Faculty & Staff

Brian Fancher is a music educator and vocalist residing in Waite Hill, Ohio. He teaches at Mayfield High School where he works with two bands, three choirs, marching band, show choir, and the fall and spring musicals, while also teaching music theory courses and advising the Ultimate Frisbee Club and Drama Club. He can also be found singing Baritone in the Cleveland Orchestra Chorus. He earned his Bachelor of Music Education degree from The College of Wooster, where he studied voice with Dr. Carrie Culver.

In his spare time, he likes to eat, play Ultimate Frisbee, play video games, and take pictures of people, places, and things.

Project Manager

Douglas Hertz (b. 1993) is a composer, percussionist, and educator based in Brooklyn, NY. He first became involved with The Walden School as a Young Musicians Program Student in 2010 and has since participated in the Creative Musicians Retreat and held both staff and faculty roles.

Hertz’s compositions have been heard around the United States, having been recently programmed by the Aries Composers Festival, Midwest Composers Symposium, PASIC, Nief Norf Summer Festival, Atlantic Music Festival, the Dynamic Music Festival, Bard College’s Music Alive series and the Deer Valley Music Festival. He has also held recent residencies with the Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy of Music and Periapsis Music and Dance.

His music has been either performed or recorded by the University of Michigan Philharmonic Orchestra, Wet Ink Ensemble, Da Capo Chamber Players, American Symphony Orchestra, Boston Philharmonic Youth Orchestra, Calidore String Quartet, Vanguard Reed Quintet, Up/Down Percussion Quartet, and BrassTaps Duo. He is also an avid collaborator, having worked recently with choreographer Al Evangelista, visual artist Lizzy Chiappini, and performance group, Call Your Mom.

Hertz holds a B.A. in music from Bard College a M.M. from the University of Michigan. His past teachers have included Evan Chambers, Bright Sheng, Kristin Kuster, George Tsontakis, Joan Tower, Kyle Gann, and Janet Weir.

https://www.douglashertzmusic.com/

Composer Eliza Brown attended The Walden School as a YMP student from 2000-2002 and has since returned for many years as a staff and faculty member. Eliza’s music, described as “delicate, haunting, [and] introspective” by Symphony Magazine, has been performed around the world by leading new music ensembles including Ensemble Dal Niente, ensemble recherche, Network for New Music, Quince Contemporary Vocal Ensemble, Spektral Quartet, ICE, Wet Ink Ensemble, Wild Rumpus New Music Collective, and PRISM Saxophone Quartet. Deeply interested in the relationships between music and the other arts and humanities, Eliza has also engaged in interdisciplinary collaborations with practitioners of theater, dance, architecture, painting, and film, frequently taking on other artistic roles in these collaborations in addition to “composer.”

When not at Walden, Eliza teaches music theory and composition as an Assistant Professor of Music at DePauw University (Greencastle, IN). Eliza has also taught at Columbia College Chicago and Northwestern University, where she earned her DMA in composition in 2015. elizabrown.net

Originally from Utica, NY, Jacob Sachs-Mishalanie is a Brooklyn based composer. He is pursuing a PhD at the CUNY Graduate Center, where his research focuses on the music of Pierre Schaeffer. He teaches Music Technology at Hunter College and Brooklyn College. Beginning in November 2020, he created & hosted “Algorithmic Sound,” a series of free virtual masterclasses featuring composers and artists that engage with creative coding. Recently, he is working on a variety of projects as an audio engineer.

In his chamber music, he is interested in questioning commonly assumed dualities of electronic sound, such as live vs. recorded, acoustic vs. amplified, and synthetic vs. natural. His pieces often involve polarizing or blurring the lines of these dualities by juxtaposing acoustic instruments with imitations of themselves. In his tape, Scribble (Mondoj, 2020), and other electronic music, he playfully engages with algorithmic composition, pop production techniques, uncanny MIDI instruments, and field recordings. He has released a number of free Max for Live devices that generate MIDI patterns and gestures.

Katherine Balch (b.1991) writes music that seeks to capture the intimate details of existence through sound. Her work has been commissioned and performed by the Minnesota and Albany Symphony Orchestras, Ensemble Intercontemporain, International Contemporary Ensemble, Contemporaneous, Yale Philharmonia, the New York Youth Symphony and wildUp, among others, and has been featured in IRCAM’s Manifeste, Aspen, Fontainebleau, Norfolk, and Santa Fe music festivals.

Katherine is the 2017-2020 composer-in-residence for the California Symphony, and recently joined the management roster of Young Concert Artists, Inc., where she is the 2017-2019 composer-in-residence. This season includes new pieces for the Tokyo and California Symphonies, and for violist Christophe Desjardins as part of the MANCA festival in Nice, France. Recognitions include awards from ASCAP, BMI, and the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

She completed her B.A./ B.M. in the Tufts University / New England Conservatory double-degree, and her M.M. at Yale School of Music. She is currently pursuing her doctorate at Columbia University, where she studies with Georg Haas and Fred Lerdahl. Passionate about education, she is faculty at Bard College-Conservatory Prep in the Hudson Valley, and is so happy to be returning to Walden for her second summer of creative music making! When not making or listening to music, she can be found baking, collecting leaves, and playing with her cat, Zarathustra.

www.katherinebalch.com

Violinist/violist, composer, and visual artist Leah Asher is an avid performer of contemporary music and creator of new artistic works. Leah is a member of The Rhythm Method string quartet, the violin-piano duo Aether Eos, and co-creator of MEANINGLESS WORK with Nicolee Kuester. She has been featured as a concerto soloist with NOSO Sinfoniettaen and Oberlin’s Contemporary Music Ensemble. Leah formerly served as solo violist of NOSO Sinfoniettaen and co-principal viola of the Arctic Philharmonic. She regularly performs with other New York-based ensembles such as the International Contemporary Ensemble, Talea ensemble, and Shattered Glass. As a composer, Leah has been commissioned by ensembles including andPlay, Chartreuse, Periapsis, NorthArc Percussion Group, The Great Learning Orchestra, Du.0, and solo artists such as Meaghan Burke, Tristan McKay, and Jennifer Torrence. Leah released her debut solo album, Retreat into Afters, on SCRIPTS records in 2018.  

Nate May (B. 1987) is an American composer whose music draws on research and imagination, often treating contemporary issues of place, migration, and environment with textural intricacy, rhythmic drive, and a taste for repurposed sounds. Raised in Huntington, West Virginia, much of his work stems from a “fascination, love, and respect for the people” of Appalachia (Soapbox), including his oratorio State—premiered by singer Kate Wakefield (Lung) and MUSE, Cincinnati’s Women’s Choir—and his monodrama, Dust in the Bottomland—set in present-day West Virginia and sung by lyric bass Andrew Munn, which has been performed twelve times in seven states and broadcast on radio and television. He has been a fellow at the highSCORE festival (Pavia, Italy) and the Sō Percussion Summer Institute (Princeton, New Jersey), and was selected as one of three U.S. composers to participate in the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s 2017 National Composers Intensive. He has received commissions from the Walden School, Brianna Matzke, Thea Rossen, and Neutrals Duo, and his work has been performed by Eric Wubbels, Adam Sliwinski, Nathan Nabb, Patchwork Duo, Hajnal Pivnick, Quartetto Indaco, and many others. Large-scale collaborations include the world-touring work Spiral by choreographer/dancer Wanjiru Kamuyu, and Kalahari Waits, the debut album of indigenous experimental trio Khoi Khonnexion, produced during a year in South Africa on a Reese Miller scholarship from the Telluride Association.

Currently pursuing a D.M.A. in composition at Yale, he holds degrees from Cincinnati’s College-Conservatory of Music (M.M., Composition) and the University of Michigan (B.F.A., Jazz and Contemplative Studies), and has studied with Christopher Theofanidis, Geri Allen, Ellen Rowe, Stephen Rush, Miguel Roig-Francolí, and Michael Fiday. His work has received support from ArtsWave, People’s Liberty, and the Berea College Appalachian Sound Fellowship. He currently serves as a Teaching Fellow at Yale, and previously served on adjunct faculty at Cincinnati’s College-Conservatory of Music. This is his second summer teaching at Walden.

Nina Kindrachuk is an indie-pop singer/songwriter based in Music City and graduated this past May, also in Nashville, Tennessee with a music business degree. Although she loved the honor of initially belonging to the School of Music as a vocal major, having an understanding of the business side of the music industry was equally important to honing her craft as a developing artist. 

Nina was first introduced to the Walden School in the summer of 2015, as she dragged her feet in fear of a new dialect of music making (to her); composing. Having taken voice lessons since the fifth grade, she was very comfortable with performing in a commercial setting (pop, jazz, indie, classical) and learning vocal techniques. Before she knew it though, her eyes were opened to an entirely new perspective through the welcoming commentary in weekly composer’s forums, the zany Walden dances and camp traditions, and the overwhelming show of affection and open-mindedness from the entire Walden community. 

Outside of attending Walden for two summers, she attended Brentwood, TN’s JAM Camp for one summer; collaborating in the jazz band as the frontwoman and singer in a separate vocal ensemble. In the summer of 2016, Nina attended Middle Tennessee State University’s Governor’s School for the Arts (GSFTA), learning classical voice and has been involved in the Tennessee All-state and Mid-state choirs since middle school. Her vocal coaches, Morgan Kasprowicz and Mark Thress, had an especially profound impact on her respect for vocal health and maximizing one’s vocal mechanics in a creative way. Furthermore, she has had an amazing time partaking in high school, college, and extracurricular a cappella groups (both SATB and SSAA). 

Nina hopes to combine her experiences from all of the aforementioned schools and private vocal lessons to fuel her budding artist career through more consistent songwriting and an eventual EP release.

In her spare time, Nina can be found testing out new recipes for herself and her friends, listening to a funny or psychology-heavy podcast, or continuing to teach herself acoustic guitar. She does not recommend performing all of these activities at the same time. 

Dr. Rebekah Griffin Greene is an award-winning bassist, composer, pianist, cellist, poet, and singer who holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in bass performance, composition, and music education from the Thornton School of Music at the University of Southern California, as well as a doctorate in bass performance from the State University of New York at Stony Brook.

After recovering from a serious wrist injury and winning the Alice Nelson Music Competition in 1995 on the bass, she orchestrated her own bass and piano piece for the San Luis Obispo Symphony, launching her career as a composer and bass soloist. Now active in New York City as a freelance jazz, solo, chamber, Broadway and orchestral musician, she has performed her own works, as well as traditional recital repertoire, in such places as Hong Kong, Quebec, New York City, Los Angeles, Honolulu and Chicago. Her chamber pieces have been performed by ensembles on four continents, and her Atlantis Revelation soundtrack has had hundreds of thousands of internet radio plays since 2012.

Her composition teachers include Morten Lauridsen and Frank Ticheli, and her bass teachers include Paul Ellison, Joseph Carver and Kurt Muroki. Having taught classroom music in both Los Angeles Unified and New York City Schools, she is currently teaching private and group bass at the Lucy Moses School, Bloomingdale School of Music, and the Thurnauer Music School, where she is also the Head of Theory and Ear Training. She lives in Queens, New York City, with her trombonist husband, Dr. Terry Greene II, her son, Kayden, daughter Phoenix, and many instruments. Please visit YouTube to see some of Rebekah’s compositions and performances.

Sarah Riskind is the Director of Choral Activities/Assistant Professor of Music at Eureka College in central Illinois, where she conducts choral and instrumental ensembles and teaches composition, musicianship, and music appreciation courses. In her nine summers at Walden, she has shared her specialties in choral composition and improvisation, arrangements of Judeo-Spanish melodies, and Renaissance polyphony.

Among her original works are Jewish and Judeo-Christian music, secular pieces with improvisatory elements, and frequent settings with string obbligato parts. In February 2020, her Psalm of the Sky for tenor-bass choir, violin, and piano was premiered by St. Xavier High School’s Ensemble X as part of the Creative Commissions Project through the University of Cincinnati. Other recent premieres include the tenor-bass arrangement of Oseh Shalom by the Appalachian State Glee Club in April 2019, the Robert Frost setting Looking for a Sunset Bird in Winter by the Pacifica Choirs Interludes Ensemble in March 2019, and several arrangements of Judeo-Spanish melodies by the Seattle Jewish Chorale and Sarah’s own ensemble Las Kantaderas del Noroeste in November/December 2018. She has also written for the Quince Contemporary Vocal Ensemble, International Contemporary Ensemble, and Ensemble Dal Niente as part of the Walden School Faculty Commissioning Project. Several of her works are featured in the Project Encore catalogue of contemporary choral music.

Sarah sings soprano and accompanies voices as a violinist/fiddler and improviser. She holds a DMA in Choral Conducting from University of Washington, an MM in Choral Conducting from University of Wisconsin at Madison, and a BA in Music from Williams College.

www.sarahriskind.com

Academic Dean, Young Musicians Program

The music of composer, oboist, and installation artist Sky Macklay (b. 1988) explores bold contrasts, theatrical elements, audible processes, humor, and the physicality of sound. Her works have been performed by ensembles such as ICE, Yarn/Wire, Wet Ink Ensemble, Mivos Quartet, Ensemble Dal Niente, Hexnut, and The Da Capo Chamber Players. Her piece Dissolving Bands, an abstract orchestral reflection on the American Revolutionary War, was commissioned and premiered by the Lexington (MA) Symphony  and was the winner of the 2013 Leo Kaplan award, the top prize in the ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Awards. In 2015, her sonic and kinetic installation of inflatable harmonica-playing robots, Harmonibots, received the Ruth Anderson Prize commission from The International Alliance for Women in Music. She has also been commissioned by The New York Virtuoso Singers and the Jerome Fund for New Music. Her string quartet Many Many Cadences, recorded on Spektral Quartet’s newest album, also received an ASCAP award.

Originally from Waseca, Minnesota, Sky is currently pursuing her D.M.A. in composition at Columbia University in NYC where she studies with Georg Friedrich Haas, George Lewis, and Fred Lerdahl. As a 2015-17 Composers and the Voice fellow with American Opera Projects, Sky is currently writing an opera set inside a woman’s uterus. Sky first joined the Walden community through the Teacher Training Institute in 2009, and she has taught for the Young Musicians Program every summer since 2010. Some of Sky’s favorite things about Walden include sharing the summer with 70 best friends, helping young composers bring their music to life, and dancing to Pierre Boulez, Aaron Copland, and Michael Jackson all in the same night.

New York native Dr. Terry L. Greene II is a trombonist, improviser, drummer, arranger, composer, educator and poet. Terry received his Doctorate in Musical Arts from Stony Brook University in 2008, studying under trombonists Ray Anderson and Michael Powell, as well as outside of school studies with trombonists Steve Turre and Vincent Gardener.

He has since then performed with The Roots, Tony Allen, Amp Fidler, Macy Grey, David Murray, Oliver Lake, Elliot Sharp, Mark Helias, Ray Anderson, Charlie Persip, Rufus Reid, Steve Turre, Kim Burrell, Kirk Franklin, Israel Houghton, and several other notable creative artists.

You can hear Terry as a trombonist on Oliver Lake’s latest big band album titled “Wheels,” Elliot Sharp’s 2016 Aggregat album called “Dilectrical,” an NPR filming of David Murray’s Cuban Ensemble, and “congahead.com” performances with Chia’s Dance Party at LP founder Martin Cohen’s home. He plays with the Astoria Symphony, and played funk and gospel with the Christian Cultural Center Band. Terry has additional experience playing other musical genres including new music, hard rock, free improvisation, Afro-Cuban, Brazilian, and Colombian music.

As a composer, he has collaborated and performed his own music and poetry with the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE) and Splinter Reeds woodwind quintet in conjunction with faculty commissions from the Walden School Young Musicians Program in Dublin, New Hampshire. Terry has also written and arranged for the Christian Cultural Center Band and his own small jazz ensembles on several freelance projects. His pieces have been performed in New York City, Carmel Valley, California, and New Hampshire.

In addition to his versatile performance abilities, Terry also teaches students of all ages and economic backgrounds. Most notably would be his work with The Walden School Young Musicians Program as a faculty member, composition forum moderator, band leader, jazz and free improvisation instructor, coach for singer/songwriters, choral singer, and creative musical contributor on trombone and drums.

Some of his other adventures include teaching theory and performance ensembles at Frank Sinatra High School of the Arts, teaching jazz history and performance at Stony Brook University, teaching musical instruments and poetry/hip hop to children in the South Bronx and Far Rockaway for the Thrive Collective, and teaching general music to students at Clara Barton High school in Brooklyn. Terry also led improvisation workshops as an educational facilitator for The Coltrane Home, which is the organization that preserves the home of John and Alice Coltrane.

Terry is passionate about being an artist who is a husband and father in New York City, and lives in Queens with his equally accomplished wife, Rebekah Griffin Greene, their son Kayden and daughter Phoenix.

Trevor Danko is an artist based out of New Jersey and Philadelphia. From a very young age music has always been a part of his life, and is the art form he feels most passionately about.  His first instrument was the piano, followed by the guitar, then the bass, then the drums. Most of these instruments were self taught. Throughout his schooling, he has always participated in choral groups, both large and small, as well as musical theatre and theatre arts. Shortly after beginning to play the drums, he joined his school’s jazz band. In addition to participating in school music programs, Trevor also played in multiple bands with friends of his growing up, usually as the bassist or the drummer. Throughout high school, he took many opportunities to perform in student showcases and student-organized music festivals with fellow musicians.

About four years ago, Trevor started composing his own original music, and began songwriting.  In 2017, he began by releasing a few original songs on soundcloud, then self-released his debut single on streaming platforms in the summer of 2018.  A follow up single was released the next year, as well as his debut EP, which came out in November of 2019.  Since then, Trevor has continued to compose his own music, while working in collaborative partnerships with other producers and musicians in an effort to release a larger body of work.  He has begun to teach himself electronic music production, and hopes to one day fully produce his own music, and also be able to produce other artists’ work.  

Other interests of Trevor’s include philosophy, being outdoors, dancing, making visual art, and learning about new ways to be creative.