Keeley Brooks, advocate for feminist ensembles, sends us this update about this year’s LunART Festival
Apply by Dec. 15 to the Composers Hub Program, mentored by Libby Larsen
The LunART Festival kicks off the 2025-26 season on November 16th with their inaugural LunART Choir concert, directed by Jen Terhune Streit. Titled Metamorphosis, the concert celebrates the journey of life and the power of treble voices. Local Madison poets Karen Swan, Kaisa Ullsvik Miller, and Kelly Parks Snider join the program, and LunART’s 2026 Composer-in-Residence Libby Larsen’s work “If I could stop one heart from breaking” is featured as the first of her works to showcase this season. The LunART Choir has grown out of, and honors, Kathleen Otterson’s ARTemis choir. When writing about her personal choral leadership style, Jen Terhune Streit says, “I’m passionate about building choirs that not only sound extraordinary but also feel like home, where music is lived through connection, laughter, and shared purpose.” As a former LunART volunteer and intern, I can attest that the feeling of collective joy, support, and dedication is powerful in every LunART event.
LunART’s yearly programming spreads music and art around several venues in Madison and beyond, with previous venue partners including the Wisconsin Youth Symphony Orchestra, The Arts and Literature Laboratory, Mineral Point Opera House, and Taliesin in Spring Green. Since LunART’s founding in 2018, it has celebrated the work of over 200 women composers at over 100 public events. As Wisconsin’s only festival dedicated to promoting contemporary women composers, LunART not only supports the composers but also inspires future generations of women composers. The 2025 festival kicked off with a moving panel discussion at the Arts and Literature Laboratory titled “Her Legacy, Our Voice.” Moderator and Madison-based artist and activist Kelly Parks Snider welcomed the 2025 Composer-in-Residence Dr. Chen Yi, 2025 Artist-in-Residence Desere Mayo, and mezzo-soprano Adriana Zabala to join her in conversation about their personal experiences as artists, how their art and lives influence each other, and advice for young female artists.
As the Artist-in-Residence, Mayo created portraits of several historical women composers for a series of beautiful prints and notecards. Her creative process was directly related to the music of her subjects, listening to their pieces as she worked and letting the music influence the art. Mayo has worked in the education field and believes strongly in the importance of art to help teach history. She shares this passion with Zabala, whose 2025 festival performance of Steven Mark Kohn’s The Trial of Susan B. Anthony was a celebration not only of the power of the women voice but also a moving shared experience of sitting with history in real time.
LunART provides an impetus for community, bringing composers, artists, performers, and audience members together for evenings of present listening and celebration of each other’s crafts. The space that LunART creates is so important because mutual support is the first step to action, understanding, art, and change.
Mayo described, “In every child there is a seed, and if you see it, you water it. If we’ve been so bogged down, then your pilot light goes out, and then you can’t see it.” But she reminded the audience that “Other women come in and help light it again.”
To me, this is the importance of a space such as LunART. Mentor to the 2025 Composers Hub Cohort of six early-career composers, Dr. Chen highlighted the value in the festival’s workshops, such as Beth Russell’s “Copyright for Composers” and the high-quality recording taken of each composer’s piece. These are vital aspects of a composer’s career development that are so often not taught or require immense resources. LunART fills that gap, bringing composers together for a well-rounded week of mentorship, growth, and learning.
Beyond the technical development tools, LunART also provides a space for female composers to continue to build friendships and networks of support. It is hard to quantify the impact of nurturing these relationships, but it is profound and deep. We want to continue supporting more women in the arts, and to do so, girls need to see and hear from women in the arts. Mayo’s goddaughter told her, “I draw because of you.” She reflected, “My legacy and her voice, and in the future it will be her legacy and another one’s voice.”
As LunART begins its 2025.2026 season, we are overjoyed to welcome Libby Larsen as the 2026 Composer-in-Residence. With over 500 works to her name, the Grammy award-winning composer is a leader not only in performance but in education with her American Composers Forum now entering its 52nd season. LunART’s Call for Scores for the 2026 festival just closed with 208 applicants from 24 countries and 37 states. But don’t worry, there is still an opportunity to apply! Applications to join the Composers Hub program mentored by Larsen will open on November 1st and run through December 15th. To learn more and submit your application, head to lunartfestival.org.