Presenter Information

Eli Conley, masterclass instructor, TIGQ performer panelist, TIGQ vocal pedagogy panelist, leader of community sing

Eli Conley (he/him/his) is a singer-songwriter and voice teacher. He performs as an indie folk artist, leads community singing classes for LGBTQIA+ people and allies, and teaches singing and songwriting workshops around the country. Eli also maintains a private voice studio in Berkeley where he works with students one-on-one, including many transgender and non-binary singers. As a gay transgender man, Eli has a deep commitment to working within diverse LGBTQIA+ communities to build up their collective power, creativity, & resilience. Eli is a certified teacher of Somatic Voicework - The LoVetri Method™. He completed his training at the Contemporary Commercial Music Vocal Pedagogy Institute, and continues to study to deepen his practice of this functional, voice science-informed method. Eli has also studied classical singing at Oberlin Conservatory and jazz vocal performance at Berklee College of Music. He is a former member of the International Orange Chorale of San Francisco and the Grammy award-winning San Francisco Symphony Chorus.

Anna Dickinson. TIGQ performer panelist

Elliot Franks, TIGQ performer panelist, masterclass singer

Ruth Rainero, masterclass instructor, TIGQ vocal pedagogy panelist

Ruth Rainero (she/her/hers) holds a Master’s degree in Voice Performance and Pedagogy from the Royal Conservatory of the Hague in The Netherlands, and a Bachelor’s degree from the California Institute of the Arts. She speaks five languages, sings in five more and has been teaching classical voice—first in Amsterdam and then San Francisco—for over thirty years. Her areas of expertise range from early baroque to contemporary music, and she performed throughout Europe at various international festivals with a wide range of ensembles. In Europe and the United States, Ms Rainero performed under the direction of conductors ranging from Philippe Herreweghe, Niklaus Harnoncourt and Nicholas McGegan to Steve Reich and Reinbert de Leeuw.

At her private studios in New York City and San Francisco, Ruth teaches singing, voice rehabilitation, and communication skills. She has taken courses in voice science, and can therefore combine knowledge of anatomy, acoustics, biomechanics, and vocal fold oscillation with her many years of teaching experience. In addition to her classical voice studio, Ruth receives referrals from laryngologists of both singers and non-singers suffering from muscle tension dysphonia and other voice disorders. Ruth teaches internationally, and is a featured lecturer at voice conferences throughout the United States and Europe. These include the Pan European Voice Conference, the International Voice Symposium, the Physiology and Acoustics of Singing Conference, the Pacific Voice Conference/Pixar “Emotions and the Voice”, and the UCSF Fall Voice Conference. Before devoting herself exclusively to her private studio, Ms. Rainero was on the faculty at the American Conservatory Theater (ACT) in San Francisco, the University of California at Davis and Skyline College in San Bruno. Her students perform internationally, both on and off Broadway, and in major opera houses throughout the world.

William Sauerland, presenter, event advisor, TIGQ vocal pedagogy discussion group facilitator

Breanna Sinclaire, TIGQ performer panelist

Breanna Sinclaire (she/her/hers) is a native of Baltimore, Maryland, and a graduate of CalArts. She received her Masters from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and she was the first transwoman of the opera program, under the pedagogy of Ms. Ruby Pleasure.Operatic performances include Carmen, La Calisto, The Old Maid and The Thief, The Magic Flute, L'enfant et les sortilèges, Platée, and West Side Story, as well as Meredith Monk’s Songs of Ascension at REDCAT, and Zachary Sharrin’s Time Bodies at MOCA.

Outside of opera, Ms. Sinclaire has enjoyed a variety of performance opportunities with LGBT and other non-profit organizations throughout the nation — most recently the Gay Men’s Choruses of Washington, D.C. & San Francisco. She made her debut at the Walt Disney Concert Hall with the Los Angeles Gay Men’s Chorus. Other performances include Americans for the Arts, Washington, D.C. and Toronto Pride Festivals, SF Trans March, Fresh Meat Trans and Queer Arts Festivals, Harvey Milk LGBT Democratic Club, LinkedIn’s LGBTQ Employee Resource Group speaker series panel discussion (alongside civil rights leader Cecilia Chung), Janet Mock’s Redefining Realness book tour, and the Transgender Law Center’s SPARK! anniversary celebration. She also, made her debut as a guest artist for the Gay Men's Chorus of DC in Durufle's "Requiem performing "Pie Jesu" at Church of the Epiphany.

She was among Out Magazine’s 2015 "OUT100" list of LGBT heroes. She was the first transwoman to perform the National Anthem at a professional sporting event for the Oakland A's, SF Giants, & San Francisco Deltas. She made her debut with SF Symphony on December 31st as the first trans singer to perform with the orchestra.

Wendy Vastine, presenter, TIGQ performer panelist

Wendy Vastine (they/them) has been teaching voice – both speaking and singing - in the trans and/or non-binary community for the past decade. They have worked with voices with all levels of training – from the complete newbie to the professional performer. They have trained extensively with members of the Roy Hart Theatre and have worked in the research labs of some of the leading voice scientists. While they are a total voice science nerd, their first love is with accessing the soul through the voice, and its healing potential. They have presented at numerous conferences, lectured in multiple universities, and they have taught and performed nationally and internationally. Wendy holds a BFA in theatre from New York University: Tisch School of the Arts, and an MA in Speech-Language Pathologist from University of Pittsburgh. They are a voice teacher, National Center for Voice Science trained vocologist, and a clinical fellow in Speech-Language Pathology. One of their projects most dear to their heart is that of a peer-based training, which involves training other members of the trans and non-binary community to teach within the community. They are currently living and teaching voice in Berkeley, California.

Shawna Virago, TIGQ performer panelist, TIGQ discussion group facilitator

SHAWNA VIRAGO (she/her/hers) is a transgender trickster celebrated for her striking lyric-based songs. Her music twists together folk and punk, offering raw observations about survival in a predatory world, queer love, and sticking up for the underdog. Virago is celebrated as a music pioneer – she was one of the nation’s first openly transgender women to perform and tour nationally, and has performed as an out transwoman since the early 1990’s. Virago has been profiled online, in print and on radio including Bitch, Louder Than War, No Depression, Paste magazine, on NPR and PBS, and on left-of-the-dial radio.

Virago is the Artistic Director of the San Francisco Transgender Film Festival and her own films have screened at more than 30 film festivals around the world

Virago is a published writer and her work appears in Gender Outlaws: Next Generation and in the anthologies Trans/Love: Radical Sex, Love & Relationships Beyond the Gender Binary,Take Me There, In the Woods and on the Heath and Transnational Queer Underground. Virago has been featured in documentaries aired on PBS and NPR.

Reuben Zellman, event co-coordinator, moderator & host, NVBA Director

Reuben Zellman (he/him/his) is a teacher, conductor, singer and longtime activist and educator in the transgender community. In addition to directing New Voices Bay Area, he is a lecturer in the School of Music at San Francisco State University, where he teaches ear training, musicianship and choral ensembles, and is a staff countertenor in the Choir of Men and Boys at San Francisco’s Grace Cathedral.

Reuben holds degrees in linguistics from U.C. Berkeley, a Master’s of Music in choral conducting from San Francisco State, and a master’s in Hebrew literature and rabbinical ordination from the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, where he also trained in chazzanut (theory and performance practice of Jewish liturgical music). He served for nine years as a synagogue rabbi and music director. Reuben speaks and has been published extensively on issues of gender identity and religion; other research interests include applied ethnomusicology and Jewish music of the Baroque and early Classical periods.

Born and raised in California, Reuben has studied and worked in Santiago de Chile, Jerusalem, New York and Los Angeles, and has lived mostly in his beloved Bay Area since 1996. He is passionate about helping to expand marginalized communities’ access to opportunities in music and other forms of culture, and empowering and supporting our communities to raise our voices, share our truths and fight for our rights and dignity.

New Voices Bay Area: TIGQ Chorus

Pianist: Vutu Nguyen. Director: Reuben Zellman

New Voices Bay Area is a new, 30-voice, very mixed choral ensemble of transgender, intersex and non-binary singers. We are based at San Francisco’s Community Music Center in the Mission. Our goal is to build a creative, empowered, joyful space for our TIGQ community, and to encourage voices that have been silenced or shamed to grow and be heard. Made up of singers from beginners to professionals, the chorus learns and performs great music from diverse traditions, builds strong connections, and lifts up our community’s strength and struggle through choral singing. NVBA debuted in November 2018 with performances at the SF Trans Day of Remembrance and at Grace Cathedral, commemorating World AIDS Day.