The Survival Imperative

Erin Guinup

The performing arts face an existential crisis: while entertainment was a vital societal need fifty years ago, our constantly stimulated digital world has eliminated boredom, and traditional arts programming appears increasingly expendable to funders and communities. This masterclass provides conductors with a comprehensive framework for reimagining their role beyond entertainment, starting with a systematic needs assessment and assumption-challenging processes to identify what communities truly require. Participants will learn practical tools for designing programs that address society's most pressing needs for connection, healing, meaning, and civic engagement while implementing effective change management strategies to guide existing audiences through organizational evolution and create genuinely inclusive spaces for previously excluded communities. Through hands-on exercises applying this framework, conductors will discover how to maintain the highest musical standards while creating transformative experiences that demonstrate the arts' essential value, ensuring both community impact and organizational sustainability.

Topics Include:

Redefining Arts' Purpose in Society - Moving beyond entertainment to address fundamental human needs including connection, wellbeing, civic engagement, and meaning-making in an over-stimulated digital age
Needs Assessment Framework - A systematic approach for identifying authentic community needs and challenging long-held assumptions about what audiences want versus what communities actually require
Strategic Program Design for Impact - Practical tools for aligning repertoire selection, concert structure, and ensemble preparation with identified societal needs while maintaining artistic integrity and musical excellence
Change Management for Arts Organizations - Navigating the transition from traditional programming models, managing existing audience expectations, and creating inclusive spaces that welcome previously excluded communities
Rehearsal as Community Practice - Transforming rehearsal processes to prepare singers not just musically, but as agents of social connection, empathy, and collaborative healing within their communities
Measuring and Communicating Impact - Developing assessment tools and storytelling strategies that demonstrate tangible community benefits to secure sustainable funding and build organizational resilience

Resources Attendees will Receive:

Community-Centered Programming Framework
List of Societal Needs Performing Arts Organizations Can Meet

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Meet Your Professor

Erin Guinup is a composer, conductor, and arts consultant whose innovative work spans multiple continents and communities. As the founding Executive and Artistic Director of the Tacoma Refugee Choir, she led singers from 75 countries in performances for more than 50,000 people, including the Governor's State of the State Address, TEDxSeattle, and national conferences for ACDA and Welcoming America.

This fall, Erin will direct Puget Sound Singers at the University of Puget Sound and launch Soul Serenade, a unique choir project designed to help attendees process grief and trauma through the healing power of music. As the founder of Arts Resonance—a consulting firm centered on strategic planning, audience development, leadership support, and the art of belonging—she brings an outside-the-box approach to creating transformative musical experiences.

As a composer, Erin's works emerge from a deep belief that music should be both accessible and transformative. She is drawn to stories and texts that invite us to see ourselves in others, to acknowledge pain while nurturing hope, and to discover the joy that comes from being truly present with one another. Her compositions have been performed at the ACDA National Conference, on PBS, and by the US Air Force Band of the Golden West and Symphony Tacoma.

Drawing from extensive performance experience, Erin's diverse background includes the title role in Mary Poppins, and appearances as soprano soloist with Symphony Tacoma, Ensign Symphony & Chorus, Tacoma Concert Band, and Tacoma City Ballet. She has performed in nearly twenty languages throughout her career and her cross-cultural musical collaborations include performing with the Israeli-Palestinian choir Common Ground Voices in Jerusalem and Germany, participating in the Silkroad Ensemble's Global Musicians Workshop, and singing in China on a diplomatic cultural exchange. She also sings lead for a rock band and her one-woman show, The Ladies of Lyric and Song, celebrating female musical theatre composers, toured internationally.

A contributing author to three books and sought-after presenter on vocal technique including Belting 101, Erin's accolades include the American Academy of Teachers of Singing Award for Inclusion and Inspiration, Chorus America's Louis Botto Award for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, and 253 Lifestyle Magazine's Person of the Year. She holds an MBA in Arts Innovation from the Global Leaders Institute.

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