Kym Scott, Artistic Director
Dr. Kym Scott is the Director of Choral Activities at West Virginia University where she conducts the WVU Chamber Singers, Mountaineer Chorus, and Community Choir. She also teaches conducting, choral techniques, and choral literature, and oversees the choral conducting graduate program. She has directed choirs in Australia, Asia, Europe, the UK, and the United States, including several performances by the USC Chamber Singers with The Rolling Stones in Los Angeles and Anaheim during their “50 and counting” world tour.
Dr. Scott regularly presents at state, regional, and national conferences, and has conducted All-State and Festival Choirs. She currently sits on the board of the West Virginia chapter of the American Choral Director’s Association in addition to serving as the collegiate honor choir chair. She is a founding member of MASICA, the Mid-Atlantic Southern Intercollegiate Choral Association and is a regular chorister and conductor with Maestri Vocale Treble, a collaborative treble voice choral ensemble.
An Australian native, Dr. Scott received her undergraduate degree in piano performance from the Queensland Conservatorium of Music and her Masters degree in aural pedagogy from the University of Queensland. In 2011 she relocated to the United States to complete her doctoral studies at the University of Southern California.
Having worked with all age groups, Scott is particularly passionate about choral music in the community. She has conducted community choirs for over twenty years, and has worked with choirs for the homeless, disadvantaged, and incarcerated.
When faced with the challenges presented by the Covid-19 pandemic, Scott combined her professional past as a couture fashion designer and seamstress with the newfound needs of her choral singers and designed the sing-safe performer’s mask. The mask is now being used by students and performers throughout the United States and Canada as well as in the UK and Europe.
Jim Overly, Accompanist
Jim Overly is an accompanist for the musical theatre program at Point Park University, where he directed the choral ensemble Point Park Singers for 5 years. He is also the director of music at Saint David Episcopal Church in Venetia, where he just started his fifth year. Over the course of his career as an educator, Jim has taught K-12 general, choral, and instrumental music in West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Oklahoma, and on the Navajo Reservation in Shiprock, New Mexico. His most memorable teaching experiences took place in a K-8 partial hospitalization program in Pittsburgh for children with behavioral and emotional disorders.
Jim earned a BME in vocal and instrumental music education as well as an MM in saxophone performance at the University of Tulsa in Oklahoma. However, his vocational path has taken a detour into musical theatre and accompanying territory over the past 20 years. With his partner in creativity Martha Oliver, he has composed the music for one full-length musical and seven inter-generational one-act musicals for the winter holidays, whcih have all been produced in southwestern Pennsylvania. Jim has also written the libretto, lyrics, and music for a unique adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s short story “The Selfish Giant”, which has been produced twice. He has also directed, music directed, choreographed, and performed in MANY musicals and plays in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Oklahoma. His favorite role to date is Mary Sunshine in Tulsa University’s production of CHICAGO when he was in graduate school.
If you’re interested in voice, piano, and/or saxophone lessons with a patient teacher, please contact Jim at spauxman@yahoo.com. He actively works to meet each student where they are and helps them to progress at a level that is comfortable for them.