Matt Watroba

Traditional Song Week coordinator Matt Watroba has spent most of his adult life sharing his knowledge and passion for folk music with just about anyone who would listen. As a performer, Matt has delivered thousands of shows in just about every setting you can think of. As a song leader, he is committed to inspiring or facilitating at least 100 community sings every year somewhere in the country. In 2019, Matt was inducted into the Folk DJ Hall Of Fame as part of the Folk Alliance International conference in Montreal.

Chris Koldeway 

Chris Koldewey comes from a family rich in maritime traditions, where his lullabies as a child were traditional songs of the sea. In addition to singing folk music, he plays guitar, concertina, banjo, and mandolin. Chris was privileged to sail and chantey on two historic vessels: the barque Picton Castle out of Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, and the only wooden whaler left, the Charles W. Morgan out of Mystic, CT. Using his experience from a 32-year career as a public school music teacher, Chris engages and inspires audiences and workshop students as they expand their participation and enjoyment of traditional music.

Claudia Schmidt 

Claudia Schmidt is delighted to return to the Gathering for her second year. For well over 50 years, she has been using song to uplift and inspire with equal parts tears and laughter, celebrating the human condition and the world in which we seek to survive and flourish. For Claudia, being with the Traditional Song Week community—which is so deeply committed to singing as both a foundation and a testament to our interconnectedness with all things—is endlessly nourishing and joyful.

Zoe Mulford

Zoe Mulford is rapidly becoming best-known as the writer of “The President Sang Amazing Grace,” which has been covered by Joan Baez and by The Kronos Quartet featuring Meklit. The song was voted the 2018 “Song of the Year” by Folk Alliance International. Originally from Pennsylvania, Zoe first started performing her own songs while living in North Carolina in the 1990s. Since then, she has released five albums on the cooperative Azalea City Recordings label. She now lives in the North of England and tours on both sides of the Atlantic.

Pat Wictor

Brooklyn-based singer-songwriter Pat Wictor makes his home in many musical worlds. Grounded in rural blues and gospel traditions, Wictor’s lean, poetic songs and expressive guitar playing are seasoned with jazz, pop, improvisational surprise, philosophy, and social commentary. Pat’s latest album, FLARE, a meditation on political division in America, was called “brilliant” by WFUV’s John Platt, and reached #1 on the Folk-DJ charts in 2022. Wictor currently tours solo and in a variety of duos, and he is a music educator of note, teaching workshops on guitar, songwriting, body percussion, and vocal and instrumental improvisation.

Kathy Bullock

Dr. Kathy Bullock is a Professor Emerita of Berea College, Berea, Kentucky where she taught for thirty years. A workshop clinician, scholar, performer, and choral director, Dr. Bullock has provided presentations throughout the United States, Europe, and Africa, specializing in African American sacred music. She earned a Ph.D. and M.A. in Music from Washington University and a B.A. from Brandeis University. Dr. Bullock brings to her programs a rich cultural heritage and tradition as well as an infectious excitement in the performing and sharing of it with others.

Cara Valenti

Through her years of leading morning vocal warm-ups and inspired performances with the Swanettes, Cara Valenti is a well-known fixture of the Traditional Song Week community. A singer, songwriter, music educator, and choral artistic director, Cara lives in Durham, NC, where she teaches at Triangle Day School and serves as Artistic Director of the Common Woman Chorus, a queer feminist ensemble founded in 1983. In 2024, Cara and Laura Jones—her longtime friend and musical collaborator—released an EP under the name Tall Glass. For Cara, helping people find their unique voice and sing together in community is her greatest joy.