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About Martha Guth
Dr. Guth is Associate Professor of Voice at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music. She has been Co-Artistic Director and Director of the Composer/Mentorship program at SongFest, and is a frequent faculty member at the Vocal Academy for The Collaborative Piano Institute, and at Opera Seme in Arezzo, Italy. She has presented lectures, masterclasses and recitals at the University of Toronto, Indiana University, Peabody Conservaotry, Boston Conservatory, Univeristy of Madison-Wisconsin, University of Manitoba, Notre Dame, the Cincinnati College Conservatory of Music and many more.
As a young artist Martha won first prize at both the Wigmore Hall International Song Competition and the Concours Musical International de Montréal, launching a performance career specializing in concert and song repertoire. Her deep interest in art song led her to co-found Sparks & Wiry Cries a non-profit dedicated to art song spanning publication, live performance, and commission of new works with friend and collaborator pianist Erika Switzer. Sparks is the force behind the popular regional songSLAM’s that are presented in partnership with other song organizations and Universities all over the world from Slovenia to the U.K., Canada, and every region of the US, and presents its own sparksLIVE events every January in NYC. In 2023 as Co-Director of Sparks & Wiry Cries, Martha led a partnership with the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture and the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society to produce the world premiere of Freedom on the Move: Songs in Flight composed by Shawn Okpebholo with performers Rhiannon Giddens, Karen Slack, Will Liverman, Reggie Mobley and Howard Watkins. As Co-Directors of Sparks & Wiry Cries Martha Guth and Erika Switzer and the projects they champion are ‘Creatives’ for UIA Management.
Her discography includes Summer Night, a Juno nominated disc of songs by Healy Willan on Centrediscs for The Canadian Art Song Project with Allyson McHardy, Helen Becqué and Peter Barrett; Das Ewig Weibliche a solo disc of Schubert songs with Penelope Crawford on fortepiano; Roberto Sierra’s Beyond the Silence of Sorrow with the Orquesta Sinfonica de Puerto Rico for Naxos (nominated for a 2016 Latin GRAMMY); John Fitz-Roger’s Magna Mysteria for the Innova label; Go by Contraries, songs of Andrew Staniland with Baritone Tyler Duncan and Pianist Erika Switzer released on Centre Discs, The Brahms Liebeslieder Waltzes for Sparks & Co., and The Five Boroughs Song Book for GVR records. Forthcoming is a disc for Naxos of Mendelssohn’s Lobgesang with the Yakima Symphony, along with a few other projects up her sleeve!
About Erika Switzer
Erika Switzer is an accomplished pianist who collaborates regularly in major concert settings around the world, including at New York’s Weill Hall (Carnegie), Geffen Hall, Frick Collection, and Bargemusic, at the Kennedy Center, the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, the Spoleto Festival (Charleston, SC). Her performances have been called “precise and lucid” by the New York Times, and Renaud Machart of Le Monde described her as “one of the best collaborative pianists I have ever heard; her sound is deep, her interpretation intelligent, refined, and captivating.”
From 2000-2007, Switzer performed and studied in Germany, an experience that profoundly inspired and shaped her work. During that time, she appeared at Festspielhaus Baden-Baden and in the Munich Winners & Masters series and won numerous awards, including best pianist prizes at the Robert Schumann, Hugo Wolf, and Wigmore Hall International Song Competitions.
“…one of the best collaborative pianists I have ever heard; her sound is deep, her interpretation intelligent, refined, and captivating.”
Switzer has long been a leader in envisioning and promoting the future of art song performance. In 2009, in collaboration with soprano Martha Guth, she founded the organization Sparks & Wiry Cries, which curates opportunities for song creators and performers, commissions new works, presents the songSLAM festival in New York City, and publishes The Art Song Magazine. She is also devoted to new music, and has recently premiered new compositions in the 5 Boroughs Music Festival Songbook II; at the Brooklyn Art Song Society; and at Vancouver’s Music on Main.
Switzer collaborates with a range of top singers and instrumentalists. A frequent collaborator is baritone Tyler Duncan, and as a duo, Switzer and Duncan have performed in major concert halls and music festivals around the world. She is also an active teacher, serving on the music faculty at Bard College and the Vocal Arts Program of the Bard Conservatory of Music. Switzer holds a doctorate from The Juilliard School, and lives in New York’s Hudson Valley.
About Andrea Yun
Cellist Andrea Yun has performed throughout North America, Europe, and Asia, both as a soloist and chamber musician. She is most active as an orchestral musician. She is a member of the Detroit Opera and Ann Arbor Symphony, and is principal cellist of the Baroque on Beaver Island festival orchestra. She has performed with orchestras such as the Detroit Symphony, San Antonio Symphony, Toledo Symphony, and Windsor Symphony, among others. Andrea has served under the baton of conductors such as Kurt Mazur, Michael Tilson Thomas, James Levine, and Charles Dutoit. In 2023, Andrea performed as a soloist in Handel’s Xerxes under the direction of Dame Jane Glover. Andrea was acting principal for the Detroit Opera in 2022-2023, and has served as principal for the Windsor Symphony, San Antonio Symphony, Flint Symphony, and Saginaw Bay Symphony Orchestra. Andrea’s solo and chamber performances have been heard on CBC Music (Canada), WKAR-East Lansing, WRCJ-Detroit, Interlochen Public Radio, and Blue Lake Public Radio.
Andrea is highly regarded as a teacher and teacher trainer. She maintains a cello studio in Ann Arbor, Michigan, where she founded Cellympics, a play-based approach to cello technique acquisition for children. Since its inception in 2012, Cellympics has been replicated in over 9 states and 5 countries. Andrea has held teacher training workshops throughout the world – Korea, Australia, England, Spain – as well as throughout the Americas. Andrea is one of 40 Suzuki cello teacher trainers in the Americas, and she was hired in 2020 by Paul Katz to be a part of his CelloBello teacher training faculty. In 2020, Andrea was designated Teacher of the Year by the Michigan chapter of the American String Teachers Association.
Former teaching positions include: Lecturer, University of Michigan; Assistant Professor of Cello, University of Texas at San Antonio; Adjunct Assistant Professor of Cello, Bowling Green State University (OH); Orchestra director, Pioneer High School (MI); Orchestra director, Okemos Chippewa Middle School (MI). At Indiana University, Andrea earned a dual bachelor’s degree in music education and mathematics, as well as a master’s degree in cello performance with Tsuyoshi Tsutsumi; she completed her doctorate in cello performance and pedagogy from the University of Michigan with Erling Blöndal Bengtsson.
About the Beaver Island Performing Arts Alliance
Each summer from the last weekend of July through the first weekend of August, the Baroque on Beaver Festival presents world-class orchestral, chamber, and vocal performances on the most remote inhabited island of the Great Lakes. In 2026, the Festival celebrates 25 years of bringing classical music to Beaver Island. Baroque on Beaver is the signature event of the Beaver Island Performing Arts Alliance (BIPAA).
“The Beaver Island Performing Arts Alliance produces the Baroque on Beaver Festival and promotes the performing arts with its partners to enrich the greater Beaver Island community.”
Beyond our signature annual event, the Baroque on Beaver Festival, the BIPAA strives to engage with the BI community broadly and in multiple types of artistic presentations with both summer-season and year-round arts programming. Additional 2026 events include the Beaver Island Jazz Series in association with the BIC Center and WVBI, and a Christmas Concert in association with the BIC Center. Learn more at www.baroqueonbeaver.org/bipaa.
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