Barbara Brundage, President
Debra Burger, Vice-President
John Ozard, Treasurer
Tom Gleason, Secretary
Wanda Fisher, Ian Hamelin, Howard Jack, MaryAnn Morrison, John Roberts, Judith Shea, Phil Teumim, George Ward.
Staff
Joy Bennett, Executive Director/Artistic Director
Dan Roesser, Assistant Director
Barbara Brundage is a graduate of RPI with a BS in Materials Engineering. She was the Legislative Representative for the National Organization for Women in the NYS Legislature and then worked in the NYS Assembly for 17 years, where she fought for LGBT rights and rights for persons with disabilities. After her legislative career, she became Director of the Regulatory Affairs Unit at the NYS Office for People with Developmental Disabilities. She is a long-time member of the Voorheesville community and has served on the Board since her retirement in 2014.
Debra Burger is Vice-President of the Old Songs Board of Directors, and a long time Board Member since 1990. She has previously served as president and chairperson of the dance committee. She also serves on the festival program committee. She is a psychotherapist in private practice. Growing up in NYC she followed her interest in folk music and began performing in New York folk clubs and in Catskill Mountain resorts. Still performing, Debra is also an actor in the area’s community theaters.
John Ozard is Board Treasurer. He retired from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation in 2017 after a 40+ year career as a Wildlife Biologist. Most of his career was dedicated to managing and restoring endangered and threatened species and protecting their habitats. Most recently he served as supervisor of the Avian Diversity Unit in the Bureau of Wildlife and is an avid kayaker. He has has been the site supervisor for the Old Songs Festival since 1982.
Tom Gleason joined the board in 2023 and became secretary in mid 2023. Thomas Gleason is a graduate of the State University of New York, New Paltz and Albany Law School. He is a founding member of and now senior counsel with Gleason, Dunn, Walsh and O’Shea, an Albany Law firm where he has practiced law since 1988. He is an Adjunct Professor of Law at Albany Law School, where he has taught Insurance Law for over 25 years and has had extensive experience representing not-for-profit organizations and boards of trustees. He is a long-standing and active member of the Advisory Committee to the Chief Administrative Judge of the Courts of the State of New York.
Wanda Fischer joined the Board in 2020. She has hosted WAMC’s folk music program, “The Hudson River Sampler,” since September 18, 1982 – one of the longest, continuously-running radio programs in the Northeast US.
Ian Hamelin joined the board in 2023. Ian Hamelin has run sound at the Old Songs Festival’s main stage for many years. He has also had the honor of working the stages of the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s summer home at Tanglewood and the Bethel Woods Center for the Performing Arts. While working with artists across a diverse genre such as Willie Nelson, David Brubeck, Arturo Sandoval, Cyro Baptista, Chris Botti, Jakob Dylan (The Wallflowers), Hot Tuna, John Sebastian, and Gordon Lightfoot .. to name a few .. Ian’s heart lives in the folk traditions and has been seen behind the soundboard at Caffe Lena, Old Songs, Champlain Valley, Falcon Ridge, ADK Folk Festival and the GottaGetGon Festival. Organizationally he has been involved with the Dance Flurry Organization (DFO) since 1999 first as a Flurry Festival volunteer stagehand, stage manager, and “sound pro” and later as a member of the DFO Board of Directors, Flurry Festival Volunteer Planning Committee and eventually the Flurry Festival’s Administrative, Marketing, Technical and Finance Manager (not all at once!).
Howard Jack graduated from Michigan State University and the University of Michigan Law School. His legal career has included, among other positions, service as an Assistant General Counsel at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, General Counsel of the New York State Energy Research & Development Authority, and an Administrative Law Judge for the New York Public Service Commission. He also served for eight years as Chief Operating Officer of the Audubon Society of New York State, Inc.
MaryAnn Morrison is a retired Special Education teacher who loves all kinds of music, especially folk. She graduated from Oneonta State with a BS in Education and a minor in Music. MaryAnn’s love of folk music began when she was introduced to folk songs as a young camper at 4-H Camp. She developed a graduate level Independent Study course researching and performing Child ballads. For more than 15 years she headed the Old Songs Festival Special Services crew which provides hospitality for individuals with disabilities who attend the Festival.
John Roberts, born and raised in the midlands of England, has a B.A. in psychology from Manchester University. He taught himself to play guitar starting in high school, developing a lasting interest in folk music. As a graduate student at Cornell University, he met his long-time singing partner Tony Barrand. He joined Old Songs in 1990, first in programming, then as a board member. He works as a music transcriber and engraver as well as a performer of his native British folk songs, accompanying himself on concertinas, banjo and hurdy-gurdy.
Judith K. Shea was Board Secretary from 2017 -2023. She began actively supporting live music and theatre in the mid-eighties. After obtaining a Bachelors Degree in Business Administration, with an Accounting Option, she embarked on an accounting career. While staying close to her love of Celtic music, Judith continues to increase her knowledge and appreciation of folk music. Judith is staff member for the Instrument Exchange at the Old Songs Festival.
Phil Teumim was President of the Old Songs Board of Directors from 2007-2022. He is a mostly retired engineer and management consultant with degrees in electrical engineering and business specializing in the management and regulation of public utilities, including electric, gas, water, and land line telecommunications. He worked for the NY Public Service Commission until 2002. Phil is also a singer-songwriter and performs with several local groups in the Capital District.
George Ward is a folklorist and lifelong collector and performer of traditional songs. He was trained in folklore studies for documenting and preserving traditional materials. Drawing on the rural singing traditions of the Northeast for his main inspiration, he began a long personal interest in the traditional musicians of the southern Adirondacks. George is a teaching artist, known for traditional and original soundtracks for media productions about Erie Canal and regional history, and has been a board member since the organization’s inception.
Joy Bennett, Executive Director/Artistic Director – has been the Executive/Artistic Director since 2018. She retired as Director of Contracts from NYC Transit (MaBSTOA) after 26 years, served on the Board of the Folk Music Society of NY, Inc. for 20 years (10 as President), co-created Traditional Music and Dance Camp (TradMaD Camp) with Heather Wood in 2015 and they continue in their co-directorship of the event, and has been a performer for over 20 years. Joy has a significant business background and understands the folk music world from multiple aspects – board member, presenter, performer, and promoter; and working closely with Dan Roesser, has successfully guided Old Songs through the pandemic into recovery, and and continues on today.
Dan Roesser, Assistant Director
Dan develops and maintains the Old Songs website, designs and produces the printed marketing materials, provides in-house computer tech support, and manages the bookkeeping and the office. He graduated from the College of Saint Rose in 2004 with a B.F.A. in Graphic Design. He joined Old Songs in 2013. Before coming to Old Songs, Dan previously worked in the Marketing department at the Albany Times Union.