MUSIC CONTACT - Key Persons
Adam was born in Illinois, grew up in Georgia, studied music in Texas and Massachusetts, and he lived in New York City for 10 years before settling in Vermont with his wife Marielle. A lifelong lover of music, Adam enjoyed a decade+ long career as a professional opera singer, appearing with companies including New York City Opera at Lincoln Center, The Atlanta Opera, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, Light Opera of New York, Virginia Opera, Opera Omaha, Opera San Jose, and others, including his European debut with Wexford Festival Opera in Wexford, Ireland and his Asian debut with the Shenzhen Music Festival in Shenzhen, China.
In 2018, Adam "retired" from the opera world and joined the acclaimed classical/crossover group Empire Trio, and he has traveled the US extensively, singing in theaters across the country. He continues to perform with the trio as his schedule permits. Pre-pandemic, Adam was a small business owner in New York, and has passionately brought music to communities everywhere with his love of educational outreach. Music and travel are instrumental (pun intended!) to his life, and he loves to travel the world and meet music ensembles of all types.
When he's not on the road or in the office, Adam enjoys swimming, tennis, recreational softball, oil painting, and battling Vermont hedgehogs in his ever-growing garden.
Born and raised in the suburbs of New York City, Carolyn's passion for travel and culture started in high school when she participated in a summer exchange with a Parisian family. After graduating from the University of Vermont, she continued to explore the world, by working for CBS Sports on the Olympics in Albertville and Lillehammer and for the Hard Rock Cafe in Paris and ultimately landing at Music Contact International where she worked in the late 1990's coordinating tours and traveling throughout Europe and Africa.
Carolyn received her Master of Business Administration from Thunderbird School of Global Management and pursued a career in marketing working for multinational consumer brands like Herbal Essences, John Frieda and Seventh Generation. She is thrilled to return to Music Contact International to share her passion for travel with others.
When she isn't working or traveling, Carolyn enjoys spending time with and cooking meals for her family and friends, enjoying the beautiful surroundings in Vermont, as well as swimming, biking, running and walking.
Charlotte is a life-long New Englander with roots in Connecticut, degrees from Bowdoin and St. Michael's College, and a career at Middlebury College. Travel is a fundamental part of Charlotte's life. She is fluent in German, has spent time in Austria, and has traveled extensively throughout Europe.
In 2000, Charlotte joined Music Contact International as a Tour Manager. Since then, she has traveled with countless choirs and orchestras, bringing endless energy and knowledge to all of the places she visits. In addition to traveling as a Tour Manager, Charlotte enjoys all kinds recreational travel - on foot, on horseback, by bicycle, in the sky or on the water - and feels that journeying opens a door to new cultures, histories, and natural environments. She is privileged to experience other communities while also gaining new perspectives on her own, through travel to places near and far.
Charlotte is usually up before the sun, swimming, running, or hiking. She lives on a farm in the Green Mountains with her husband, their dogs, and a few horses.
Chloe grew up in Colchester, Vermont where she spent her youth singing in choir, dancing, and doing theater. Chloe attended Goucher College in Maryland to Study Arts Administration and Art History where she spent a semester abroad at the Studio Arts Center International School in Florence, Italy. She has gone on to work for a variety of nonprofits as well as visual and performing arts organizations, including the Shelburne Museum in Vermont and Madison Square Park Conservancy in New York City. In 2020, Chloe returned to Vermont with her partner and two little pups, Buddy and June. She resides in Burlington and hopes to get back to her singing roots by joining a local community choir! Along with her passion for traveling, Chloe enjoys all things crafty and spending time with friends and family, ideally on the ocean. No matter the destination, her favorite thing to do while traveling is to find the best bakeries and desserts traditional to the local community and culture!
Gary grew up in Iowa. He studied English and International Studies at the University of Nebraska and German at the Goethe Institute and Ludwig Maximillian University in Munich, Germany. Later, he received his MFA from Vermont College of Norwich University.
Gary first traveled abroad in 1987 during a sophomore semester abroad to Munich, Germany. This first trip was a revelation, illustrating the power of experiential learning and the consciousness-raising effect of travel through different countries and cultures, as well as the significance and ability of the universal language of the arts to bring people from different backgrounds together.
Fluent in German, Gary worked at Music Contact International's Burlington, Vermont office from 1998 until 2000, when he and his family decided to move to Germany. After gathering experience in international education, Gary returned to Music Contact International as a Tour Manager in 2009.
Gary is married to a German national and has three children. He currently resides in Berlin, Germany. When not leading tours or traveling, Gary works as a freelance writer, editor, and translator.
Hannah first started traveling internationally as a teenager in Latin America. Her early travel experience made quite an impression and led to her working as a Peace Corps volunteer in two countries as well as pursuing a M.A. in Intercultural Communications and career in international relations. Through her volunteering, work and personal travel, Hannah has visited over 20 countries.
Before joining Music Contact International, Hannah managed international exchange programs abroad and in the U.S. for students and professionals. Hannah is happy to share her passion for cross-cultural exchange, exploring different places and meeting new people with MCI groups. Her coordination skills and understanding of group travel ensure tour participants' experience is safe, well-organized, comfortable, and most importantly memorable!
In her spare time Hannah enjoys hiking, kayaking, running, skiing and all that the beautiful state of Vermont has to offer. Hannah remains active in the Burlington community as a sports team mascot, pulling weeds and harvesting vegetables at her community garden, volunteering with new Americans, and is a proud member of the Burlington Bocce Club.
Jodi and her husband Manfred found their passion for showing the world to travelers early. Their first group tours began by bringing Germans across the American west in tandem vans in 1986. By the time they founded Music Contact International in 1987, Jodi and Manfred knew that they wanted to build their lives around a business that connected people across the world. They began their work with performance travel in that first year when their company was selected by the Cultural Affairs Department of Vienna, Austria to represent their Advent Sing Festival to North American Choirs. She traveled the world growing the network of festivals over the following three decades.
Jodi grew up in New Jersey but has always traveled extensively. At fourteen, she spent six weeks in Greece and backpacked around Europe for two months at seventeen. While studying Art History at Barnard College, Jodi lived for a time in Salzburg, Austria where she secured fluency in German. She and her husband, Manfred, met while working on a three-masted Schooner on the Baltic Sea out of Kiel, Germany.
In addition to presiding over Music Contact International from their office in Burlington, Vermont, she still enjoys traveling with groups as a tour manager multiple times each year. When she's not working, she raises funds for women's issues in developing nations through the Vermont Women's Giving Circle which she founded in 2010 and enjoys being active outdoors through gardening, hiking, and especially alpine skiing. She and Manfred have two adult children, Sidney and Lucas.
Manfred and his wife, Jodi, founded Music Contact International in 1987.
Originally from northern Germany, not far from Bremen, Manfred began traveling at a young age. He spent time exploring Europe's cultures, landscapes, customs and art forms before he finished his studies of biology and geography at the Westfälische Wilhems University in Muenster.
Manfred's travels by land, sea, and air since then have brought him to many corners of the world, and he loves learning about the history and people of foreign places. The stories he recounts from memory about various tour destinations have been a highlight for countless groups he has traveled with.
Manfred is always looking for new, exciting, and unique performance opportunities for Music Contact International's tour groups. He loves to experience new cultural traditions and design performance tour itineraries that match groups with the best venues and leisure activities.
When he's not working, Manfred enjoys sailing, riding his Russian motorcycle, working on his home in Shelburne, and cooking for his wife and two adult children who still come home for his incredible meatloaf!
Nathan grew up in Gloucester, Massachusetts, where he developed a love of boating and the outdoors. During high school and college, Nathan became passionate about travel. He moved west to study sociology, music, and French at Colorado College, and spent his twenties living in Francophone countries, where he gained fluency in French. Nathan spent time in Paris and Perpignan, France, and has lived in Senegal and Morocco. Now that he has settled in Vermont, he appreciates living in proximity to Montréal and Québec City, where he can exercise his language skills.
In 2004, Nathan joined Music Contact International. He presently works as Operations Team Manager, overseeing most phases of the tour-planning process. Nathan manages International Choral Festivals in Vienna, Austria; Ponce, Puerto Rico; Ghent, Belgium; the Czech Republic, and Ghana. He loves to share his ideas about different countries and performance venues with directors choosing destinations for their groups.
Nathan also enjoys meeting tour groups in person and frequently travels alongside them as a tour manager, getting the chance to hear them perform around the world.
Music is an important part of Nathan's life. He is plays the saxophone in bands throughout New England and in his hometown, Burlington.
Rhea grew up in rural southern Vermont on a farm raising beef cattle and horses. She traveled in New England extensively as a child and has fond memories of catching crabs in coastal Maine and outrunning waves on the shores of Massachusetts. As a teenager, she realized her interest in exploring extended well beyond New England and she started traveling in Europe, Asia and around the US.
Rhea is also a passionate artist, specializing and teaching ceramics for many years. Art has always influenced the way Rhea travels, whether that be to Xi'an to see the Terracotta Warriors, or to London to see historic row houses, Rhea seeks out creativity and art wherever she travels.
Before joining Music Contact International, Rhea lived and studied in Washington, DC. She received a B.A. in Psychology and Geography from George Washington University in 2021. After five years away from the green mountains and clean lakes of Vermont, Rhea decided to move back to New England where she is continuing to explore and travel with her dog and Music Contact International.
Sahara grew up in Plymouth, Vermont and spent her childhood reading, camping, and building precarious woodland forts. A lover of the outdoors, her first job in high school was working for the Vermont Youth Conservation Corps restoring trails in the Marsh Billings Rockefeller Historical Park. While in college, Sahara was given the opportunity to travel to Ireland to do a special study abroad program for Irish literature. Her Dublin trip sparked an interest in travel that has persisted to this day. Before joining Music Contact International in 2023, Sahara worked in the news industry as a Technical Media Producer, Newscast Director, and Video Editor. She combines her passion for travel and extensive production work in her coordination role at Music Contact.
A native of New England, Tyler studied music and earth sciences at the University of Vermont. After graduating, Tyler played in local bands and toured regionally before getting an opportunity to tour as a manager and multi-instrumentalist with artists from Niger, Sierra Leone, Brazil, Cuba, Spain, and France. After several years of travel with these groups Tyler moved across the country to the California bay area and eventually landed in Seattle, WA, continuing his musical endeavors and working with human service agencies serving refugee and immigrant communities in South King County. Tyler moved back to Vermont in the 2021, returning to his most favorite state to be closer to family and friends.
Aside from his work at Music Contact International as a Tour Coordinator, Tyler enjoys playing music, listening to vinyl records, shooting pool, cycling, and spending time with friends and family. He is passionate about Buddhist meditation and mindfulness, and is an advocate for those struggling with mental health and substance use challenges. He resides in Burlington, Vermont and hopes to live in the woods one day.
Join Vienna's international choir festival and perform a concert in Vienna's prestigious City Hall, where Strauss first presented the waltz. Travel to the gilded Abbey of Melk… more