Mary Albing
Preacher, Tuesday and Wednesday
Special Interest Seminars
Mary Albing is a pastor of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Ordained for Word and Sacrament ministry in 1988, she has served parishes in eastern North Dakota and Minneapolis, Minnesota and as a chaplain and Clinical Pastoral Education Supervisory candidate at Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis. She taught homiletics for two years at Luther seminary. She has published a number of parish education materials for the ELCA, and a book, Called Into Ministry. Mary currently serves Lutheran Church of Christ the Redeemer in SW Minneapolis, a congregation devoted to worship and social justice. She is technically on leave from call, and LCCR is technically vacant as the ELCA continues to struggle with its policies with respect to LGBT rostered ministers.Visit the LCCR web site lccronpenn.org.

James Alison
In-Depth Seminar
Special Interest Seminars
James Alison (b. 1959) is a Catholic theologian, priest and author. He has studied, lived and worked in Mexico, Brazil, Bolivia, Chile and the United States as well as his native England. He earned his doctorate in theology from the Jesuit Faculty in Belo Horizonte, Brazil. He is the author of  Knowing Jesus (London: SPCK 1992,8; Springfield: Templegate 1993); Raising Abel New York: Crossroad 1996 (The UK edition is called Living in the End Times  SPCK 1998) The Joy of Being Wrong (Crossroad 1998); Faith beyond resentment: fragments catholic and gay (London: Darton Longman & Todd 2001; Crossroad 2001) On being liked (DLT 2003 and Crossroad 2004). Undergoing God has been published by DLT (London) and Continuum (New York) in 2006. Editions of some of James books are in preparation in French and Russian.
Having lived with the Dominican Order between 1981 and 1995, James currently works as an itinerant preacher, lecturer and retreat giver. He accompanies a wide variety of publics, through academic lectures, undergraduate, postgraduate and professors' seminars, adult catechesis courses, retreats for priests, parish groups, and Catholic and ecumenical gay and lesbian retreats. Engagements in 2007 included Belfast, Rochester NY, Minneapolis, New York City, Baltimore, Toledo OH, Rome, Mexico City, and others. 2008 looks as though it will be similarly widespread. A systematic theologian by training, James’ current theological interests include the development of an adult catechesis program following on from the non-violent understanding of desire associated with René Girard as well the elaboration of some insights into the relationship between Creation and Salvation which have emerged in his work both pastoral and academic. When not on the road, he calls London “home.” Some of his more recent writings, as well as photos, and links to a video introduction to him can be found on www.jamesalison.co.uk

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Christopher Aspaas
Women's Chorus Director
In-Depth Seminar
Special Interest Seminars
Aspaas, an assistant professor of choral/vocal music at St. Olaf College, received his B.M. in voice performance from St. Olaf, his M.M. in choral conducting from Michigan State University in East Lansing, and his Ph.D. in choral music education at Florida State
University in Tallahassee. At St. Olaf, Aspaas conducts the St. Olaf Chapel
Choir, an upper-class mixed ensemble of 120 voices, and the 88 first-year student men of the Viking Chorus. In addition, he teaches Choral Conducting, Choral Literature, and private applied voice. Aspaas is also serving as the Guest Conductor of Magnum Chorum, a 40-voice mixed chorus based in the Twin Cities, and as the Phyllis and Richard Duesenberg Concert Choir Chair for the 2008 Lutheran Summer Music program. The Chapel Choir has recently performed such works as the Walton Coronation Te Deum, Mendelssohn Psalm 42, Samuel Barber's Prayers of Kierkegaard, the Howell's Requiem and the Vierne Messe Sollenelle. Aspaas is active as a guest conductor, clinician, and adjudicator, traveling to Alaska, Florida, New York, South Carolina, and Virginia in spring of 2008. In March, Aspaas
will return to Muscat, Oman to lead nearly 200 students from international schools in the 5th Annual TAISM Choral Festival.

Aspaas is also in demand as a tenor soloist, performing Bach cantatas with Helmuth Rilling and the Oregon Bach Festival Orchestra, the Evangelist roles in the John and Matthew Passions of Bach with the Bach Collegium of Fort Wayne, Ind., and other solo roles with the Tallahassee Symphony Orchestra, the Indianapolis Chamber Orchestra, and the South Dakota Symphony Orchestra and the St. Petersburg Chamber Philharmonic in Russia.

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Bruce Benson
Preacher
Benson came to St. Olaf as the college pastor in 1981 from parish ministry in Minnesota, Montana and South Dakota. He has served on the Trinity Seminary Board of Trustees and the Advisory Council of the theological journal Word and World. Benson has also authored and reviews a segment of Worship Blueprints, Series B and Gathered to Serve, the Adult Bible Study for the 1992 Augsburg VBS Series. Benson is the writer and on-air host of the national radio broadcast program, Sing For Joy, owned and produced by St. Olaf College; Worship Coordinator.

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Mary Louise "Mel" Bringle
In-Depth Seminar
Plenary, Thursday evening
Special Interest Seminars
Bringle is professor of philosophy and religious studies and chair of the humanities division at Brevard College in Brevard, NC. She is the author of two books of pastoral theology — "Despair: Sickness or Sin?" and "The God of Thinness: Gluttony and Other Weighty Matters". Since beginning to write hymn texts in 1998, she has won numerous international textwriting competitions and been recognized as an “emerging textwriter” by The Hymn Society in the United States and Canada, an organization which she now serves as president-elect. Her original hymns and translations from Spanish (particularly of the works of Pablo Sosa) appear in a variety of denominational hymnals and supplements, as well as in her own single-author collections — "Joy and Wonder, Love and Longing" ) and "In Wind and Wonder".

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David Davidson
Adult Mixed Choir Director
In-Depth Seminar
Special Interest Seminars
David R. Davidson has been the Director of music and arts at Highland Park United Methodist Church in Dallas since November 1, 2003. He came to Dallas in 1985 to be the Director of Music at Highland Park Presbyterian Church where he served eighteen years. He has also served as an adjunct instructor of choral conducting and handbells at the Perkins School of Theology on the campus of Southern Methodist University for eleven years. A nationally recognized church music and choral clinician throughout the United States, Davidson has chaired the Worship and Choral Music R & S Committee for ACDA as well as served as vice president of Church and Community Choirs for the Texas Choral Directors Association. He has also served as President of the American Guild of English Handbell Ringers, Inc., an organization that awarded him Honorary Life Membership. He has served on the Board of the Presbyterian Association of Musicians in addition to having served as handbell and choral clinician for the Montreat Music and Worship Conferences. He received an award of distinction from the National Religious Music Week in 2003 for his work at Highland Park Presbyterian Church. Davidson conducted the Highland Park Presbyterian Church Chancel Choir in performances for the American Choral Directors National Convention in Louisville, the Texas Choral Directors Association Convention, the 1994 American Guild of Organists National Convention and as the featured choir for the 1990 International Church Music Festival in Coventry, England.

Davidson has been the Director of the acclaimed Dallas Symphony Chorus (DSC) since 1995, performing in New York, Europe and South America receiving high praise from critics. They performed as a headliner ensemble for the 2001 National ACDA Convention in San Antonio.

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Engle is the pastor of the North Hills Christian Reformed Church of Troy, Mich. After graduating from Calvin College and Seminary, he was the first-ever ordained minister of Music in the Christian Reformed Church, a position he held at the Calvary Christian Reformed Church of Bloomington, MN. After moving to Michigan he received a Ph.D. from Oxford where he researched the organ controversy in the Netherlands during the Reformation. His current project is a book entitled Sound Theology, an examination of protestant conceptions of sound, and how sound (instrumental, choral and spoken) could best be used, or not used, in worship. Engle is president-elect of the Choristers Guild.

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Steve Edwards
Plenary, Wednesday evening
Special Interest Sessions
Edwards, the principal of SMSQ Architects in Northfield, Minn., designed the remodeling of Boe Memorial Chapel at St. Olaf College. He has extensive experience with church master planning of worship, social and educational spaces with a particular emphasis on historic preservation and the roles of worship and music. He is also concerned with the important role that acoustics, audio-video and sound systems play in the life of a religious community. smsq.com

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John Ferguson
Organist
In-Depth Seminar
Ferguson is respected as one of America’s foremost church musicians, with unique gifts in leading congregational song from the organ. He has designed worship events for major gatherings of church musicians and choral conductors in the United States and abroad. At St. Olaf College he conducts the St. Olaf Cantorei and directs the organ and church music programs. He has more than 100 published titles and has contributed to, or authored, five books on organ and church music.

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David Hagedorn
In Depth Seminar
Special Interest Seminars
Hagedorn is an artist in residence in the music department, director of the jazz ensembles and teaches percussion and theory at St. Olaf College. He earned an M.M. in percussion performance from the New England Conservatory and a D.M.A. in percussion performance from the Eastman School of Music, where his principal teacher was John Beck. Hagedorn has recorded with the George Russell Living Time Orchestra and the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra. He regularly performs in a jazz oriented percussion duo and does freelance work in the Twin Cities.
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Marty Haugen
Wednesday Evening Music Event
Special Interest Seminars
is a liturgical composer from Eagan, Minn. For the past 15 years he has presented workshops around the world for both Roman Catholic and Protestant liturgical ministers. His communion setting, Now the Feast and Celebration, and his vespers service, Holden Evening Prayer, are well known among Lutheran congregations, while his Mass of Creation is arguably the most widely used musical setting of the Ordinary among English-speaking Roman Catholic parishes. Together with David Haas, he began the popular GIA psalm series, Psalms for the Church Year. Haugen has more than 350 separate titles published on more than 30 recorded collections. martyhaugen.net

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He Qi
In Depth Seminar
Special Interest Seminars
He Qi ranks as arguably China's most internationally sought after contemporary Christian artist and was the first among Mainland Chinese to earn a Ph.D. in religious art after the Cultural Revolution. His brilliantly colorful and highly contemporary paintings emerge unmistakably from ongoing Chinese contexts. He hopes to help change the "foreign image" of Christianity in China by using artistic language, and at the same time, to supplement Chinese art the way Buddhist art did in ancient times. Dr. He was a professor at the Nanjing Union Theological Seminary and a tutor for master candidate students in the philosophy department of Nanjing University. Paintings in his gallery in Stillwater, Minn. can be seen at www.heqigallery.com.

Therees Tkach Hibbard
In Depth Seminar
Special Interest Seminars
Tkach Hibbard has conducted choirs ranging from young children to professional singers; and has served as adjudicator, workshop leader, and guest conductor for numerous choral organizations throughout Great Britain, Ireland, Europe and North America; and recently in Hong Kong.  Before joining the faculty at the University of Nebraska Lincoln School of Music she worked for twelve years as a choral conductor, singing tutor and university lecturer at several UK colleges and universities in the London area. Her work as a movement specialist in the training of choral singers has created unique opportunities for her to work with choirs and conductors from around the world. In addition to her work as a conductor, she has also performed professionally as a vocal soloist and chorus member both in London and the United States. unl.edu/music

Jennifer Anderson Koenig
Preacher
Special Interest Seminars
Koenig, associate college pastor at St. Olaf, choreographed and performed for three years with the professional modern dance company Ballet Harren, later serving for three years on the dance and fine arts committee at Luther Seminary. Koenig served in parish ministry in Iowa before coming to St. Olaf in 1997. Describing her years at St. Olaf as full and rich, she has chosen to be well and present for students, her children and husband, and her community, bringing her into contact with “amazing experiences on a daily basis.”
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Robert Mahoney
Wednesday Plenary
Special Interest Seminars
Mahoney designed the greatly enhanced acoustics for the renovated Boe Memorial Chapel at St. Olaf College. His professional involvement in performance and room acoustics dates back to 1970 when, as a student at Juilliard, he recorded the school’s productions in Alice Tully Hall. In addition to a degree in physics from Fordham University, New York, he earned an advanced degree in architecture at the University of Colorado, Boulder. Mahoney has applied his interests in the physics and practice of acoustics working on major arts facilities in Australia, Canada, France, Mexico and nearly every state in the continental United States. For nearly 20 years, he has performed regularly as a horn player with numerous chamber orchestras, opera and ballet companies and symphony orchestras. rfma.com

Jill Mahr
Handbell Choir Director
Mahr is instructor of music in handbells and flute at St. Olaf College. She conducts both the St. Olaf Handbell Choir and the Chapel Ringers and oversees the Manitou Handbell Choir, which is student conducted. At her church in Northfield, Bethel Lutheran, she directs the Grace Notes, a children’s handchime choir, and Ring Forth, a teen bell choir. Mahr is past secretary of the American Guild of English Handbell Ringers Area VII. She is principal flute of the Mankato Symphony and teaches flute privately in her home.

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Jeffrey O'Donnell
Wednesday Plenary
Special Interest Seminars
O'Donnell is the director of broadcast media at St. Olaf College and executive producer of the college’s sacred music radio program Sing For Joy. He is a 2002 graduate of St. Olaf College, where he received a B.M. cum laude in church music. O’Donnell oversees the college’s initiatives in concert recording, web streaming and program outreach. He enjoys performing with Twin Cities choral ensembles and is on the steering committee for the 2008 AGO National Convention in the Minneapolis and St. Paul area. singforjoy.org

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Scott Riedel
Wednesday Plenary
Special Interest Sessions
Riedel is president of Scott R. Riedel & Associates, Ltd., designers of the audio, video and communications systems for the renovated Boe Memorial Chapel. Projects under his consultation have included the design of acoustical environments, organs, and sound systems for new and renovated churches and auditoriums nationwide. He is organist-choirmaster at Christ Church, Episcopal, Whitefish Bay, Wis., and is a guest lecturer at Columbia College in Chicago, Ill. He graduated from the University of Wisconsin School of Architecture and the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music. riedelassociates.com

Catherine Rodland
In-Depth Seminar, Organ
Rodland, artist in residence in organ and music theory at St. Olaf College, graduated cum laude with departmental distinction in organ performance from St. Olaf College in 1987, then received the M.M. and D.M.A. from Eastman School of Music studying with Russell Saunders. As a prizewinner in several national organ competitions, including both the 1992 and 1998 American Guild of Organists Young Artists Competitions. Rodland has concertized extensively throughout the United States and Canada and maintains an active career as a recitalist. She also performs regularly at St. Olaf, most recently dedicating the new Holtkamp pipe organ in Boe Memorial Chapel.
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Pete Sandburg
Plenary Wednesday
Sandberg serves as Assistant Vice President for Facilities at St. Olaf College and has worked at the college since 1988. He is a catalyst at St. Olaf for sustainable practice and is an Accredited Professional for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED AP). Currently, he is working on a number of campus projects: the renovation of Boe Memorial Chapel, the construction of the ring road aroung Old Main, the installation of the wind turbine, and is helping pave the way for the new science complex.

Elizabeth Shepley
Director of Youth Choir in
Choir Connection
Special Interest Seminars
Shepley is the artistic director of the highly respected Northfield Youth Choirs program, conducting the Treble Choir, Con Brio and Concert Choir. She is the director of children’s choirs at Bethel Lutheran Church in Northfield and is on the adjunct faculty at Luther Seminary as the instructor of children’s choral techniques and repertoire. Shepley has a Master’s degree from the University of St. Thomas, with an emphasis in Kodaly, and holds certifications in Orff-Schulwerk and Kodaly methodologies. She has led conferences and festival choirs nationwide. northfieldyouthchoirs.org

Phil Stoltzfus
Special Interest Sessions
Stoltzfus, who holds M.Div and Th.D. degrees from Harvard Divinity School, was assistant professor of religion at St. Olaf College from 2000-2007, teaching a course devoted to visual and musical representations of biblical passages, and he developed an upper-level course, "Theology and Music." He is currently teaches at the University of St. Thomas, St. Paul, and United Theological Seminary of the Twin Cities. His first book, Theology as Performance: Music, Aesthetics, and God in Western Thought was published in 2006.

Judith Seleen Swanson
Art Director
Seleen Swanson an artist and recipient of the Distinguished Alumna Award from St. Olaf College. Her designs set the stage for the annual St. Olaf Christmas Festival, grace many publications and enhance the interior spaces of numerous churches. Judy designed the 2006 CWTA logo gracing the cover of the brochure.
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Bradley Hunter Welch
In Depth Seminar
Special Interest Session
Hunter Welch, a native of Knoxville, Tenn., holds the Bachelor of Music degree from Baylor University in Waco, Texas and the Master of Music, Artist Diploma, Master of Musical Arts, and Doctor of Musical Arts degrees in Organ Performance from Yale. He is the 2003 winner of the Dallas International Organ Competition and was also awarded the Audience Prize for the second time, having previously won it in 2000. He serves as Artist-in-Residence at Highland Park United Methodist Church in Dallas, Texas, and he performs approximately 20 concerts annually. hpumc.org

Paul Westermeyer
In Depth Seminar
Special Interest Session
Westermeyer came to Luther Seminary in 1990 to implement and direct the Master of Sacred Music (MSM) program, which helps musicians in the church refine their craft and simultaneously study the theological foundations of their work. A musician-theologian, he majored in music at Elmhurst College, did his M.Div. at Lancaster Seminary, his M.S.M. at Union Theological Seminary in New York and his Ph.D. in church history at the University of Chicago. His book, Te Deum: The Church and Music, is an historical analysis of the church's encounter with music from the Old Testament to the present. Other books include The Church Musician, With Tongues of Fire, Let Justice Sing: Hymnody and Justice, and Let the People Sing: Hymn Tunes in Perspective. luthersem.edu