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The Traveling Musicians Union

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Live Sound

Elise Witt

27 December 2022 by Elise Witt

Elise Witt’s concerts of Global, Local & Homemade Songs™ and her Impromptu Glorious Chorus™ workshops create and connect singing communities around the globe. Her songs are available for choruses and choirs through the Elise Witt Choral Series and for solo and community singing in All Singing: The Elise Witt Songbook, as well as on 12 CDs.
She currently serves as Director of Music Programs at the Global Village Project, a special purpose middle school for teenage refugee girls in Decatur GA, where she uses singing to help students learn English, share their cultures, gain self confidence, and learn to navigate their new world.

Daniel Senie

9 December 2022 by Dan Senie

Dan is half of the duo Dan & Faith, an acoustic, singer/songwriter/storyteller duo from New Hampshire. Dan plays guitar, harmonica and banjo. Faith plays acoustic bass guitar, mandolin, dulcimer and ukulele. Their songs tell the stories of people and places, real and imagined. 

Joel Simpson

21 May 2022 by Joel Simpson

Joel Simpson has been a self-employed musician since 2001. Growing up in a musical family, Joel started playing guitar as well as singing/songwriting at a young age. His passion for music led him to earn a music business degree from Elmhurst University, and found Randomosity Records in Downers Grove, Illinois. He splits his time between private instruction, music production, and music performance.  Joel is proficient on voice and many string instruments. His production work focuses on folk and jazz. Joel has recorded with Lee Murdock, Ashley & Simpson, The Chancey Brothers and many more.

Sharon Abreu

28 April 2022 by Sharon Abreu

Sharon Abreu (“Ah-BRAY’oo”)

Sharon Abreu is a singer, songwriter, instrumentalist, teacher, and student of life. She was singing harmony with her family around the dinner table by the age of 3. Sharon grew up with many musical influences, from classical and opera to Broadway to folk, pop and rock, and she enjoys mixing those up in her concerts. She performs as a solo artist and also as half of the acoustic Irthlingz Duo with her partner Michael Hurwicz. She has performed at venues as diverse as the Northwest Folklife Festival, the Orcas Island Chamber Music Festival, and the United Nations.

Sharon was studying classical singing in New York City when she attended a pumpkin festival in the West Village and ended up joining the sponsoring organization, Hudson River Sloop Clearwater. Through her work with Clearwater, she started using her voice and songs for environmental education and ended up singing in concert with legendary folksinger Pete Seeger.

Sharon has sung lead roles in operas including The Marriage of Figaro, Don Giovanni and The Magic Flute.  She’s been a soloist in performances of major choral works including Bach’s Magnificat and B Minor Mass and Mozart’s Requiem and Vespers. Sharon starred in a sold-out run of the musical The Taffetas at the Orcas Center and in summer stock at the Ferry Terminal in Bellingham, Washington. Sharon has provided music for major international Earth summits at the United Nations in New York and the World Summit on Sustainable Development in South Africa. And she was honored to sing for Nobel Peace Prize winner Wangari Maathai in Berkeley, California in 2006.

In 2007, she prepared New York City high school students to perform her climate change musical revue Penguins on Thin Ice for the U.N. Commission on Sustainable Development, receiving a standing ovation from a full auditorium of international delegates.

In 2016, Sharon performed her one-woman musical show The Climate Monologues in the Los Angeles Women’s Theatre Festival, the United Solo Theatre Festival in New York, and for The MarshStream Theatre Festival online in 2021. She received the “Spirit of Nature, Ecology & Society” Environmental Justice Award for her performance of The Climate Monologues, at the Culture of Climate Change Colloquium at the City University of New York in 2011. Sharon composed and recorded the songs for Zero Waste Washington’s public school education program.

Sharon teaches voice, violin and piano, and she has been the vocal coach for musicals including Billy Elliot and Mamma Mia. For 2-1/2 years, she was a Musician-in-Residence with the Orcas Island Chamber Music Festival, bringing music and singing to local preschools. She is featured in Professor Mark Pedelty’s books, Ecomusicology (2012) and A Song to Save the Salish Sea: Environmentalist Musicians in the Pacific Northwest (2016).

Sharon has been a member of the Local 1000 North American Traveling Musicians Union, American Federation of Musicians, AFL-CIO since 1997.

John Coz

8 December 2021 by John Acosta

John hails from the Bronx, New York. His father Juan Acosta was a percussionist from Cuba who worked as a touring musician with Latin jazz greats such as Tito Puente and Celia Cruz. In California, John began his recording career working as a composer, guitarist, producer and engineer for artists on Warner Brothers, DreamWorks, Geffen, BMG, Elektra and Capitol Records. John was a member of the group Forest for the Tree’s which reached #18 on the Billboard Modern Rock charts, has collaborated with Beck, and landed a top ten hit in the UK working with the artist 1000 Clowns. John’s work as a musician lead to his work with AFM Local 47, advocating for musicians rights. Currently John serves as President of AFM Local 47 and on the AFM International Executive Board.

Kevin Neal (Kevin O’Donnell)

8 December 2021 by Kevin Neal

I, Kevin Neal, am a pedal steel guitarist and dobro player currently living in Toronto, Ontario. 

Chris Vallillo

8 December 2021 by Chris Vallillo

Roots based singer songwriter/folk musician.

Howard Wooden

8 December 2021 by Howard Wooden

A long standing member of The Woods Tea Co. Howard is a musician, audio engineer, video editor, graphic artist and web designer.

Heather Dale

8 December 2021 by Heather Dale

Heather Dale’s original Celtic music explores world legends and history. She finds contemporary themes within old material, and fuses folk traditions with blues, jazz, and world music influences. Often compared to Loreena McKennitt and Sarah McLachlan, Dale’s rich vocals are paired with more than a dozen folk instruments in live performances with multi-instrumentalist Ben Deschamps. In her 25+ year career, she’s released 18 studio albums, 5 live albums, 3 songbooks and a full-length musical theatre work based on the King Arthur legend titled “Queens of Avalon.” She and Ben have played 1500+ shows across 3 continents, and together they run the musician-friendly OnlineConcertThing.com music platform. Heather & Ben have been proud Local 1000 members since 2011. 

Ben Deschamps

8 December 2021 by Ben Deschamps

Multi-instrumentalist Ben Deschamps plays regularly with Celtic artist Heather Dale, and also tours internationally as a side musician for other folk and blues acts. Ben’s long recording career includes producing and/or engineering over 40 albums, and running live sound for performances. Ben Deschamps and Heather Dale have played 1500+ shows across 3 continents. Together they run the musician-friendly OnlineConcertThing.com music platform. Ben has been a proud Local 1000 member since 2011.

Kev Corbett

8 December 2021 by KevCorbett

I am an experienced songwriter, freelance sideman (basses, guitars, drums), instructor, performance coach, and host, working out of Eastern Canada. 20 years and 20 countries’ worth of touring experience, much radio and television experience, multiple national tours as a solo artist. Your songs are safe with me. Your stories may become a song.

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