Siri Bardarson - Cello. Oak Harbor
School District, Freeland. siri@whidbey.com | Siri began piano lessons at age seven . When she was 11 she began cello study who began her
cello studies at the Cornish School in Seattle at age 11 and continued with Eva Heinitz at the University of Washington. She
abandoned her cello for many years while she and her twin sister, Karin Blaine, pursued their popular music interests as the
guitar/vocal duo Ditto. Later, as the Blaine Sisters Band, the pair performed in many Seattle venues. As Siri Blaine, Bardarson
went on to sing as lead vocalist with the swing band The Rhythm Boys. Their many performances included Bumbershoot, Folklife,
Bite of Seattle, Hot Jazz Port Townsend and the Bellevue Jazz Festival, plus many local clubs. Bardarson currently sings
with the Fabulous Fenderskirts, a vocal trio with jazz quartet. She is also a continuing member of South Whidbey’s Saratoga
Strings.
Randal Bays is an American
musician whose mastery of the art of Irish fiddle playing has earned him an international reputation among fans of Irish music.
Randal he started on trumpet at age eight, and then took up the guitar at age twelve. A year later he had his first
paid gig and went on to play in several popular rock and blues bands around the Midwest while learning to play the classical
guitar. Randal attended two years of music school in Indiana, where he studied music theory and composition before emigrating
to the Pacific Northwest at the age of twenty. He’s made his home there ever since, and now lives on Whidbey Island.
After wandering into a wild session on a rainy night in Portland, Oregon in 1978,
Randal took up the fiddle and started teaching himself to play Irish traditional music. He was influenced by many of the Irish
musicians in the Northwest, including Kevin Burke, Michael Beglan, Michéal O’Domhnaill, and many more who passed
through, including James Kelly, Joe Burke, etc. He eventually met the Clare fiddler Martin Hayes in Seattle and agreed
to provide guitar accompaniment for Martin’s landmark debut recording in 1993. This led to the first of many trips to
Ireland, where Randal’s fiddling found great acceptance among fans of traditional music.
In recent years Randal has toured and recorded with many of the finest Irish musicians, including James
Keane and Daithi Sproule (in the band FINGAL), James Kelly, John Williams, Martin Hayes, Tony McManus, Aine Meenaghan, Roger
Landes. His most recent recording, “Dig With It” (2009) features the brilliant Canadian guitarist Dave Marshall,
with whom Randal now tours in North America and Canada.
Bays has performed
all over the U.S., Europe and Canada, including appearances at major festivals such as the Gaelic Roots Festival in Boston,
the San Francisco Celtic Music and Arts Festival, the Festival Des Musiques-Vivantes in France, the Willie Clancy Summer School
and Festival in Ireland, Catskills Irish Arts Week in New York, the Swannanoa Gathering in Asheville, North Carolina, Augusta
Heritage Week in Elkins, West Virginia, the Friday Harbor Irish Music Camp, the Alaska Irish Music Festival, California's
Sebastopol Festival and many more.
Randal Bays is a dedicated and thoughtful
teacher of Irish fiddling, often in demand for workshops and music camps, and is a co-founder of the Friday Harbor Irish Music
Camp. He’s also composed original scores for several award-winning films and documentaries.
Below: Randal
Bays and Tony McManus performing Randal's composition, The 99 March, followed by The 98 March, a traditional tune from
the Irish Rebellion of 1798, the "year of the French".
William Dolde - Violin, Viola,
Cello. Clinton. 360-341-4124, wdolde@gmail.com | William is the strings teacher at the Whidbey Island Waldorf School and a member of Saratoga
Chamber Orchestra. William grew up in Pittsburgh and Connecticut and received
a BA from Yale. In addition to receiving early childhood credentials at the University of Maryland and Waldorf certification
at Rudolf Steiner College, William has taken RIE I training in Los Angeles. William has taught workshops for parent &
child teachers at Sophia’s Hearth in Keene, NH. In addition to teaching kindergarten in Maryland and Monterey, William
has taught nursery and parent & child classes at the Waldorf School of Baltimore. He works as a parent coach and curriculum
consultant for an adult education institute. He finds work with infants, toddlers, preschoolers and their families rewarding
and just right. His greatest teachers are his wife Kelly and sons Liam (6) and Crispin (2).
Quinn Fitzpatrick - Guitar (performance,
composition, instruction). Clinton. 360-579-3052. quinnfitzpatrick@yahoo.com, www.quinnfitzpatrick.com | Quinn has been a professional musician and teacher for over 15 years, on both the east and west coasts.
A transplanted New Englander, he moved to California after receiving a degree in music from the University of Massachusetts.
Interested in music from an early age, he taught himself how to play piano at age five and guitar at age thirteen. Quinn is
an eclectic guitarist who draws upon folk, country, rock, blues, funk, latin and jazz. He has played in several popular San
Francisco bay area bands over the past decade. After a successful career both playing and teaching guitar in the San Francisco
bay area, he relocated to Whidbey Island to focus on recording a CD and to promote his solo fingerstyle acoustic guitar music.
Quinn currently teaches guitar classes and private lessons in South Whidbey, Coupeville and Seattle. He is also an
instructor for Guitars in the Classroom (a non-profit organization that instructs teachers how to play guitar and bring music
into the classroom). He has taught at California State University, East Bay; University of California, Berkeley; and Antioch
University in Seattle. He is a versatile, encouraging and patient instructor who teaches all styles, ages and levels.
Quinn’s intent for every student is to have a solid foundation, be inspired and play the music they love.
James Hinkley - Cello, Langley
(Joes Island Music). 341-1722, jphink@hotmail.com, www.billet-deux.com James is one of the founders and lead voices in the hot club-style combo Billet Deux. He began his studies at the Cranbrook Theatre School at the Cranbrook Institute in
Michigan. Soon after, he switched his focus to music and went on to earn degrees in music performance and composition. He
was one of the founding members of Daedalus, a music group dedicated to the work of living composers, and has had his own
works performed in Cleveland, Pittsburgh, San Francisco, London and Berlin, as well as supplying the scores for six episodes
of MTV's "Liquid Television". He has performed with the Baton Rouge, Toledo, and Akron symphonies, and served
as principal cello for the Lima Symphony, Ohio Ballet, and the Ohio Light Opera. He currently lives on Whidbey Island, and
is still active as a composer and performer in both the classical and jazz idioms.
Talia Toni Marcus - Violin, Viola, Piano. 360-221-6077,
ttmarcus@rocketmail.com. Also at Click Music in Oak Harbor. Talia has been performing professionally since she was 10 years old. Talia was a child
prodigy who performed on TV with Jack Benny and Burns and Allen in the 50s. She has recorded and toured the world with steller
artists such as Van Morrison, Pavoratti, Ornette Coleman, Kenny G, Jermane Jackson, and Carla Bley's Jazz Composers
Orchestra. Below: 12-year-old Talia on the Jack Benny Show.
Roxallanne Medley - Violin - Coupeville. 360-678-3720,
rkmedley1@verizon.net | Roxallanne Medley, conductor of the Whidbey Island Youth Orchestra, has been a violinist since she was 5 years old.
She joined the Portland Youth Symphony when she was 10, sitting last chair in the second violin section, moving up through
the strings to become concertmaster when she was 16. She won a scholarship to the famous Aspen Summer Music School in Aspen,
Colorado, where she studied chamber music with the Julliard Quartet. Roxallanne was a member of the Seattle Symphony Orchestra
for 16 years. During that time, she also played in the Seattle Opera Orchestra and the Pacific Northwest Ballet Orchestra.
Since leaving the symphony, Roxallanne devotes her musical energy to performing Celtic music, teaching violin, playing quartet
music, conducting the youth orchestra and serving as concertmaster of the Saratoga Chamber Orchestra.
