About Sharon Broadley-Martin

Sharon Broadley-Martin is an associate professor in the Contemporary Writing and Production department at Berklee College of Music, where she has taught vocal writing since 2002. She is the coauthor, with department chair Matthew Nicholl, of the advanced vocal writing curriculum. She has recorded four CDs with Nippon/Columbia Records and two recordings with Pausa Records as composer, arranger, and vocalist. Broadley-Martin has 30 jazz vocal arrangements published through UNC Press. She has performed around the globe at such prestigious festivals and venues as George Wein's Jazz Fest (Japan), Montreal Jazz Fest, Sea Jazz Fest (Finland), and the Boston Hatch Shell. As a studio singer, she has worked on several projects with Emmy-winning producer and writer Brad Hatfield (also a Berkleemusic instructor). She has also directed the Berklee Jazz Choir, Boston College's B.C. Bop, and numerous all-state and college ensembles around the country.

About Bill Elliott

Bill Elliott has been teaching arranging and orchestration in the Contemporary Writing and Production department at Berklee College of Music since 2004. His original songs and arrangements have appeared in many TV shows and films, including Dick Tracy, Northern Exposure, Nixon, Independence Day, Introducing Dorothy Dandridge, Cats Don't Dance, Gilmore Girls, Cinderella Man, and Wedding Crashers. Elliott has worked as a song arranger for Disney's Home Video productions, such as Return of Jafar, Aladdin & the King Of Thieves, Kronk's New Groove, and Bambi II, in addition to composing scores for several Disney Channel films, independent films, and the ABC TV movie Child Star: The Shirley Temple Story. He arranged and produced Michael Feinstein's Grammy-nominated album The Sinatra Project and Australian singer David Campbell's album On Broadway.

Elliott began his career as a pop piano player, working with a number of local Boston artists and spending two years in Bonnie Raitt's band in the late 70s. He then became involved in studio work, first as a player and then as an arranger, working with such diverse artists as Stevie Nicks, Donna Summer, America, Robbie Dupree, Johnny Mathis, and Smokey Robinson. Since 1993 he has led the 19-member Bill Elliott Swing Orchestra, which has performed widely and recorded four CDs. Elliott has recorded two CDs of orchestral music for children with actor John Lithgow. As Lithgow's music director, Elliott has conducted the Chicago, Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Detroit, and San Diego Symphonies, and the Orchestra of St. Luke's in Carnegie Hall. Most recently, he has been widely praised in reviews for his orchestrations in the new musical Robin and the Seven Hoods at the Old Globe Theater in San Diego.

About Jeremy Ragsdale

Vocalist, pianist, and vocal arranger Jeremy Scott Ragsdale is an instructor in the Voice department at Berklee College of Music. Called the "freshest jazz singer I've heard in years" by Michael Brecker, Ragsdale has studied, performed, and/or recorded with Patti Austin, Kevin Mahogany, Esperanza Spalding, Lalah Hathaway, Walter Beasley, Hiromi, Phil Wilson, Kim Nazarian, Peter Eldridge (of the New York Voices), and Susan Tedeschi. From 2002-2005, he was a member of the jazz vocal quartet Syncopation, which toured extensively across the United States and Japan. In 2003 and 2004, he was a backup singer for Grammy-nominated recording artist Patti Austin on her Beboperella tour. He ultimately became the arranger for the background vocalists, writing vocal parts based on the arrangements on her For Ella album.

From 2006-2011, Ragsdale served as the vocal jazz director at Towson University, where he directed both the vocal jazz ensemble and the pop music ensemble. He has been a coach for college and professional-level acappella groups across the country, and appears frequently as a choral clinician and arranger for high school vocal ensembles. He is an alumnus of New England Conservatory and graduate of Berklee College of Music, where he received the Berklee voice program's two highest merit-based scholarship awards.

Visit www.jeremyragsdale.com for information on Ragsdale's solo album, the voice programs at Berklee College of Music, and his upcoming performances.

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