NE Voices 2026 Instructors

Check out the preliminary list of instructors for NE Voices 2026!

NE Voices Festival 2026 Instructors

Adam Tarpey

Adam Tarpey (he/him) is an educator, arranger, and performer based out of Worcester, MA. A graduate of Ithaca College’s School of Music and a former grade 6-12 chorus teacher, he recently finished his MFA in Interactive Media from Clark University. Adam continues to work in the a cappella community as Associate Director of NE Voices and Director of Education for Nexus, NE Voices’ summer program. 

Amber Bates

Amber Bates is a general music teacher at Nathanial Morton Elementary school and the music director of Northern Lights at PNHS. She began her a cappella journey in high school as a member of Northern Lights and has since gone on to become their music director. She is beyond excited to give back to the a cappella festival that gave her so much and pushed her to continue music in her professional life. a

Andrew Orsie

Andrew Orsie is a New York City singer, musician, actor, mime, and winsome smiler, now turned tech goblin over the pandemic years. By day, they work as a technical support engineer, but by night, they're the tenor and business manager and one of the arrangers of Black to Gold, a six piece a cappella group that recently won the Aca-Idol competition at Singstrong in 2024 and released their debut album, Wide Awake, in 2022, which won the CARA for Best Debut Album by a Non-Scholastic Group. Also, notably and extremely relevant, the group headlined NE Voices last year, and clearly Andrew had a great time and couldn't get enough! Andrew has been singing a cappella since being a baby; their parents literally met in barbershop groups, so they were basically born for this. Otherwise, they hate long walks on the beach, love a good video game, pretend to have a consistent workout schedule, and will NEVER say no to a hike.

Anthony Pulido

Anthony Pulido is based in Boston and serves as the Chief of Staff for the Contemporary A Cappella Society (CASA). He also works with a number of groups in the area as an arranger, director, and producer. He moved from Florida to Boston where he obtained a BS in Biochemistry from Northeastern University. While attending NU, he first joined the a cappella community singing with the Unisons, before performing in professional settings in Boston. He has continued contributions to the community, including judging for Varsity Vocals, joining the festival production teams for BOSS and SoJam, and as the third member of the head/voice podcast. Feel free to reach out to him if you want to talk a cappella, biochemistry, tabletop games, cooking/baking, or food places that he needs to go to!

Beejul Khatri

Beejul Khatri (he/him) is a Newton-based vocal percussionist, game dev, rapper, and former member of The Nor’Easters. During his time (2010-2015) with the Nor’Easters, he participated in several competitive efforts- notably receiving awards for “Outstanding VP” at SoJamX and ICCA Finals 2013. His VP has also been featured on several award winning tracks, compilation albums, and releases from The Nor’Easters. 

Blake Farfan

Blake Farfan is a CARA award-winning vocal arranger and former music director of the prestigious collegiate a cappella group, The Nor'easters. In his time with the group, they travelled to London and throughout the USA, performing at various large-scale workshops, gigs, and events- including at the White House. 

Blake’s arrangements have been performed by high school, collegiate, and post-collegiate ensembles nationwide, featured in nationally ranked competition sets, and have garnered millions of views on social media.

Now based in Los Angeles, CA, he splits his time between vocal arranging and his work as an apprentice composer at HUMAN Worldwide, an award-winning music production house specializing in original composition for advertising and television.

Dylan Melville

Dylan Melville is a professional bass vocalist, booking agent, and arranger currently based in Boston, Massachusetts. An alumni of both University of Miami and Berklee College of Music, he’s trained with some of the best vocal teachers in the nation. Dylan has been a featured vocalist on TV networks like NBC, TNT, ABC, with artists like John Legend, Stevie Wonder, Pitbull and more. He currently is the bass in professional group Ball in the House, and is the founder of DMel & Friends, a multiple time CARA award winning ensemble.

Hannah Caple

Hannah Caple is a creative professional from Plymouth, MA. She is a recent graduate of Roger Williams University, where she earned her degree in Graphic Design and developed a strong interest in accessibility, visual storytelling, and socially engaged design. 

Hannah is a proud alum of Plymouth North High School’s Northern Lights a cappella group, where her love for collaboration, creativity, and expressive storytelling first began. These early performance experiences continue to influence her approach to design, emphasizing connection,connection, and thoughtful communication. Today, Hannah brings this interdisciplinary perspective to her creative practice, blending design, storytelling, and community engagement. She is excited to continue growing as a creative, and contributing to spaces that value collaboration, expression, and meaningful work.

Jess Garcia

Jess Garcia is a Boston-based creative and singer. With training in classical, jazz, musical theatre, and pop singing, Jess loves to exercise all aspects of her musicianship in every performance. She spent five years in Pitch, Please!, Northeastern University's premiere women-centered a cappella group. There, she led the group to a 3rd place finish at ICCA Finals in 2023, serving as their President for three years and their Secretary and PR Manager for one and a half. In her time in Pitch, she won the Varsity Vocals award for Outstanding Soloist for the song "Titivating" and the Contemporary A Cappella Recording Award for Best Upper Voices Collegiate Lead Vocal for the song "Meteorite". She also produced, directed, creative directed, styled, and movement directed numerous music videos for the group, earning several A Cappella Video Awards. Nowadays, Jess works full time at a nonprofit organization in the Boston area that focuses on creative youth development through the performing arts. She is also building her own production company, See Ya! Productions, which aims to bring top quality music videos to the independent artist. @seeyaproductions @jesstgarcia

Jules Zannikos

Jules Zannikos is a singer and songwriter who is a current member and former Brand Manager of the award winning a cappella group, the Nor’easters from Northeastern University. At Northeastern, Jules is a health science major on the pre-physician assistant track and is also receiving a minor in Music industry. She is most known in the a cappella world for her solo on the Nor’easters rendition of “Stayaway” (opb. MUNA), for which she received a 2024 Contemporary A Cappella Recording Award for Best Mixed Collegiate Lead Vocal. She released her first EP, “say you won’t blame me” in August of 2024, and her second EP, “father’s daughter” was released December 2025. Both can be found on all streaming platforms. She began posting her own music and covers on TikTok in May of 2025 and has amassed over 70,000 followers on the platform to date. Jules is so excited to be teaching at NE Voices for her first time ever!

Julia McBride

Julia McBride, graduate of the University of Delaware School of Music, and current graduate student of Longy School of Music of Bard College, is a music educator with a passion for contemporary a cappella. Julia teaches elementary general music by day and directs the competitive high school a cappella group, “Spectrum”, after-school. She also serves as the Education Manager for the NE Voices A Cappella Festival. Julia has sung with a wide range of contemporary a cappella groups, including the professional a cappella group, Cape Harmony.

Kari Francis

Dr. Kari Francis is a choral musician whose work explores the resonant spaces between improvisation, early music, and the unbounded freedom of the human voice. She can be heard singing with the NYC-based choir Choral Chameleon and beatboxing on Season 3 of NBC’s The Sing-Off with Kinfolk 9 and on GRAMMY-winner Cory Smythe’s album Accelerate Every Voice. Her approach to ensemble directing centers living and historically underrepresented voices as part of creative and learner-centered pedagogies, while her composing merges elements of psalmody, vocal jazz, renaissance polyphony, and contemporary a cappella. She has written chapters for books published by GIA Music and the National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS), and maintains an active schedule as a guest conductor and clinician. Kari is the Director of Choral Activities at Bowdoin College and the choir director of The Walden School Young Musicians Program.

Lauren Garcia

Lauren Garcia is a local performer from Plymouth, MA. She previously spent her summers with the professional Cape Cod a cappella group, Cape Harmony, where she sang all over Cape Cod and the islands and was their Brand Manager. She’s also formerly a member of The Nor’easters at Northeastern University, Northeastern’s premier award-winning a cappella group, where she brand managed, as well. Most notably, Lauren is a proud alumni of NE Voices and Plymouth North High School’s Northern Lights and Girl Treble. Today, she is directing Girl Treble, Plymouth North’s student led premiere treble group, where she got her start. Lauren is thrilled to return to NE Voices for her 7th year!

Louis Shriber

Louis Shriber is a New England based composer, singer, and director. He is currently pursuing a Masters in Choral Conducting from the New England Conservatory of Music where he studies with Erica Washburn. Louis performs a wide variety of music, including jazz, classical, contemporary, musical theater, and pop, with multiple ensembles. He serves as Conducting Fellow for the NEC Prep Youth Choir and sings as a staff baritone with the Newton Trinity Parish Choir. In addition to his ensemble work, Louis performs as a solo artist around New England, most recently, he hosted and performed as the guest artist for the 2025 Quarterfinals of the International Championship of Collegiate A Cappella. As a composer and arranger, Louis has had his works performed by multiple ensembles across New England, even having his choral work How Can I Learn to Love be featured at the first Arlington Choral Festival in 2023. He has had numerous vocal arrangements of his be performed by groups all over Rhode Island, songs such as Cruella De Vil, Bridge Over Troubled Water, and Make You Feel My Love to name a few.

Norah Flanders

Norah Flanders is a private voice, piano, and musical theater teacher at Boss Academy in Hanson, MA. She grew up doing vocal music, theater, marching band and jazz band. She now studies social work at Bridgewater State University and works to combine her passion for people and music to create meaningful experiences for all of her students.​

Olivia Materetsky

Olivia Materetsky is a 10-time recipient of the Varsity Vocals and CASA Outstanding Vocal Percussion Awards and former music director for Pitch, Please! of Northeastern University. During her time with Pitch, Please!, she led the group to their first two ICCA Northeast Semifinal wins (2023, 2025) and their first ICCA Finals placement (2023, 3rd place). Olivia also served as the in-house video producer for Pitch, achieving 7 AVA nominations and 5 AVA wins in her 5 years in the group. She is ecstatic about the opportunity to share her experience with young a cappella enthusiasts at NE Voices!

Beyond a cappella, Olivia runs Materetsky Multimedia as a videographer, editor and colorist specializing in performance media.

@oliviamateretsky8 @materetskymultimedia

Shannon Phypers

Shannon Phypers is Executive Producer of the National A Cappella Convention, veteran teacher and owner/operator of Sanctuary Cultural Arts Center in Maynard, Massachusetts. Shannon has been teaching at and running festivals around the country for the last fifteen years. She is passionate about cultivating educational communities where folks can bond over shared experiences and the power of music and the creative arts.

Spencer Camacho

Spencer Camacho (he/him) is an instructor at West Chester University, teaching Music Theory, Aural Skills, and Music Technology courses in the Wells School of Music and Civic & Professional Leadership within the Honors College. Spencer, currently completing his PhD in Leadership at the University of Southern Maine, holds a Master of Music Technology from NYU and Bachelor of Music Education from West Chester University. He thrives at the intersection of music, education, leadership, creativity, and technology, looking for ways to collaborate, contribute, and grow in these cross-disciplinary fields. Spencer holds expertise in contemporary a cappella, having produced 3 studio albums, arranged for collegiate groups and presented at a cappella festivals across the country including Boston Sings, the Los Angeles A Cappella Festival, and SoJam A Cappella Festival. Award winner for several International Championship of Collegiate A Cappella arrangement titles, Spencer thrives working with groups in both writing music and helping musicians bring the art to life.

Walter Nelson

Hi, I’m Walter. I’m based in Boston, MA, but I was born and raised in Dallas, TX. I started singing and performing at a young age through school plays and church choirs, which is where my love for music and performing really began.

I joined my first a cappella group in high school and, honestly, swore I would never do it again (very dramatic, I know). But somehow, I ended up at Boston University, auditioned, and was accepted into an a cappella group that completely changed my life: BU Treblemakers. I graduated from BU and the Trebs in 2024, and my time there shaped not only how I see music, but how I think about leadership, organization, and growth within creative groups.

I’m currently working at an advertising agency in downtown Boston, where I focus on paid social strategies, media strategy, and branding. In this course, I’ll be teaching how to elevate your group’s brand and strengthen its business and leadership approach, drawing from both my a cappella experience and my professional work in advertising.​