The VdGSA is administered by an all-volunteer Board of Directors who work hard to run the many programs we offer. You can read about our current Board members below. For more information about how the Society works, please see our bylaws.
Officers
President
John Moran
Arlington, VA
Few things do not interest John. He has played the viol since his days as a cello major at Oberlin and has taught baroque cello and gamba at Peabody for over twenty years. He stays busy at home and on the road, performing, teaching, and writing, and loves to hear from other viol players.
Vice-President
Chrissy Spencer
Atlanta, GA
Chrissy, singer and gambist, helps organize the southeastern regional early music workshops Mountain Collegium and Music on the Mountain. She served on the VdGSA Conclave management team for six years (2013–2018). She is on faculty of the Georgia Institute of Technology, advocates for alternative transportation, and keeps chickens in her backyard.
Past President
Lisa Terry
Queens, NY
Lisa is an avid chamber music performer and soloist on viola da gamba and violoncello. From her home base in New York City, she performs with Parthenia Viol Consort and is principal cellist and viol soloist with Tempesta di Mare, Philadelphia’s baroque orchestra. Lisa was President of VdGSA (2016–2020). She is often heard in dance bands for Country Dance New York and at Early Music Week at Pinewoods Camp.
Treasurer
Tracy Hoover
Wichita, KS
Tracy has been an active viol player since her undergraduate days at Wellesley in the 1980s. She and her husband Curt Gridley are the founders of Groover Labs, a tech-focused, nonprofit coworking and makerspace in Wichita. Tracy is also a skilled knitter. She and Curt have two adult children, Henry and Fiona.
Executive Secretary
Leslie Nero
Silver Spring, MD
Leslie is active as a professional violinist in the Greater Washington area, where she also teaches beginning strings in public schools. She was immediately hooked on the viol at Oberlin’s Baroque Performance Institute. She attended her first Conclave in 2009 and is lucky to have a community of like-minded friends in the DC area to play with.
Membership Secretary
Nancy Washer
Brockport, NY
Nancy lives two blocks from the historic Erie Canal. In addition to her duties on the Board of the national Society, she serves as the Area Coordinator for Western New York, including the Rochester and Buffalo metropolitan areas. After playing the violin for years, she started on the bass viol in graduate school and attended her first Conclave in Boulder, CO after playing for only a few months. She’s been hooked ever since.
Elected Members
Randolph became involved with the VdGSA in 2008 when he designed the current logo, and continues to support the Society with graphic design, working on the design of the previous and current websites. Randolph is an architect in Bergen, Norway, and is an amateur bass gamba player.
Website Committee Chair
Tobi Szuts
Oakland, CA
In college, Tobi fell for the euphoria of a well-tuned consort that can spontaneously play quietly. He studied with Jane Hershey in Boston and loves playing Senfl from original manuscripts. Being head of the Website Committee is half-way between consort music and his day job as a data scientist.
Rental Program Coordinator
Kathleen Merfeld
Kathleen has administered the VdGSA’s Rental Program for the past ten years. She has also served on the committees for the Consort Loan Program, the instrument donations, Chapters, and the Circuit Rider Program. She plays in the Tropical Viols Consort based in Miami.
Key Largo, FL
Appointed Members
Parliamentarian
Kathy Schenley
Chapel Hill, NC
Kathy attended her first Conclave in 1981. She was the local host for Conclaves in Raleigh, NC in 1983 and 1984, and went on to run or help with over 20 Conclaves before retiring from Conclave Management after the 50th anniversary event in 2012. Kathy has served several terms as an elected Board member and is currently the Board Parliamentarian. She also established and leads the Central Carolina Chapter of the VdGSA.
Policy and Compliance Advisor
Ann Barclay Rovner
Maui, HI
Ann has been playing viol since the late 1980s and has studied with Julie Elhard. She helped start the North Star Viols–Minnesota chapter after attending her first Conclave in Northfield, Minnesota. After moving to Maui several years ago, she was thrilled to find other gamba players there. She is the chapter representative for both Minnesota and Hawaii.
Young Players' Representative
Shrish Jawadiwar
Kendall Park, NJ
Shrish is a composer, double bassist, and viol player. He became curious about the viola da gamba after playing J.S. Bach’s D major gamba sonata on the double bass. After attending a workshop by Heather Miller Lardin, she helped him obtain his first viol. He enjoys playing consort and solo music alike, and plans to compose new music for viols in the near future.
Ex Officio Members
Conclave Music Director
Julie Elhard
St. Paul, MN
Julie performs regularly as soloist and chamber musician and has made several appearances with the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, including Bach’s St. Matthew Passion under the direction of Nicholas McGegan. She received a Performing Artist Certificate from the Royal Conservatory of Music in The Hague, Netherlands and has published the Passamezzo Method series for the gamba.
Conclave Manager
Risa Browder
Arlington, VA
Asked at age three if she would like to play the violin, Risa replied, “Yes!” She’s been playing ever since. She teaches Baroque violin and viola at Peabody Conservatory, directs middle- and high-school orchestras, and performs widely in the Washington, DC area. She loves cooking, swimming, playing viol consorts, and plotting and planning Conclave as a member of Team Spork.
Conclave Manager
Pedro Funes
Houston, TX
Pedro is a member of Team Spork (Conclave Management). He currently is the Assistant Orchestra Director at Woodcreek MS in Humble ISD and Director of Viols of the Creek (Woodcreek MS/Summer Creek HS Viol Ensemble), founding member of Les Touches and president of Viols of Houston. He has two cats named Marais and Elsa with husband Kallop.
Conclave Manager
Becca Humphrey
Merion Station, PA
Becca lives and works in the Philadelphia area where her greatest passion is exploring the intimate and collaborative dynamic of chamber music. When not playing cello or viola da gamba, Becca will be on the tennis or pickleball court, or in the Allegheny Mountains of western Pennsylvania.
Newsletter Co-Editor
Jane Furth
New York, NY
Jane first touched a viol ca. 1979, attended Conclave regularly starting in 1997, led the Greater New York chapter of the VdGSA for twelve years, and joined the newsletter staff when she was first elected to the Board in 2013. Her real life has included teaching English in a New York City public school and reporting, writing, and editing for Life and Fortune magazines.
Newsletter Co-Editor
Randolph Miles
Bergen, Norway
Francis Beaulieu
Montréal, QC
Elected in 2020
Francis has been active as a viol maker for over fifteen years and aspires to someday become a decent player. He enjoys solitude, reading, and walking on cold beaches.
Jeanne Collins
Salem, OR
Elected in 2022
Jeanne is a retired CPA and airline pilot. A lifelong amateur violinist and violist, upon retirement in 2007 she completed a Master’s Degree in music theory and after years of playing modern orchestral and chamber music, turned to early music in 2012. In the viol, Jeanne has found her musical home. She has studied with Tim Scott, Joanna Blendulf, and Adaiha MacAdam-Somer and plays regularly with a local consort.
Sarah Cunningham
Haverford, PA
Elected in 2021
Sarah has been playing and teaching the viol all over the world for over fifty years, and it is still her passion to communicate through music across the centuries, with composers, colleagues, students, friends, audiences, and players of all levels. She teaches at Juilliard and Princeton.
Amy Domingues
Washington, DC
Elected in 2019
Amy enjoys a varied musical career performing and teaching cello and viola da gamba. When not doing those things, she is cooking vegan food, entertaining cats, or playing a mean game of Scrabble.
John Phillips
Berkeley, CA
Elected in 2021
A native of Southern California, John holds a BA in German Literature and Music from UC Santa Cruz and an MA in Musicology from UC Berkeley. His professional career has been as a harpsichord maker. He took up the viola da gamba in the new century and now avidly plays it in several sizes.
Gilbert Ritchie
Greenville, SC
Elected in 2022
Gilbert retired from a career in health-care administration, and more recently, medical software development. His interest in early music began with recorder in college, and expanded to the viol while playing in an early music group in the 1980s. He is also a founding board member of SC Bach, a non-profit committed to producing performances of the music of JS Bach and his contemporaries.
Anne Duranceau
Vancouver, BC
Elected in 2021
A former ballet dancer and current double bass player, Anne long ago discovered the viol, and instantly started longing to play. It took two decades before she could borrow her first viol, and longer still to acquire her own instrument. She now plays a few sizes of viols, violone, and lirone in various ensembles in British Columbia, including the Historical Performance Ensemble and Vancouver Viols.
Lindsey Macchiarella
El Paso, TX
Elected in 2020
​​Lindsey is a musicologist on the faculty of the University of Texas at El Paso, where she teaches music history and directs the UTEP early music ensemble. She regularly performs locally on both recorder and viola da gamba with her early music quartet, Sprezzatura. Her research specialties are early modern music in France and Russia, especially the work of Aleksandr Skryabin.
Patricia Ann Neely
New York, NY
Elected in 2019
Pat is a viol player and music teacher. She holds degrees from Vassar and Sarah Lawrence Colleges and has performed with many early music ensembles, including Sequentia, Tempesta di Mare, Washington Bach Consort, Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra, Rheinische Kantorei Köln. She directs Abendmusik, New York’s early music string band and chairs Early Music America's Equity and Diversity Task Force.
Alice Robbins
Amherst, MA
Elected in 2023
Alice teaches in the Five College Early Music Program at Mount Holyoke and Smith Colleges. A graduate of Indiana University and the Schola Cantorum of Basel, Switzerland, she has performed widely on both baroque cello and viola da gamba. Having fallen in love with the viol at age 9, she began playing in college and joined the VdGSA in 1972. She is also president of the New England chapter.
