About

Envisioned by mezzo soprano Claire McCahan and her sister, landscape architect Molly McCahan, Spiral Songs curates immersive musical gatherings incorporating classical art song and folk song with participatory group singing, outdoor exploration, and guided mindfulness work. Inspired by the cycles of the earth and the local landscape, programs are crafted to reflect the unique qualities of the seasons. Spiral Songs offers participants the opportunity to observe the dynamic connection between our lives and the outer landscape, to attune to the cycles of land and place, and to build compassion and resilience through shared musical experience.

Mezzo soprano Claire McCahan is regarded as a musician of sincerity and versatility, delivering compelling and honest performances spanning baroque, recital, opera and contemporary repertoire. She has received multiple awards in art song programming and performance including first prize in the 2022 Joy in Singing International Art Song Competition, the 2022 NATS Artist Awards, and the 2023 Doug Davis Performance Award. Claire has enjoyed working with living composers at organizations including the Tanglewood Music Festival, Art Song Colorado, and Catalyst New Music. Recent appearances include the Cincinnati Song Initiative’s Fellowship of the Song, soloist with the Silesian Philharmonic in Katowice, Poland, the American Bach Soloists Academy, the Tanglewood Music Festival, Boulder Bach Festival, Colorado Bach Ensemble, the New Hampshire Music Festival, as well as Opera Saratoga, Boulder Opera, & Renegade Opera.

Molly McCahan is a landscape architect and scholar who earned her Master of Landscape Architecture degree at the Ohio State University’s Knowlton School of Architecture, where she received the University Fellowship Award. She is trained in naturalism pedagogy, group facilitation, and landscape work. Molly additionally holds a B.A. in Music Theory & Composition as well as EcoGastronomy from the University of New hampshire. She works in a variety of roles and projects ranging from landscape design and implementation teaching undergraduate students how to become young scholars. In addition to the Spiral Songs project, she is the co-founder of Path Songs for a Future World with fellow landscape architect Sydney Lister. Path Songs… seeks to develop original music and visual art to invite viewer-participants to embrace, reframe, or revisit connections to their surroundings, especially in the context of climate change.

Mezzo-soprano Hailey McAvoy is familiar to operatic and concert stages, including the Fisher Center for Performing Arts, Aspen Music Festival, MassOpera, Opera Ithaca, Eastman Opera Theater, Aquilon Music Festival, and the Baton Rouge Symphony. This year, she will be heard in recital with flutist Maron Khuroy of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra and pianist Bethany Pietroniro in White Plains, NY, and will workshop the role of Mem in Paola Prestini’s Sensorium Ex in conjunction with the Kennedy Center. Sensorium Ex will premiere with  Beth Morrison Projects and VisionIntoArt in 2025. As a performer with Cerebral Palsy, McAvoy works to amplify the discussion around disability in the arts. She has interviewed with AGMA Magazine, written for Our Singing Bodies, and been a panelist for Opera NexGen’s Accessibility in Opera. To learn more, visit www.haileymcavoy.com.

Pianist Elias Dagher values music’s power to tell stories and build community. He lives in Quincy, MA. In the spring of 2022, Elias completed a two-year fellowship in collaborative piano at Bard College, where he worked daily with both vocalists and instrumentalists. He spent the summers of 2022 and ’23 at the Tanglewood Music Center. In an effort to bring together many of his loves–music, literature, community–Elias co-founded the Boston Text and Tone Festival alongside his colleague Pierre-Nicolas Colombat. The festival, which took place in January 2024, included four concerts of vocal music, poetry recitation, and spoken word performance. Some of Elias’s most influential teachers have included Eugene Kaminsky, Jeffrey Goldberg, Julian Martin, Jerome Lowenthal, Alexander Korsantia, Vivian Weilerstein, Cameron Stowe, Erika Switzer, and Kayo Iwama. Elias also plays the mbira dzavadzimu, a plucked instrument of metal keys wound over a wooden soundboard, which comes from the Shona people of Zimbabwe.

Shelby Trevor enjoys a diverse career as a classical violinist, educator, composer, folk musician, and sound healer. Shelby grew up in the Lakes Region of New Hampshire studying classical and folk music since the age six. Shelby received his Undergraduate Diploma in Violin Performance and continued in the Graduate Performance Diploma program at the Longy School of Music. Shelby performed and instructed professionally in the Boston area until 2014 and served as faculty of Suzuki School of Newton and Wheaton College. Shelby relocated to Fernandina Beach, FL in 2014 continuing his career in music. Notably, Shelby founded and directed the Amelia Island Community String Orchestra. Shelby also attained a BA in psychology from Lesley University and has performed with First Coast Opera Co., Subtropical String Trio (founding member), Cosmic Collection Service, Suzuki School of Newton Faculty Orchestra, and more. Shelby is a composer and has premiered his own works for violin and piano, piano quartet, string quartet, violin solo, as well as folk tunes.

Pianist, vocal coach, and conductor, Brendon Shapiro, is a champion of vocal music of the 20th and 21st centuries. He is on the music staff at Boston Lyric Opera and has also served as pianist and coach at LA Opera, San Francisco Opera, Bard Summerscape Festival, Opera Omaha, Odyssey Opera, Opera Maine, Opera Steamboat, Opera NEO, and many other opera companies across the country. He has conducted at Boston Conservatory, Boston Opera Collaborative, MassOpera, and Opera Fayetteville. Brendon is an alumnus of LA Opera’s Young Artist Program and Boston Lyric Opera’s Emerging Artist Program. Brendon is a founder and Co-Artistic Director of Catalyst New Music and Executive Director of Boston Singers’ Resource. He also maintains an active coaching schedule in the Boston area.