early 80’s and when he launched his own solo career later in the decade. He studied composition at Boston’s New England Conservatory with George Russell before moving to Los Angeles, where he plugged into the city’s studio scene with the help of his mentor Tommy Tedesco (The Wrecking Crew). While developing his freelance guitar-work by day, JCQ composed a volume of original music and sought out old Boston schoolmates to help bring the music to life via gigs throughout Los Angeles. An opportunity to open for longtime hero, Gato Barbieri convinced him to keep writing and start making records…
Dreams come true…Achieving his goal of producing music blending contemporary jazz with music styles from Colombia, JCQ quickly became a staple of NAC, World, Jazz and Smooth Jazz radio with tracks from his first two albums, a self-titled effort in 1990 (featuring Tommy Tedesco) and Through The Winds in 1992 on Nova Records. Critically acclaimed records followed in 1997 with The Way Home on Escapade records segueing to releases on Moondo Records, a label he founded in early 2000 and distributed by Robert Fripp’s label, DGM. A decade of music ensued with notable releases, Medellín, Los Musicos, Los Primos, Las Cumbias…Las Guitarras, Joy To The World, and Guitarras De Pasión compilation series featuring music by JCQ (Vol. 1 Charted #1 on iTunes/World Music for 7 months). Amongst many highlights in JC’s recording career, a standout remains when featured on Jazz on the Latin Side Volume 1 (2000) and Volume 2(2001), all-star live recordings at B.B. King’s Blues Club in Los Angeles (Ubiquity/Cubop Records) alongside Alex Acuna, Poncho Sanchez, Justo Almario, Otmaro Ruiz, Francisco Aguabella and Luis Conte, to name a few. Joining forces with top tier music collaborators and label partners has bolstered JCQ’s profile as a world-class guitarist/recording artist able to produce, perform and record a world of music while nurturing a signature sound.
When his hands aren’t on the guitar, JCQ’s career in music expands to session work, teaching, producing, custom music, music licensing, publishing, and consulting. Career highlights includes teaching music business, composition and jazz studies at Colleges throughout Los Angeles (College of the Canyons, California State University), launching Moondo Records Inc. into a formidable world/jazz record label (distributed by Ryko, WEA, Eone Ent.), securing a publishing deal with BMG Rights Management to administer his Publishing, and establishing Café Moondo, a Production Music-label partnership with Warner Chappell to produce music of multiple genres for TV and Film licensing. A recent chrysalis was when JCQ transitioned to TV production as Music Supervisor and Executive in Charge of Music for Haim Saban’s entertainment company, Saban Brands LLC, producing music and championing music rights for all of Saban’s TV properties (The Power Rangers, Paul Frank Industries, Julius Jr., Digimon, Glitter Force, etc.). The unique role culminated in opportunities to produce acclaimed recording artists such as Sheryl Crow and Blush to perform pop songs featured on the Julius Jr. Show/Netflix and Glitter Force/Netflix respectively.
Successfully fulfilling diverse music paradigms throughout multiple decades has been the pillar for JCQ’s expansive career. Recognized as a seasoned all-purpose music specialist, JCQ remains in the forefront while creating, producing and exploring new ventures…
Looking ahead…”One of the greatest things about creating music today is the ability to record without limitations while nurturing an artistic voice! Often through collaboration, the results can easily surpass one’s vision and for me, that’s the gift! To follow the creative steps with a distribution strategy one can control independently is equally remarkable. The collaborators, whether in business or creative, are essential as new ways to circulate works are developed internationally. I’m excited about the chapters ahead, let the music binging begin!”
– Jonathan Widman
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Leslie C. Gay Jr., Associate Professor at the University of Tennessee, holds a Ph.D. in ethnomusicology from Columbia University. He has published articles and reviews on American music and culture in the journals Ethnomusicology, American Music, and World of Music. His research also appears in Audible Infrastructures: Music, Sound, Media (2021) and Ethnomusicology: A Contemporary Reader (Routledge, 2005, edited by Jennifer C. Post). With his collaborator, René Lysloff, he conceptualized, co-edited, and contributed to Music and Technoculture (Wesleyan University Press, 2003), which examines emerging and dynamic relationships among music, culture, and technology.
Gay has published research on indie rock musicians in New York City and music publishing in the 19th-century United States. Currently, he is completing a book on the reception of African American music in Denmark. He began this continuing historical and ethnographic research with a Fulbright Scholar grant in 2002, at which time he also served on the faculty of Aarhus University (Aarhus, Denmark).
His additional teaching and research interests include ethnography, sound studies, and ecomusicology. At University of Tennessee, Gay founded and served as inaugural director of the Balinese gamelan, a semar peguligan ensemble. He’s also active within the College of Arts and Science interdisciplinary programs of Africana Studies and Global Studies.
Leslie Gay is a member of the editorial board of the journal Jazz Perspectives. He remains active in the Society for Ethnomusicology, the Society for American Music, the International Association for the Study of Popular Music, and the International Council for Traditional Music. He has been a participant in the NEH Summer Research Program (1994) and the Fulbright Specialist Program (2011).
PhD, Ethnomusicology – Columbia University (1991)
MPhil, Ethnomusicology – Columbia University (1989)
MM, Music Theory – University of North Texas (1980)
BM, Music Theory – University of North Texas (1976)
Books
Representative Articles and Essays
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Nathan Madsen has been involved in game audio since 2005 and has worked with many top tier brands including LEGO, Dragon Ball Z, Harry Potter, MechWarrior, Monopoly, Clue, The Game of Life, Titanfall, Great Wolf Lodge and Disney. He’s an experienced composer and sound designer who is well-versed with the technologies used to create and implement music, sound, and voice overs into interactive multi-media. Madsen is also an active performer and recording artist on saxophone and piano and has experience rearranging and producing covers of iconic video game scores. On top of his creative pursuits, he’s an active lecturer who’s given presentations at Oklahoma Baptist University, University of Northern Iowa, University of Northern Colorado, as well as has taught game audio courses for DeVry University’s Game, Simulation and Programming degree and is currently teaching Audio for Video Games within the UT College of Music.
MM, Music Performance – Texas Christian University (2005)
BME, Music Education – Oklahoma Baptist University (2002)