Wyers, Giselle E.

Giselle Wyers is Associate Director of Choral Studies and Voice at the University of Washington, where she conducts the University Chorale and teaches undergraduate choral conducting and graduate choral repertoire as well as courses in music education and voice.

Wyers is a leading national figure in the application of Laban movement theory in music, offering workshops across the nation for conductors and choirs. She is a regular member of the Westminster Summer Sessions, where she co-teaches choral conducting with James Jordan.

Wyers' dedication to exposing audiences to the music of contemporary American composers earned her a Medici Scholar Award and has led to numerous publications in national journals, including Choral Journal and American Choral Review. She is especially interested in exploring how modern composers use music as a form of peace-making and social justice.

Wyers is in frequent demand as a clinician and guest conductor throughout the United States. As a composer, her setting of Ave Maria (Earthsongs) won the Cambridge Singers International Choral Composition Competition, and has been performed in the USA, Ecuador, Poland, Latvia, and Germany. As a vocalist, she has recorded with Westminster Symphonic Choir, Oregon Repertory Singers, and Linda Ronstadt.

Wyers holds a DMA in Conducting from University of Arizona, where she studied with Maurice Skones and minored in Historical Musicology with John Brobeck. She earned her master's degree from Westminster Choir College, where she founded the Greater Princeton Youth Chamber Orchestra, and her bachelor's degree from UC-Santa Cruz, where she founded the San Lorenzo Valley Community Chorus and Orchestra.