Submitted by Kela Wanyama, Communications Chair
Places Dr. Lyman has lived:
Cleveland, Boston, Iowa, Texas, Belgium, and currently Tacoma.
Professional Positions:
“I really love hard work and don’t mind working hard,” says Lyman, who is director of choral activities at Tacoma Community College, artistic director of the Seattle Bach Choir, Sine Nomine Renaissance Choir in Seattle, Tacoma Music Ensemble (formerly Canonici), and music director at Skyline Presbyterian Church in Tacoma. At Tacoma Community College, Dr. Lyman’s students come from all walks of life. “It’s so great to have them in a choir together because they bring so many different kinds of experiences. It’s awesome! [I am] a big fan of seeing more effort put into community colleges in general and raising the profile of community college programs…. People who do music here do it because they have a deep passion for music. We give them the access.” Dr. Lyman focuses on Baroque and early music in her additional ensembles: “The Seattle [region] is one of those places where non-professional singers can sing this kind of music at a high level.”
Position with WA-ACDA:
Dr. Lyman started attending ACDA events as a graduate student. In ACDA, “it always comes back to the music, highlighting what’s in the music. That is point one for me.” WA-ACDA offered her opportunities to connect and begin meeting people when she first moved to Washington. “The style of Summer Institute is so intimate and relaxed… It was easy to get to know people and the communication with people lasted! There were a lot of useful sessions for me as an emerging conductor.”
In terms of the future of WA-ACDA, Dr. Lyman appreciated the recent national conference’s focus on ‘A Lifetime of Song’ and says “it is important that we become more accessible to the populations of students or singers in our choirs that we don’t serve very well right now. We can look at where we live and can all agree, in a very divisive world, that the last thing we should be doing is turning people in our communities away because of how we name our groups, what we wear, etc. I’d like to see more work done to thread choral singing throughout the lifetime and continue the wonderful work we are doing.”
Pastimes, Parenting, and Beyond the Podium:
“I love being a parent,” says Dr. Lyman, who has two children. “Being a parent is one of the most important things in my life and it affects my work in an immeasurably positive way.” Dr. Lyman also enjoys singing, cooking, and hiking. “It’s so beautiful here. I do a lot of thinking about my programming while I’m out hiking,” she says.
Washington ACDA 