Professional musician, educator, arts administrator, and scholar Kaitlyn Leahy (she/her) has spent her professional life immersed in community music. While supporting the development of community music schools, she specializes in program development, educational innovation, and organizational leadership. In collaboration with fellow teachers and learners she has worked continuously to expand access to music education, especially to adult learners. Throughout her teaching career, Kaitlyn has prepared many students to succeed in a multitude of performance settings while remaining sensitive to their holistic needs. Her work has been published in prominent journals such as the International Journal of Music Education and Frontiers in Psychology and she has shared her work at local, national, and international conferences.

 

Dr. Leahy holds a DMA from Boston University, MM from Boston University, and a BM from Crane School of Music at SUNY Potsdam.

Anne Riesenfeld (she/her) is the Executive Director of the New School of Music. Anne's connection to NSM goes back decades: she joined as a voice teacher in 1995 before serving as Executive Director from 1999 to 2004. In the years that followed, she served as Executive Director of Musica Sacra, a Cambridge-based chamber chorus, and of Lorelei Ensemble, a professional vocal chamber ensemble. In 2023, she returned home to NSM as Executive Director, drawn back by the community she'd missed and her deep commitment to music education.

 

As a professional singer, Anne has performed as a soloist and choral member throughout the United States and in Europe, with recordings on the Telarc label. She holds degrees in vocal performance and composition from Bennington College and the New England Conservatory. Anne is married to a born-and-bred Cantabrigian, with whom she has two adult children. Anne dreams of swimming the English Channel, but acknowledges she may have to wait until the next lifetime.

Kate Salfelder (she/her) is a versatile administrator, composer, and educator. She joined the New School of Music in 2024 after serving in marketing and communications roles at MIT and Langwater Farm. In addition to her work at NSM, she currently serves as Executive Director of the early music vocal ensemble, Blue Heron.

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Kate holds a Doctor of Musical Arts in Composition from the New England Conservatory and a Master of Music from Yale University. She maintains a small private studio where she teaches keyboard harmony and counterpoint. Previously, she served on NEC’s composition faculty and as Lecturer in Music Theory at MIT. In her spare time, she can be found realizing figured bass lines and dabbling at the organ.