Board of Directors

Julie Haight-Curran, President 
Julie Haight-Curran has over 30 years of administrative experience with the Minnesota Orchestra, serving as the orchestra’s Personnel Manager from 1993 to 2013. Prior to managing personnel, she had numerous jobs within the organization that included marketing, budgeting, development, coordinating Young People’s Concerts, and more. She earned an MBA from the University of St. Thomas in 1990. Julie’s love of music began early in life as she played double bass with her high school orchestra and jazz band in Mason City, Iowa. She went on to study double bass with Eldon Obrecht at the University of Iowa.
Philip Blackburn, Vice President  
Philip Blackburn was born in Cambridge, England, and studied music there as a Choral Scholar at Clare College. He earned his Ph.D. in Composition from the University of Iowa where he studied with Kenneth Gaburo and began work on publishing the Harry Partch archives. Blackburn's book, Enclosure Three: Harry Partch, won an ASCAP Deems Taylor Award. He has worked at the American Composers Forum since 1991, running the innova Recordings label and developing re-granting programs and opportunities for composers.

He is also a composer/environmental sound artist and has served as teaching artist for school residencies connected with the Flint Hills International Children’s Festival, creating multimedia performances using home-made instruments.

Blackburn has published articles on topics such as Vietnamese, Garifuna, and Cuban music, the social dynamics of ensemble performance, and the use of sound in public art. He received a 2003 Bush Artist Fellowship and built an art-house in Belize.
His favorite Zeitgeist moment: “Pushing furniture around the new space, channeling La Monte Young.”
Heather Barringer, Executive Director & Ensemble Member 
Heather Barringer joined Zeitgeist in 1990. She graduated from the University of Wisconsin-River Falls with a bachelor’s of Music Education and also studied at the University of Cincinnati-College Conservatory, studying with Allen Otte. In addition to performing and recording with Zeitgeist, she is a member of Mary Ellen Child's ensemble, Crash, and has worked with many Twin Cities organizations, including Nautilus Music Theater, The Dale Warland Singers, Theatre de la Jeune Lune and Ten Thousand Things Theater.

Barringer’s favorite Zeitgeist experiences include the group’s 30th anniversary concert: “For our anniversary, we commissioned 30 composers from our community to write short works for us. Taken individually, each of these miniatures succinctly reveals the musical personality of the composer. As a collection, these works are a snapshot of our Twin Cities musical community. Rehearsing these pieces was like spending time each day with 30 close friends and presenting them to a packed house of enthusiastic new music lovers was a celebratory event indeed.

“Being involved with Zeitgeist gives me the opportunity to be on the very frontier of the musical world and to guide and grow an organization that serves the new music community in the Twin Cities,” she added.
Shruthi Rajasekar
Shruthi Rajasekar is an Indian-American composer and vocalist exploring identity, community, and joy. Chosen by The Guardian as a composer "who will enrich your life,” Shruthi creates intersectional music that draws from her background in the Carnatic (South Indian classical) and Western classical idioms. Composition honors include the KHORIKOS ORTUS International Award (New York City, USA) and the Global Women in Music Award presented by the United Nations & Donne in Musica (Rome, Italy). A native of Minnesota, Shruthi pursued graduate studies in the United Kingdom as a Marshall Scholar and is an alumnus of Princeton University. Shruthi first had the honor of working with Zeitgeist as a youth winner of the annual Eric Stokes Song Contest. 
William Eddins
William Eddins is the Music Director Emeritus of the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra and a frequent guest conductor of major orchestras throughout the world. Engagements have included the New York Philharmonic, St. Louis Symphony, Philadelphia Orchestra, the symphony orchestras of San Francisco, Boston Minnesota, Cincinnati, Atlanta, Detroit, Dallas, Baltimore, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Houston, as well as the Los Angeles and Buffalo Philharmonics.

Career highlights include taking the Edmonton Symphony Orchestras to Carnegie Hall in May of 2012, conducting RAI Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale on Italian television, and leading the Natal Philharmonic on tour in South Africa with soprano Rene Fleming. Equally at home with opera, he conducted a full production of Porgy and Bess with Opera de Lyon both in France and the Edingbur and a revival of the production during the summer of 2010.

Mr. Eddins is an accomplished pianist and chamber musician. He regularly conducts from the piano in works by Mozart, Beethoven, Gershwin and Ravel. He has released a compact disc recording on his own label that includes Beethoven’s Hammer-Klavier Sonataand William Albright’s The Nightmare Fantasy Rag.
Carrie Henneman Shaw  
Praised in the New York Times “as graceful vocally as she was in her movements”, “consistently stylish” (Boston Globe), and as a “cool, precise soprano” (Chicago Tribune), Carrie Henneman Shaw is a two-time McKnight Fellowship for Performing Musicians winner (2010, 2017). She has premiered major works by such Minnesota composers as Jocelyn Hagen and Abbie Betinis, whose annual Christmas carols she records for Minnesota Public Radio, and sung American premieres by such composers as Georg Friedrich Haas, Hans Thomalla, and Augusta Read Thomas. In addition to her work as an interpreter of contemporary works, Carrie specializes in music of the 17th century and has performed operatic roles with one of America's leading Baroque opera companies, Boston Early Music Festival. Carrie is a member of Chicago's Ensemble Dal Niente, Quince Contemporary Vocal Ensemble, and Pesedjet. She holds degrees in English and voice performance from Lawrence University and a doctorate from the University of Minnesota. She teaches at Winona State University and Bethel University.
Pat O’Keefe
Woodwind player/artistic co-director Pat O'Keefe is a graduate of Indiana University, the New England Conservatory and the University of California, San Diego. In San Diego, he performed regularly with the new music ensemble SONOR as well as with the San Diego Symphony, and he has performed and recorded with many noted new music groups around the country, including the California EAR Unit, the Cleveland New Music Associates and Ensemble Sospeso in New York. Pat can also be heard performing regularly with the Brazilian ensembles Brasamba and Batucada do Norte (of which he is the co-founder and co-director), the world music group Music Mundial and the improvisation ensemble AntiGravity. He is currently on the faculty of the University of Wisconsin-River Falls.
Craig Sinard
An entrepreneur, Craig Sinard launched Sinard Marketing, a production company in 1991, which now focuses on marketing, training and promotions for large and small businesses, including Ecolab, Pitney Bowes, Arista Labs and Creative Water Solutions. In addition, he also operates VR-MAX, providing experiential marketing or Omnitheater style productions for trade shows and events.

With a degree in Journalism from Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa, a master’s in Journalism from Iowa State University as well as continuing education in acting and directing from the American Film Institute, Sinard serves on myriad nonprofit boards and has enjoyed Zeitgeist shows from Peter Otto’s premier with Zeitgeist at the Walker Art Center in the 1980s through the 2011 Hammers, Horns, Skins ‘n’ Squeezeboxes show with Guy Klucevsek.

Studio Z Committee

Eri Isomura
A second-generation Japanese American and Twin Cities native, Eri Isomura is a freelance percussionist, music librarian, piano and percussion instructor, and music administrator. Eri is a core member of 10th Wave Chamber Collective, a Twin Cities-based new music ensemble. As a multi-genre percussionist, she enjoys performing solos, chamber music, and in ensembles such as the indie-classical group Champagne Confetti, Zeitgeist, and Wayzata Symphony Orchestra. Eri graduated from St. Olaf College and The Boston Conservatory. She is a member of the Minnesota Music Teachers' Association and serves on the board of the Percussive Arts Society's Minnesota Chapter (MNPAS). She currently teaches independently, and also at Yinghua Academy, Shattuck St. Mary, and St. Olaf College. See more at eriisomura.com and 10thwave.org.
Eric M. C. Gonzalez
E​ric M. C. Gonzalez is a composer of solo works, chamber pieces, electroacoustic and electronic music for film, theater, the concert hall, and beyond. Performing as agleam, Eric experiments with digital samplers, synthesizers, acoustic instruments, and vocals. Eric is creator and writer of the comic book REACH. Eric has also written collaboratively and solely on several theatrical productions. Focusing heavily on the electric cello, Eric maintains classical, contemporary, and extended technique performance practices. Eric performs in his own productions and recordings.

Decade Five Committee

Julie Stroud
Philip Blackburn
Dameun Strange
Craig Sinard
Carrie Henneman Shaw