Photo taken by Naomi Wallner

Words I live by: ​“Music is powerful. It’s a spiritual art. It goes right to the heart and to the mind. Artists have a huge responsibility to feed the soul good things, positive things.”
—Bobby McFerrin

Patricia Norton has studied piano, conducting, composition, music theory, and voice with many teachers, including Judi Vinar, Bobby McFerrin, and Alice Parker, despite being told in 1st grade to mouth the words. A summa cum laude graduate of Middlebury College with a degree in political philosophy and literary studies, she has continued her education independently through workshops and graduate courses at Westminster Choir College, the VoiceCare Network, YogaVoice, and circlesinging, as well as auditing courses in the Dartmouth music program. Local choral groups and soloists have commissioned her compositions, and she publishes an occasional poem. In the fall of 2012, she founded the Juneberry Music Choral Singing School, which merged with the UVMC in July of 2016. Patricia was choir director and organist at the First Congregational Church in Thetford for 13 years, and a Vermont Humanities Scholar. She facilitates classes in literature and music with OSHER at Dartmouth. Patricia and her husband, Tom, menagerie, and piano live in a passive-solar home, wood-heated home in Thetford, VT. Tom cooks and Patricia washes up! They greatly enjoy visits with their adult children.

Sarah Damron-Brown received her Bachelor's in piano performance from Morehead State University where she studied with Larry Keenan. Sarah attained a Masters of pedagogy, piano performance from Vanderbilt under the tutelage of Enid Katahn, and a PhD in Musicology and Piano performance from Boston University with Bela Nagy. She has since taught piano in various colleges in Nashville and Boston including Atlantic Union College while simultaneously operating her own music school. In addition to solo performances, Sarah has performed Gershwin’s Concerto in F for piano - live radio broadcast with the Morehead State Orchestra, Ravel Piano Concerto with Nashville Symphony, Rachmaninoff Concerto #2 with Boston Orchestra, and recently Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue with the Upper Valley Chamber Orchestra. She has also performed with various chamber music groups, including Boston based MOSABA. While pursuing her performance career Sarah received a Master's of Divinity from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Louisville, KY. As an ordained pastor, Sarah has conducted various choirs, establishing music programs in churches while performing piano and organ. She currently teaches at her own piano studio in Thetford, VT while performing with the Kentucky Warblers Piano Trio and Quintet Ascension. Sarah is also music minister at Monroe Methodist Church in Monroe, NH.