2011 Presenters

Merrilee Webb

(Ward Choir Management, Awesome Choir Rehearsals, Unlocking the Power of Hymns, Youth Choir, Keynote Address)
Merrilee Webb earned Bachelor and Masters degrees in Music Education from Brigham Young University Provo where she was selected as the “Most Outstanding Musician” in 1983. Merrilee is often seen conducting combined choirs for Relief Society and Young Women general meetings.
She learned to play the piano using the RKM method when she was only 5 years old and studied piano with Reid Nibley at Brigham Young University. Merrilee just returned from teaching for three years at Brigham Young University Hawaii where she successfully used the RKM method to teach hundreds of students from all over the world to play the piano. She has served as Associate Director for “Young Americans” and owns the Infinity Business Ventures Recording Studio.

Visit readingkeyboardmusic.com for more information.

Channing Dance

(Nursery Music)
Channing Dance, an erstwhile local from the Raleigh Hills Ward, returns to us from Ridgefield, Washington where her husband works as an opthamologist for Kaiser Permanente and Channing works as the mother of 4 children, 7, 4, 2, and 4 months. They love the family of neighbors around them in Ridgefield and enjoy camping at Lake Merwin. Channing loves her favorite calling as Primary song leader and nursery music leader. She taught Gymboree play & music classes for 5 years and has continued teaching preschool music classes in her home. She loves to observe the magic of music in communicating with and teaching children.

Sharla Dance

(Primary Music)
Sharla Dance has long been a favorite instructor at our workshops. She loves to teach children’s music. She is currently writing a book, "To Teach a Child a Song," and hopes to include principles and techniques that have worked well in the last 25 years of teaching. Her Bachelor of Music Education degree at BYU was a good start for post graduate studies in How the Child’s Brain Learns Music. Sharla is Kodaly and Orff Level trained, and she is currently studying how to teach children through improvisation at the piano with Forrest Kinney. She combines brain research, teaching research, and good plain fun as a way to teach teachers in her workshops. Her favorite workshops are those that combine gospel truths with the power of music to help each of us learn. Sharla has 5 children and an incredibly supportive husband. They live in the Seattle area.

Denise Erskine

(Choral Reading, Relief Society Music)
Denise Erskine has been involved with church music since the age of 15, and played clarinet in the Cupertino Symphonic Band for the past 20 years. Sister Erskine has served as the director of the Saratoga Stake Balcony Chorus for the Oakland Temple Pageant and conductor of the South Bay Institute Choir in Cupertino, CA. She attends the BYU Choral Academy each summer and currently serves as ward choir director. She travels to our workshop from the Bay Area, California.

Eric McKirdy

(Organ-izing the Hymns, Organ Q&A, Music Chair Boot Camp)
Eric McKirdy began playing the organ at an early age, and pursued it as a major in college, studying at the University of Oregon with Dr. Barbara Baird. Since that time, he has been honored to perform throughout the United States and Europe, both as a soloist and as organist for several choirs. He has written a number of arrangements for choir and organ, and for the last four years has taught extensively at the Portland Regional LDS Music Workshop. Eric serves on his chapter’s board of directors of the American Guild of Organists. He and his family live in Albany, where
he recently completed his twentieth year as ward organist.

Karen Porter

(Conducting Masterclass, Accompaniment)
Karen Porter received her Bachelor and Masters of Music degrees in Piano Performance from Brigham Young University, studying under Jeffrey Shumway and Paul Pollei. Karen was an instructor of group piano, private piano lessons and sight-singing at Brigham Young University, as well as an accompanist for BYU Women’s Chorus and vocal masterclasses. She is trained in the Kodály method and studied choral conducting at the graduate level with Dr. Ronald Staheli. Karen has sung under the baton of such acclaimed conductors as Craig Jessop, Mack Wilberg, Ronald Staheli, Jerrold Ottley and John Rutter. Karen is currently the Artistic Director of "Cántico: The Portland Chamber Singers." She lives in Sherwood, Oregon with her husband and four young children.

Emily Spencer

(Conducting Principles, Vocal Technique for Beautiful Singing, Music Theory for Creating Powerfully Moving Music, Score Preparation and Marking)
Emily has appeared as a concert soloist with several professional and community orchestras, including the prestigious Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra and Chorus. A lyric soprano, she focuses especially on the works of Bach, Handel, Haydn, and Mozart. A frequent recitalist and speaker, Ms. Spencer has also been featured in concerts and programs presented by numerous church and community arts organizations, including The Rosa Ponselle Foundation, Supporters of Opera Singers, the Milwaukee Civic Arts Association, the Cathedral of St. John, the Evangelist Fine Arts Commission, the St. John’s on the Lake Chapel Music Series, and the Provo City Arts Council.
Ms. Spencer’s greatest loves are vocal and conducting pedagogy, sacred classical choral literature, and sacred choral music composition. She has directed numerous choirs, taught private voice and piano lessons, adjudicated vocal competitions, and accompanied in choral, solo, and liturgical settings for many years. She received her Bachelor’s degree in Vocal Performance and Pedagogy from Brigham Young University in 2000 and is currently completing graduate coursework in Choral Conducting at the University of Iowa. She is graciously traveling across the country for our workshop.