CASA - The Contemporary A Capella Society

Julia Hoffman President Director of Awards

Dr. Julia Hoffman started her a cappella career as a member, and later director, of the Stanford Harmonics. She served as the West Region Producer for the International Championship of Collegiate A cappella (ICCA) for two years and has sat on CASA's Board of Directors for six years. During this time, she has also served as the Director of the Contemporary A Cappella Recording Awards (CARAs).

Julia has coordinated the A Cappella Community Awards (ACAs), produced the Sing! compilation, judged numerous collegiate and professional a cappella shows including the semi-finals and finals of the ICCA, taught classes and workshops to a cappella singers and enthusiasts of all types, and been featured on Best of College A Cappella (BOCA) albums as both a singer and an arranger.

Amanda Aldag Vice President Director of Programs

Born and raised in the suburbs of Philadelphia, Amanda started her a cappella career as musical director of Special K at Hamilton College. After graduation she moved to rural Japan for 4 years where she founded, trained and performed with an international a cappella group called the Amigos. Since moving the the DC area in 2005, Amanda has founded and performs with Euphonism (CAL) and Snowday, a group that primarily provides a cappella educational programs in the Mid-Atlantic. She has served as a CARA nominator and judge and written numerous arrangements for groups around the world.

Deke Sharon Founder
Deke Sharon has been singing a cappella since the age of five and spent his formative years with one foot in traditional choral idioms (church choir, San Francisco Boys' Chorus, madrigal groups, barbershop quartets) and the other in rock bands. The two came together during his tenure as music director of the Tufts Beelzebubs, and he formed CASA in hopes of creating a community of like-minded acappellaheads.

Often called the "father of contemporary a cappella", Deke has played a prominent and influential role in the formation of CASA's many outreach programs. Most recently, he founded the Contemporary A Cappella League (CAL), a national network of a cappella groups for post-collegiate and adult singers.

Deke founded and has been singing in the vocal rock band The House Jacks since 1991. The group has produced seven full-length albums and completed multiple world tours. He arranges and directs the groups on NBC's a cappella competition reality show, "The Sing-Off".

Steve Ryan Treasurer

Steve Ryan got his first taste of the a cappella experience as a performer with the Georgia Tech Sympathetic Vibrations, starting in 2004.  By the time Georgia Tech was finished with him, he had started (and eventually finished) the group's second CD project, and founded a new multi-cultural vocal group dedicated to a fusion of various global musical styles.  Steve continues to work closely with a cappella groups in the Metro-Atlanta area and around the southeast as a studio engineer, live sound engineer, and general consultant.

In 2008, Steve started volunteering with the SoJam production team to make the event bigger and better than ever, and is excited about working directly with CASA to promote the performance and appreciation of contemporary a cappella.  He'll be acting as the Treasurer and continuing to work on the SoJam Festival each year.

Stefanie Chase Secretary

Stefanie has had extensive involvement in the vocal music world.  She began singing as a baby, to alert her family to remove her from her crib (hey, it beats crying and screaming) and joined the Cherub Choir at church at age four, and continued singing throughout her youth.  She graduated from Carthage College where she sang in both the women's choir and the Carthage Choir, supposedly the second oldest touring choir in the United States. While at Carthage, she minored in Vocal Music Performance and was active in the music fraternity, Lambda Kappa.

Stefanie loves to sing but equally enjoys working behind the scenes to produce and promote great shows.  She booked many a cappella acts to perform at her college and, since graduating, has publicized, promoted and helped numerous a cappella acts (Sean Altman, The Bobs, Da Vinci's Notebook, Minimum Wage, Kid Beyond, and Duwende, to name a few) book shows in the NYC area.  She served previously as CASA's Co-Ambassador Coordinator, and Membership Director, has been a CARA judge for the last 3 years, and has coordinated the merchandise sales at both SoJam and the East Coast Summit.

Stefanie loves turkey bacon, despises mushrooms and the song "Celebration" by Kool & The Gang, and currently resides in Northern Virginia, where she spends her days working with IP attorneys in DC.

Tom Anderson Director of Professional Relations

Joe Antonioli Director of Technology

Joe Antonioli started performing a cappella in 1992 with the University of Vermont Top Cats. After college, he started two summer high school groups, Vermont's Own Class Act, and Vermont Velvet. He is one of the founders of Random Association, and is currently performing with Root7.

In 2002, with Marisa Debowsky and Philippe Charles, Joe started the Vermont A Cappella Summit. This event is currently hosted at Middlebury College, where Joe teaches and supports media technologies. Joe joined CASA in 1996 as the Vermont Ambassador, and since then has taken on many roles, including a term as President.  He is currently sitting on the Board as the Director of Integrated Technologies.

Brian Chambers Director of Communications/PR

Danny Ozment Member At-Large

Danny Ozment grew up in Richmond, VA and began his a cappella career at James Madison University where he founded Exit 245 and received a Bachelors degree in Music Education and a Masters degree in Conducting. Along the way he has taught all forms of choral music at the elementary, secondary, collegiate, and professional levels. In 2004 he became the Assistant Conductor of the Master Chorale of Washington and in 2008 joined the staff of the Cathedral Choral Society at the National Cathedral as Director of External Programs. In 2009, Danny started Emerald City Productions, an a cappella production company based in Springfield, VA offering recording, editing, mixing, coaching, and arranging services. He has served as a CASA Ambassador since 2009.

Greg Rubin Director of Development

Greg was raised in Boston and started his a cappella career as a member and Musical Director of The Trinity Pipes at Trinity College. In 2005 Greg started Custom Acappella, an arranging and vocal consulting company, and in 2008 Greg assumed his current position as Musical Director of the NYC based group Ten & Change. He also directs a group at a high school in the Lower East Side and is an ICCA judge. Greg's professional background includes time as a strategy consultant and as a marketing director at Sony Music and Jive Records. He lives in Brooklyn with his wife.

Benjamin Stevens Director of Education
Program Manager: Festival/Event Education Coordinator  Dr. Benjamin Stevens (PhD, MA University of Chicago; BA Reed College) oversees CASA's educational programs including CASAacademy, Harmony in the Halls, High School outreach, and Tunes to Teens. As program manager for festivals education, he is responsible for designing and implementing curricula for CASA's annual festivals (Los Angeles A cappella Festival, Boston Sings, VoCALnation, Acappellafest, and SoJam), where he also leads a workshop series on music history and criticism called "Essential Listening". Outside of CASA, he judges international a cappella contests and awards, and leads masterclasses at music festivals around the country, including SoJam and LA-AF. A professional educator, since 2004 Dr. Stevens has taught at Bard College, mainly in Classical Studies but also in Cognitive Science, First-Year Seminar, the College's unique Language and Thinking program, and the Bard Prison Initiative. His research has focused on Latin literature, the history of linguistics, and classical receptions especially in the graphic novel, science fiction, and fantasy. He has also published poetry of his own. A board member 2009-10 and 2012-. 

Megan Alexander Program Manager: Program Development

A native of Connecticut, Meg is a senior public relations major at Syracuse University. As president of her female a cappella group, The Mandarins, she has founded the Social Media and A Cappella Conference (SMACC) as well as a governing body for a cappella on the SU campus. In her life outside of music, Meg founded Dunk it!, a memorial basketball tournament, to raise money for the National MS Society. She also mentors public relations students through her role as the president for the Ehling chapter of the Public Relations Student Society of America.

Shane Ardell Program Manager: Infrastructure

Shane began arranging music at an early age and ventured into arranging a cappella music at the age of 16. She started her contemporary a cappella career at Georgia Tech as a performer, arranger, and eventual president of the all female group, Nothin' but Treble. While still in college, she also began singing in a rock/gospel semi-professional group, Breakdown, in Atlanta.

Shane continues to arrange and coach groups as well as judge for the ICCAs. She also helps to maintain acaspot.com, an online a cappella group management tool that stemmed out of Georgia Tech. An engineer at heart, Shane spends her days as a marketing consultant and project manager for a web application design and development firm.

Andrea Asuaje Program Manager: Social Media

Chris Crawford Program Manager: CASA Newsletter

Chris Crawford entered the a cappella world in 2007 when he founded Acquire A Cappella at UC Santa Cruz. In addition to the musical direction of the group, he created a business team of non-singers called the "Street Team," that runs all events, marketing, and communications.

Crawford obtained his business training from 4 years of interning in the Public Relations and iTunes Promotions departments of Apple, Inc. While a double major in music and business, he was the Apple campus rep and a peer advisor for all the student organizations. Musical training was received from the Grace Cathedral Choir of Men and Boys and the Pacific Boychoir Academy with whom he has toured internationally.

In 2009, Crawford founded A Cappella Records (ACR), the first all-digital a cappella record label. Now it's easy for a cappella groups to digitally distribute their music internationally with complete legal protection.

Virginia DeMoss Program Manager: Volunteers

Bill Hare Program Manager: Forum

Bill Hare has been a full-time recording engineer/producer for 27 years, and has specialized in contemporary a cappella production since 1989. Over the last two decades, Bill has recorded and/or mixed acclaimed albums for some of the best contemporary a cappella groups around the globe, including England's Flying Pickets, Swingle Singers and Voces8, Denmark's Basix, Norway's Apes & Babes, Italy's Cluster, The Ghost Files, and Maybe6ix, as well as working with many top American acts including +4dB, Duwende, Hookslide, Moosebutter, and The House Jacks.

Collegiate A Cappella clients include The Beelzebubs, Divisi, and about 80 others. Bill is the world's most awarded individual contemporary a cappella producer, including over 45 appearances on BOCA, over 100 CARA nominations, over 30 albums in the RARB "Picks of the Year" lists, and 11 "DeeBee" awards since 1987 in the Vocal Jazz category from Downbeat Magazine.  In 2010 he added a Grammy Award to this list in the Classical Crossover Album category for Christopher Tin's "Calling All Dawns".

For more information, visit Bill's website – www.dyz.com.

Mark Hines SoJam Executive Producer

Mark Hines caught the a cappella bug in 1998 when he joined the NCSU Grains of Time. Since then, he has produced numerous award-winning albums, judged a handful of ICCA events, taken part in the SING series selection process, performed on the SoJam stage, and even served as Executive Producer of SoJam (the first to have the title), among other notable achievements.

Mark, along with Nick Lyons (former President of the AACI), has recently parted ways with his production company of five years, and the two now produce a cappella with The Vocal Company. For more information, or to contact Mark, find him on Facebook: http://facebook.com/markhinesmusic

Tom Keyes Program Manager: Contemporary A Cappella League (CAL)

Tom's Contemporary A cappella journey began in 2005 when he joined a local semi-pro group who had posted an ad on Myspace looking for a bass. After a few non-Aca years, in 2009 he dove in head-first and decided to join the Contemporary A cappella League as a new League Director. His group, Frequency, was formed in August of 2009 and remains an active and proud CAL group. He also recently served as Administrative Director for LA-AF 2011 just two years after attending his first one.

When not geeking out at AcaEvents, Tom is an I.T. manager of 19+ years, a sound engineer, volunteer webmaster and music coordinator for a local church, a husband to his soul-mate Angie for 12+ years, and father to 3 children; Michelle, Autumn, and Gavin.

As Program Manager of the Contemporary A cappella League, he looks forward to helping YOU.

TeKay was one of the first ambassadors for CASA back in the early '90s. He's a member of Contemporary A Capella League group DeltaCappella and served as a CAL-rep for SoJam. He's been a RARB reviewer for several years and is one of the sing series producers. Previously, he served on the Board of Directors for the Alliance of A Cappella Initiatives as a jack-of-all-trades and the Executive Producer of the Sing series of recordings. He was the Associate Editor of the Contemporary A Cappella News magazine for more than a decade and was the South Regional Producer of the ICCA from 1998-2004.

Amy Malkoff Program Manager: CASA Podcast
Program Manager: Web Content

Involved in a cappella since college (Kenyon College), Amy Malkoff is a founding member and bandleader of the award-winning pop-funk vocal band All About Buford, and she has appeared on stage and in the studio with such luminaries as Wayne Brady, Jonatha Brooke, The Persuasions, Ellis Paul, Vance Gilbert, GrooveLily, Patty Griffin, and Dar Williams. She has a degree in music from Kenyon College, with music studies at Youngstown State University and masters-level coursework at the New England Conservatory of Music.

Amy is a Certified Adjudicator and Producer for the International Championships of Collegiate and High School A Cappella,  and was the launching editor-in-chief of CASA's website. She is a writer and designer (www.amymalkoff.com), as well as a solo singer/songwriter. Amy's music has appeared on both the Rounder Records and Hear Music/Starbucks labels (www.amymalkoff.com/harmony).