MMED Faculty

Sandra Doneski
Graduate Music Program Director; Dean of Faculty

Sandra has been a teacher of music to students in Kindergarten through graduate school. She is the Dean of Faculty, Associate Professor of Music and Director of Graduate and Undergraduate Music Education at Gordon College. She teaches courses in music education methods, learning theory, assessment, curriculum development; supervises student teachers; and conducts the Gordon College Children’s Choir. She founded the Children’s Choir in 2000 to give children in the community an opportunity to grow as musicians, and music education majors an opportunity to develop as teachers and conductors. Sandra has also served on the faculty of the New England Conservatory Preparatory School, where she was Associate Conductor of the Children’s Choir Program. Under her guidance, NEC implemented choral programs for early elementary and middle school students that focused on vocal pedagogy and building musicianship. She has served as a conductor for MENC (NAfME) and ACDA sponsored events throughout the Northeast, and is co-founder of Embracing the New Music Educator – a mentoring program for new music educators in Massachusetts. She currently serves as co-chair of the Massachusetts Common Music Initiative Project.

In 2009, Dr. Doneski was the recipient of the Massachusetts Music Educators Association Lowell Mason Award and the Society for General Music in Massachusetts Excellence in General Music Award. In 2012, she was awarded the Massachusetts Music Educators Association Distinguished Service Award and in 2013 she received the Administrators in Music Education Visionary Leadership Award.

Dr. Doneski has published articles and conducted workshops on choral literature and techniques, curriculum development, assessment and mentoring. She recently co-authored a chapter in the MENC Handbook: Research on Teaching and Learning in Music Education titled Research on Elementary and Secondary School Singing.

She is a graduate of Gordon College and received her Master’s and Ph.D. in Music Education from The Hartt School, University of Hartford.

Dr. Felicia Barber

Felicia Barber is the Director of Choral Activities at Westfield State University in Westfield, MA, where she conducts the University Chorus, Chamber Chorale and teaches courses in conducting and choral methods. Dr. Barber's research interests include choral teaching strategies, repertoire selection, diversity initiatives, as well as the performance practice of African American Spirituals. Her research has led to presentations across the United States and Canada.

She often serves as a clinician for high school and community ensembles, as well as presents professional development to choral music educators in Massachusetts & and throughout the northeast. Dr. Barber has presented at regional and state conferences, as well as a presentation at the Phenomenon of Singing, an International Conference held in Newfoundland, Canada. With additional presentations at the Massachusetts Music Educators Conference, Florida Music Educators Conference, Eastern Division ACDA Conference, Massachusetts Summer ACDA Conference, Connecticut ACDA, and the Westfield University Summer Institute for Music Educators. Dr. Barber is a member of National Association for Music Educators (NAfME) currently serving as the Higher Ed Representative for the state of Massachusetts. Also, she is an active member of American Choral Directors Association (ACDA); serving on the National Diversity Committee, as well as the Eastern Division & Massachusetts boards.

Dr. Barber holds a B.M. in Vocal Performance from Oral Roberts University, an M.M. in Music Education from Mansfield University, and a Ph.D. in Choral Music Education and Choral Conducting from The Florida State University.

Gerald J. Dolan, Jr. is the recently retired Director of Fine Arts for the Ipswich Public Schools. He was Director of Bands conducting the high school Concert Band, Pep Band, and Jazz Ensemble and the sixth-grade band for 30 years. He has taught high school courses in Jazz Improvisation, Computer Music Composition, and Music Theory.

Mr. Dolan has studied conducting with Malcolm Rowell and Frank Battisti. He holds degrees from St. Michael’s College and the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.

Currently the Music Director of the Northeast Massachusetts Youth Orchestras (NMYO), Gerry is Conductor of the NMYO Intermezzo Orchestra. He teaches Instrumental Conducting at Gordon College in the Graduate Summer Degree Program. Mr. Dolan served as a conductor of the United States Youth Wind Ensemble during its 2001 summer tour. He has also served as Assistant Conductor of the Metropolitan Wind Symphony, the University of Massachusetts at Lowell Youth Wind Ensemble, and Music Director of the Ipswich Community Band and Jazz Ensemble.

Mr. Dolan received the 2003 Olmstead Award for excellence in secondary school teaching from Williams College and was honored by the Massachusetts Music Educators' Association (MMEA) with the 2002 Lowell Mason Award.

As a 1993 Fulbright Scholarship recipient, he served as Head of Music at the Speedwell School, in Bristol, England.

A member of the American Symphony Orchestra League, Fulbright Association, International Association of Jazz Educators, and Massachusetts Music Educators’ Association, he is active as a guest conductor, clinician, and adjudicator throughout New England and the United Kingdom. Mr. Dolan lives in Ipswich with his wife, Susan, and their two children.

Kirsten Helgeland holds degrees in piano performance from the Eastman School of Music and the College-Conservatory of Music of the University of Cincinnati. She also holds a Ph.D. in musicology from the University of Cincinnati. Dr. Helgeland has served as a member of the Gordon College Department of Music faculty, teaching undergraduate and graduate courses in music history and theory, teaching piano, coaching instrumentalists and vocalists, and serving as accompanist for the Gordon College Children's Choir.

Since 2005, Dr. Helgeland has served as accompanist for the Newburyport Choral Society, and also as Music Director and Organist at St. Peter's Episcopal Church, in Beverly, MA. Dr. Helgeland has performed nationally in recitals in Ohio, Vermont, Massachusetts and Illinois and has appeared as a guest artist on WGBH Radio's Chamberworks. She has been invited to present for the American Musicological Society, the College Music Society, and the Society for American Music. Dr. Helgeland currently runs Studio K in Beverly MA, a music studio providing a range of services in music education, training, coaching and performance preparation.

Jamie Hillman is a multi-faceted musician who is active as a singer, pianist, conductor, music educator, and composer. He currently serves on the faculty of Gordon College, where he directs the Gordon College Men's Choir, and has taught choral methods and literature, vocal techniques, diction, and voice. As a Boston University Prison Arts Scholar and faculty member of BU's Metropolitan College/Prison Education Program, he has co-initiated a comprehensive choral music program at a medium-high security men's prison in Massachusetts.

Hillman is an examiner for Conservatory Canada and has adjudicated at festivals or presented at conferences in the United States, Canada, and Southeast Asia. His co-editorial work includes numerous editions of Arabic, Asian, Latin American, and Western choral pieces published by Earthsongs and Hinshaw Music. He holds an Associate diploma from the Royal Conservatory of Music (Toronto), degrees from the University of Western Ontario (London, Canada) and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and is completing a doctorate (ABD) in Conducting at Boston University. Hillman is the 2012 laureate of the Leslie Bell Prize for Choral Conducting from the Ontario Arts Council.

Simon Hutchinson is a composer, new-media artist, and mad scientist who combines traditional music with digital technology and creative electronics, composing new music and art that engages with the relationships between art, technology, and society.

Hutchinson’s works have been performed across North America, Europe, and Asia, including at music festivals and conferences such as the International Double Reed Society (IDRS) Conference, the International Clarinet Association’s (ICA) ClarinetFest, and the North American Saxophone Alliance (NASA) Conference; as well as new media conferences such as the New Interfaces for Musical Expression (NIME) Conference, the Kyma International Sound Symposium (KISS), the Society of Electro-Acoustic Music US (SEAMUS) Conference, and Miso Music Portugal.

In 2008, Hutchinson received the “1st Young Composers’ Competition of CMEK” (Contemporary Music Ensemble Korea) award, and, since then, his work in cross-cultural composition has also been recognized by the Yamaguchi Opportunity Fund, the Sasakawa Young Leader’s Fellowship Fund (SYLFF), the Ruth Close Musical Fellowship, and a Porter Associate Fellows Arts Research Grant.

Hutchinson holds a Ph.D. in Composition with supporting coursework in Intermedia Music Technology from the University of Oregon, where he was named the Outstanding Graduate Scholar in Music. Notable composition teachers include Jeffrey Stolet, Robert Kyr, David Crumb, Hi Kyung Kim, David Cope, and Peter Elsea. Additionally, Hutchinson spent several years in Japan studying shamisen (three-stringed lute) and Japanese Folk Music with virtuoso Sato Chouei and shakuhachi (vertical bamboo flute) with Master Sato Chikuen.

As an educator, Hutchinson teaches classes on a broad range of musical topics, including interactive media, composition, music technology, world music, and music theory. He has taught at the University of Oregon, University of Montana, Gordon College, and he is currently Assistant Professor of Music Technology at the University of New Haven.

As a shamisen player, Hutchinson regularly performs public concerts with Japanese, American, and other international performers. He has appeared on the Japanese national public broadcasting station NHK and the program “Kubota Min’yô Okunimeguri” (“Folk Music Around the Country”), as well as on the 2006 folk-music album “Tamashi no Hibiki” (“Sounds of the Soul”).

Mary Montgomery Koppel is a highly sought-after composer of choral, vocal, chamber, and orchestral works. Praised for her “luxuriant choral writing” and “myriad coloristic sonorities,” she writes in a compositional language that is both richly complex and contrapuntally refined, while remaining both aurally accessible and challenging. Recent commissions include Stabat Mater Speciosa, written for the Harvard University Choir, and Horizons for Su Lian Tan and John McDonald, released on the album GRAND THEFT and other felonies (ARSIS Audio, 2013). Ms. Koppel is a founding member and composer-in-residence of the Lorelei Ensemble, a Boston-based women’s vocal group specializing in new and early music, and engaged in commissioning composers from around the world. Since Lorelei’s founding in 2007, Ms. Koppel has contributed five new works to the repertoire for women’s voices, spanning five seasons and numerous concerts throughout New England. Performers praise Ms. Koppel for her understanding of the voice, utilizing the full capacity of the instrument in "idiomatic lines of surprising yet natural contour."

Ms. Koppel is also a professor, music director, and soprano. In addition to teaching composition and music history at Gordon College, she teaches music theory at Boston University. Before moving to the Boston area in 2006, she taught at Bennington College, where she founded and conducted the Bennington College Chamber Singers. Her music direction includes work at MASSMoCA and HERE in New York. She holds a D.M.A. from the Boston University School of Music, a B.A. from Middlebury College, and a Diplôme in Composition from l’Ecole Normale de Musique de Paris.