Jace Saplan serves as Director of Choral Activities and Associate Professor of Music Learning & Teaching and Choral Conducting at Arizona State University where they oversee the graduate program in choral conducting, conduct the ASU Concert Choir, and teach courses in choral literature and pedagogy that weave decolonial and critical theories with communal vocal practice. Jace is known as a national thought leader and consultant in enacting social change and equity-driven practice through the choral arts.

Melodie Langevin is the Director of Choirs at Seycove Secondary, a vibrant school nestled in a town residents affectionately call “The Cove” in North Vancouver. An avid chorister herself, Melodie discovered a passion for conducting while completing her Bachelor of Music degree at the University of Manitoba. She studied with soprano Valdine Anderson and sang under Dr. Elroy Friesen and with several other ensembles in Winnipeg including Camerata Nova, an innovative ensemble that performs early, contemporary, and Indigenous-infused repertoire.

Saunder Choi is a Los Angeles-based Filipino composer and choral artist whose works have been performed internationally by various groups. Saunder believes in music as advocacy, using the media as a platform for diversity, equity, inclusion, justice. His compositions are focused on narratives and conversations surrounding immigration, racial justice, LGBTQ+ advocacy, climate justice, and representations of his identity as a Filipino-Chinese. He is currently Director of Music at Unitarian Universalist Community Church of Santa Monica and a teaching artist with the Los Angeles Master Chorale.

Singer-songwriter Melanie DeMore has a remarkable voice, weaving the fibers of African American folk music with soulful ballads, spirituals and her own original music. DeMore beautifully brings her audience together through her music and commentary. In addition to her solo work, DeMore facilitates vocal workshops for professional and community-based choral groups and has taught her program called “Sound Awareness” in schools, prisons, and youth organizations in the US, Canada, Cuba and New Zealand.

Cuban-American mezzo-soprano, Olga Perez Flora was the first prize winner of the American Prize: Women in Song & Oratorio 2022 and has performed several roles and recitals with companies across the United States, Cuba, and in Italy. Dr. Flora’s recording of Cuban songs named Canciones de mi Corazon is set to release January of 2025 and she will also sing Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde with the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra in the Spring of 2025.

Internationally known as a recitalist, Dr. Flora was the first prize winner of the American Prize: Women in Song & Oratorio 2022 and has performed several recitals with companies across the United States, Cuba, and in Italy. She has also created a Cuban Song Recital named Canciones de mi Isla: Songs from my Island, featuring Cuban composers, poets and collaborators that has been enthusiastically received by audiences. In the Spring of 2019, Dr. Flora travelled to Havana, Cuba to perform in two concerts with Cuban composers José María Vitier and Leo Brouwer in her first visit to her families’ homeland.

Dr. Flora is currently an Associate Professor of Voice and Head of Voice at the University of New Mexico and the Artistic Director of the Gobbi Villa summer young artist program in Rome, Italy.