Jay Althouse

Jay Althouse received a B.S. degree in Music Education and an M.Ed. degree in Music from Indiana University of Pennsylvania. For eight years he served as a rights and licenses administrator for a major educational music publisher. During that time he served a term on the Executive Board of the Music Publishers Association of America. As a composer of choral music, Mr. Althouse has over 400 works in print for choirs of all levels. His music is widely performed throughout the English-speaking world. He is a writer member of ASCAP and is a regular recipient of the ASCAP Special Award for his compositions in the area of standard music. His book, Copyright: The Complete Guide for Music Educators, has been in print continuously since 1984 and is recognized as the definitive sourcebook on the subject of copyright for music educators. Mr. Althouse has also co-written several musicals and cantatas with his wife, Sally K. Albrecht, compiled and arranged a number of highly regarded vocal solo collections, and is the co-writer, with Russell Robinson, of the best-selling book The Complete Choral Warm-up Book, published by Alfred Publishing Co., Inc. Jay lives with his wife Sally Albrecht, in Hilton Head, S.C.

Randy Crenshaw

Randy Crenshaw has been variously described as a "musical general practitioner in an age of specialists," a "utility infielder n the ballgame of music," "the Swiss Army knife of singers," "the 'Zelig' of session singers," and "jack-of-all-trades, master of none" (that last one was from a jealous fellow singer). Randy has degrees form Willamette University's College of Music, Salem, OR (a Bachelor of Music in trumpet performance" and from Berklee College of Music in Boston, MA (a Diploma in Commercial Arranging). He has done orchestral and big-band trumpet playing, played and sung Renaissance and pre-Baroque music at the Oregon Shakespearean Festival, been a country singer, and over the years has arranged for and sung with Boston-based oldies/doo-wop a cappella group "No Strings Attached," the Berklee Vocal Jazz Choir, a cappella vocal jazz quintet "Terra Nova" (1987 Hennessey Jazz Search grand prize winners), a cappella world beat/R&B sextet "Vocal Nation," a cappella male vocal jazz quartet "Just 4 Kicks," and the contemporary Christian vocal group "The Haven Quartet," among many others. He has over forty published vocal arrangements available. He currently lives in the Los Angeles area with his wife and three young daughters, and is a Grammy-nominated in-demand free-lance session singer and arranger with hundreds of major film, television, commercial, and record credits to his name.

Mac Huff

Mac Huff is entering his third decade as one of the leading arrangers and composers in the music industry. His academic background includes degrees from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the University of Texas-Austin, as well as summer study at the Aspen Music Festival and doctoral work at the University of Southern California.

Mac is also an accomplished pianist, musical director, performer, teacher and clinician. Over the years he has composed, arranged and musical directed award winning shows for ABC-TV, NBC-TV, The Walt Disney Co., Hallmark, Inc., Colleco, Inc., Canon, Dow Inc., the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, Six Flags Show Productions, Union Station Main Stage Shows (Indianapolis), JB Robin Co. (Los Angeles), Howard Lanin Productions (New York) and TMJ Productions (Las Vegas) among others. In addition, he is in demand as a lecturer and as a guest artist for various music festivals and workshops throughout the world.

Mac's published works are represented exclusively through Hal Leonard Corporation.

Ed Lojeski

Ed Lojeski is acknowledged as one of the finest choral arrangers/directors in the business today. His arrangements have a special meaning to vocal groups and choral directors who seek material beyond the standard and ordinary. Much of his writing success derives from his own wide experience as a nationally known performer and show producer.

Mr. Lojeski has served as an accompanist and musical consultant for movie productions such as Where The Boys Are, The Unsinkable Molly Brown, Hello Dolly and Shaft and on TV films for Mannix, Medical Center, Gunsmoke and Mystery Movie of the Week. Mr. Lojeski has also written shows for Robert Goulet, Trini Lopez, The Nicholas Brothers and George Shearing. He has served a pianist-conductor and/or vocal coach for Elvis Presley, Johnny Mathis, Kathryn Grayson, The Lettermen, Tony Martin, Cyd Charisse, Charles Nelson Reilly and Karren Morrow. Choral groups under his direction have appeared on television and in the Hollywood Bowl.

Ed Lojeski is a prolific writer of pop choral arrangements that are designed to bring maturity of sound to the young chorus and an edge of excellence to advanced groups. Mr. Lojeski's arrangements are exclusively published by Hal Leonard Corporation.

Phil Mattson

Phil Mattson created the curriculum for the School for Music Vocations at Southwestern Community College, and directs the Concert Choir, Chamber Singers, and VoicesIowa in addition to his classroom teaching duties. He has taught at Pacific Lutheran University (WA) and served as Director of Choral Activities at Foothill College (CA) and Gonzaga University (WA). Mr. Mattson has published more than 70 choral and vocal jazz arrangements and compositions for various publishers, including UNC Jazz Press. He has been nominated twice for Grammy awards for arrangements and performance. He created the Phil Mattson School for Vocal Musicians in Spokane (WA) and led the Grammy-nominated P.M. Singers. He has produced three CD recordings and an instructional video with VoicesIowa. He directs the Phil Mattson Vocal Jazz/Choral Workshops each summer in the U.S. and Canada, and administers the Southwestern Vocal Jazz Festival in February each year. He is active as a conductor, pianist, arranger, and clinician, and writes for professional vocal groups including the Four Freshmen, the Real Group, Chanticleer, Beachfront Property, the Dale Warland Singers and Manhattan Transfer. .

Darmon Meador

Recognized in both the jazz vocal and instrumental world, Darmon is a distinguished vocalist, arranger and saxophonist. He has achieved rapid international recognition as the founder, musical director, chief arranger, composer, producer, saxophonist, and vocalist with New York Voices. As a member of New York Voices, he has released four albums on the GRP Records label. Darmon has performed and/or recorded with a variety of artists including Ray Brown, George Benson, Bobby McFerrin, Don Sebesky, Nancy Wilson, Ann Hampton Callaway, Patti Austin, Jon Hendricks, Jim Hall, Paquito D'Rivera and the Count Basie Orchestra. He has toured internationally, performing at such renowned venues as Carnegie Hall, Montreux Jazz Festival, North Sea Jazz Festival, Montreal Jazz Festival and the Blue Note Jazz Clubs in New York and Japan. Currently, Darmon is in the studio completing a long awaited solo CD.

Gene Puerling

There certainly is no more influential and revered a cappella arranger than the brilliant Gene Puerling. From his auspicious beginnings as a founding member of the vocal jazz group the Hi-Lo's, with whom he recorded thirteen albums between the years of 1953-1964, Gene revealed the talent and promise that would later be fully realized with his work as director, arranger and performer with the Singers UnLimited.

Gene was born in Wisconsin in 1929. Though his family was musically inclined (various members of the family played violin, piano and clarinet) Gene himself had no formal musical training! He was a working professional musician from the age of seventeen, and simply did not have the time to devote to a formal musical education.

The Hi-Lo's, who recorded their first record in 1953 when Gene was 24, garnered accolades for popular renditions of classic jazz tunes such as "Fascinatin' Rhythm" and "Skylark." Gene was developing the trademark style with which he would become so uniquely identified. Subsequent to the demise of the Hi-Lo's, Gene was working in the busy recording studios of Chicago's commercial and jingle industry, where he met studio vocalists Len Dresslar and Bonnie Herman. Len and Bonnie, along with fellow ex-Hi-Lo Don Shelton, joined together under the moniker of "Singer's Unlimited" in 1967.

Jonathan Rathbone

After training as a chorister at Coventry Cathedral and choral scholar at Christ’s College Cambridge, where he read mathematics, Jonathan rounded-off his musical education at the Royal Academy of Music with a second degree, specializing in singing and composition. Jonathan’s compositional career includes works for theatre, film, radio, television, concert platform and the church, and a song-writing contract with Noel Gay Music. Recent large-scale commissions include Requiem for a Condemned Man – an extended work for two soloists, orchestra and choir and a 40 minute a cappella choral work for the Vasari Singers.

Jonathan Rathbone was Musical Director and arranger for the Swingle Singers (1984–96) and has worked with many of the world’s leading musicians, from the New York Philharmonic Orchestra under Pierre Boulez to Stephan Grappelli and George Martin.

He is now much in demand in Europe, the USA and UK, as a freelance choral director, arranger and workshop leader. A natural communicator, Jonathan leads workshops covering anything from close harmony singing, improvisation, choral conducting, vocal arranging to choral techniques.

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Deke Sharon

Deke Sharon first sang a cappella in choirs at the age of five, and by age nine he was touring the U.S. as the youngest member ever admitted to the San Francisco Boys Chorus' Concert Ensemble. By the age of 23 he had graduated cum laude with a BA from Tufts University and a BM from the New England Conservatory of Music, directed numerous a cappella ensembles and produced two award-winning a cappella albums, founded the Contemporary A Cappella Society, and arranged hundreds of songs for a cappella groups around the world. To date, he continues to serve as Chairman and President of CASA, runs the Ultimate A Cappella Arranging Service and arrange and publish a variety of songbooks, co-write instructional booklets for a cappella groups, and produce and co-produce a number of a cappella albums.   He also music directs and performs with his own professional ensemble, The House Jacks

Steve Zegree

Stephen Zegree is Chairperson of Jazz Studies and Professor of Music at AWestern Michigan University, where he teaches piano and jazz, performs with the Western Jazz Quartet, and conducts Gold Company, an internationally recotnized Jazz-show vocal ensemble. The winner of numerous competiotions, awards, and honors, Dr. Zegree is in demand as a guest conductor, pianist, clinician, and adjudicator around the world. In recent years he has appeared twice as guest conductor of the Kalamazoo Symphony Orchestra. Under his direction, Gold Company has appeared at major jazz festivals and in concerts throughout the United States and Canada. The group has performed with artists including Bobby McFerrin, Janis Siehgel, Jon Hendricks, Rosemary Clooney, Rita Moreno, Don Shelton, and Bonnie Herman. They also maintain an active studio singing and recording schedule. With sixteen singers and an instrumental jazz back-up ensemble, Gold Company performs vocal jazz standards, Broadway tunes, and current hits, incorporating choreography and specialty acts into a dynamic and entertaining show. Gold Company has performed twice at the Music Educators National Conference national convention; the 1993, 1994, 1995, and 1996 International Association of Jazz Educators national conferences; the central division meetings of the American Choral Directors Association; and the 1993 World Symposium on Choral Music. Additionally, the ensemble has been awarded over 20 "deebee" awards from Down Beat magazine.