Sylvia Munsen has a wealth of experience teaching music education from early childhood to elementary general music to leading college and university undergraduate and graduate music education programs to creating and conducting community children’s choirs. Dr. Munsen received degrees from St. Olaf College, where she sang with the St. Olaf Choir, and the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign for her masters and doctorate. In addition to studies in Dalcroze Eurhythmics, piano improvisation and solfege, she is a certified Kodály specialist, has a masters certificate in Orff-Schulwerk, and has been a faculty member of Kodály and Orff-Schulwerk Certification courses. Sylvia has been active throughout her career  as a clinician from state to regional to national and to international venues for early childhood, Kodály, Orff-Schulwerk, and children’s choirs.

Sylvia has been a noted conductor of children’s choirs for more than 40 years. She was the Founder & Conductor of the Ames Children’s Choirs (ACC) program in Iowa for 16 years. In additional to domestic and international touring, the ACC Concert Choir was selected to perform for two ACDA-North Central Conferences, two national Kodály (OAKE) conferences, and was selected to perform the opening concert for an Orff-Schulwerk (AOSA) national conference. The ACC Concert Choir performed the premiere of John Rutter’s Mass of the Children at Carnegie Hall with Rutter conducting and has released four CDs. Sylvia has conducted more than 50 festival and honor choirs including all-state choirs, a children’s choir festival at Carnegie Hall, and festivals in Brazil and China. Published choral arrangements have been performed at Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center.

In 2012 Sylvia was awarded the Medal of St. Olav from H.M. Harald V, King of Norway, for her work creating and developing an International Student Teaching Program in partnership between Iowa State University and the Kvinnherad School District in Norway and for her work teaching, arranging, and having her choirs perform Norwegian music – folk and composed. Sylvia has arranged Norwegian folk songs and music and arranged a two-week concert tour in 2010 for the ACC Concert Choir throughout SW Norway including the performance of Norwegian music. Most recently, she lived in Bergen during the Fall 2022 semester teaching general music education classes at Høgskulen på Vestlandet (Western Norway University of Applied Science), conducting general music and choral workshops throughout SW Norway, working with choirs, and teaching music to 4th Grade students in an elementary school. Locally, Sylvia taught music to 2, 3, and 4 year-olds at the Early Learning Center at the Tucson Jewish Community Center. Currently, she is a Program Supervisor for the University of Arizona supervising elementary classroom and music student teachers.