2025 Artists In Residence

Learn More About the Artists

(alphabetical by last name)

Laura Careless

Bio

Laura Careless is a dance performer, maker and educator working on both sides of the Atlantic. She graduated from The Royal Ballet School, London, and The Juilliard School, New York, and her performance career has involved collaborations with choreographers including Aszure Barton, Jacqulyn Buglisi, Austin McCormick, Andrea Miller and Jonathan Watkins, including productions recognised by Drama Desk, Bessie, and New York Independent Theatre awards. Her choreography has been presented at The Joyce Theatre (NYC) and the Smithsonian Folklife Festival (National Mall, Washington D.C) as well as tours with The British Council and London’s VAULT Festival. In the world of opera, she has worked at The Met, COC and Houston Grand Opera. This is Laura's third production with Hogfish and she is happy and honored to return to Maine this summer. Prior collaborations have included The Magic Tree (2022, choreographer/performer), and her own one-woman show She-Wolves (SPACE Gallery, 2023) in the presence of Governor Janet Mills. Upcoming projects include A Single Man (Assistant Director and principal performer; Jonathan Watkins, Choreographer; Royal Ballet/Manchester International Festival co-production) and a UK tour of A Dance for Us, an original work for dancer and cellist created especially for babies and their caregivers. Laura is a Dance Curriculum Specialist for The Juilliard School K-12 department, traveling and mentoring dance teachers in schools worldwide; she was the Education Consultant for Rambert Classroom, an online resource for schools. She lives with her family in rural East Sussex, UK, and also works as a birth doula.

This Summer at Hogfish

SVADBA
Choreographer & Dancer
July 26 & 30 at Halo, Thompson’s Point in Portland, ME

Mary Johnston Letellier

BIO

Dramatic coloratura soprano Mary Johnston Letellier (she/her) brings her warm, expressive voice and artistic instincts to a wide variety of repertoire.

With Opera Maine, Ms. Letellier covered Musetta for La Bohème and First Lady for Die Zauberflöte. She performed Violetta in Mass Opera’s production of La Traviata and Musetta in Opera in the Pines’ Bar Crawl Bohème. During the completion of her doctoral degree at New England Conservatory, Ms. Letellier portrayed the Queen of the Night in Die Zauberflöte and workshopped the role of Harpy with Mark Adamo for Sarah in the Theater with Odyssey Opera. 

Ms. Letellier also frequently works in musical theater. With Snowlion Repertory, she portrayed Grace in The Christmas Bride in Concert, premiered the role of Conrad/ Conradine in The Secret Princess, and originated the role of Narrator in Mesmerized. Other recent engagements include Franca Naccarelli in The Light in the Piazza and The Ghost of Christmas Past in The Christmas Carol: The Musical, both at Biddeford City Theater. 

This spring, she debuted her recital about the repressed feminine titled, Our Bodies, Our Voices. Ms. Letellier and Alexandra Dietrich debuted Deep Magic of the Earth and Songs to the Moon at the University of Southern Maine. She collaborated with Opera Maine and Bowdoin College for East Meets West: Exoticism in Arias and Art Song. She was proud to lend her voice to the concert Still Dreaming: A Tribute to MLK at Milton Community Concerts, and to the Black Lives Matter Faculty Concert at USM.

THIS SUMMER AT HOGFISH

SVADBA
Milica
July 26 & 30 at Halo, Thompson’s Point in Portland, ME

Kegs & Roses
June 28th in the Beckett Castle Rose Garden

Regenerative Arts Seed Project
Personal Regenerative Arts Project - Rainbow Art Song Project
July 14th at 317 Main Community Music Center

There has been an acknowledged lack of vocal music written for trans singers. Looking at the current state of art songs, there is a noted absence of music written specifically to address the needs and challenges of trans singers, music written with trans singers as the intended performers, and contemporary music that is financially accessible to a wide audience. The Rainbow Art Song Project is aimed to help rectify these issues. This project was the unification of work done by teacher and student. It unified original and the most up-to-date research on transgender vocal pedagogy done by Mary Letellier, and a guide on compositional tools to write for trans voices based on this material by her student, Ocean Robbins. Using this guide, commissioned trans composers wrote art songs for trans performers. The  composed songs  were then recorded in multiple voice types to represent the vast scope of trans voices. All materials were uploaded to the project’s website to ensure public accessibility.

The purpose of the project is to provide a starting point for future contributions to the repertoire for trans voices. The intent is for the guide to expand and change as more research comes to light about the needs and experiences of trans singers. The project's ultimate goal is to create a standard practice of considering trans voices in the compositional process. 

Our live performance of this material aims to expose a local audience to these composers and performers, as well as the Rainbow Art Song Project website. https://www.rainbowartsongproject.org

Michele Kennedy

Bio

Praised by The Washington Post as “an excellent and engaging” soprano possessing "a graceful tonal clarity that is a wonder to hear" (SF Chronicle), SOPRANO MICHELE KENNEDY is a versatile specialist in early and contemporary music. She is a winner of the 2023 American Prize in Voice.

Michele’s recent highlights include Bach's St. John Passion with the San Francisco Symphony, Gabriel and Eve in Haydn’s Die Schöpfung with Washington Bach Consort, Handel’s Messiah with NYC’s Trinity Wall Street, Poulenc’s Gloria with Bach Society of Saint Louis, Smith Moore's MLK Oratorio at UC Berkeley, and her Carnegie Hall debut with The Hollywood Film Orchestra. This season, she joins Portland Baroque Orchestra for Bach’s Magnificat and SF Choral Society for his beloved Mass in B Minor.

A lifelong champion of new works, Michele has sung premieres with Experiments in Opera, Kaleidoscope Ensemble, Seraphic Fire, The Crossing, and The New York Philharmonic. She is thrilled to join Lorelei Ensemble in a world premiere tour of Julia Wolfe’s Her Story culminating with the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Tanglewood, and for the release of her first featured solo album with AGAVE, called In Her Hands, featuring trailblazing female composers from Barbara Strozzi and Clara Schumann to Florence Price and Margaret Bonds.

Michele completed her musical studies at Yale University, Yale School of Music, and NYU. A lover of Redwood groves and Bay vistas, she lives with her husband, visual artist Benjamin Thorpe, and their daughter, Audra May in Maine. Please find more at www.michele-kennedy.com.

THIS SUMMER AT HOGFISH

SVADBA
Lena
July 26 & 30 at Halo, Thompson’s Point in Portland, ME

Kegs & Roses
June 28th in the Beckett Castle Rose Garden

Regenerative Arts Seed Project
Personal Regenerative Arts Project - Finding Home: Sun, Moon, & Stars
July 14th at 317 Main Community Music Center

This project will explore a visceral sense of belonging in our collective space and in relationship to the natural world. It will interweave psychosomatic healing practices from Black and Indigenous traditions - rituals designed to heal intergenerational trauma over time - alongside selected chants and art songs celebrating our personal longing for home, and the sacredness, breadth, and great expansiveness that we find in the natural world.

Audrey Luna

Bio

My career as a performer and teacher spans almost 40 years. I have been fortunate to sing in opera houses and concert venues in the US, South America, Europe, Asia and the Middle East. With 30 plus years of teaching, dozens of opera roles, hundreds of songs and chamber music as my repertoire, what has kept me devoted to this process is the transcendent power of art to invite myself and the audience into a shared experience that takes us beyond ourselves so that we can discover how deeply we are connected to all things. 

Joni Mitchell put it succinctly, “We are stardust, we are golden, and we’ve got to get ourselves back to the garden.” Art, because it comes through the emotional/limbic part of the brain, is more likely to become transcendent. It allows us to conceptualize and experience the diversity of what we are and who we are. More importantly, it has the power to give not just a broader perspective on the human condition, but that the human condition is part of something much larger that exists amongst all species on the earth and the larger context of the universe. 

AMSAT certification in Alexander Technique, a hands on modality to facilitate integration of the mind, body and psyche, informs all my work. For the past four years, Hogfish has given me the profound opportunity to perform, give the cast and audience experiences with Alexander Technique, and to commune with other artists, the surrounding community and nature. My intention is to continue the journey that takes us away from our every day life into a space where we can connect with each other and the profound experience of life.

THIS SUMMER AT HOGFISH

SVADBA
Danica
July 26 & 30 at Halo, Thompson’s Point in Portland, ME

Kegs & Roses
June 28th in the Beckett Castle Rose Garden

Regenerative Arts Seed Project
Personal Regenerative Arts Project - Let’s Sing!
July 14th at 317 Main Community Music Center

My experience has shown me that using my singing voice connects me to something greater than my speaking voice. It connects me to my spirit. Singing allows that part of me that knows that I am connected to something larger to expand, thereby  inspiring my creativity, calming my mind, and releasing blocked energy. 

Most of us use our voices to define our experience, to communicate our ideas, to ask for what we want, for cognition. We don’t spend time singing. Using our singing voices is less familiar and for some taboo. Even those of us who do sing a lot, don’t often spend time simply allowing the experience to expand beyond our ego. I would like to invite anyone that would enjoy having a guided singing exploration to participate.

Hailey McAvoy

Bio

Recognized as a "gorgeous-voiced mezzo-soprano," (Broadway World), Hailey McAvoy is a versatile performer of opera, song, and concert. McAvoy’s recent operatic performances include appearing as Mem in the world premiere of Paola Prestini’s Sensorium Ex at the Common Senses Festival in Omaha, NE, and as Julia Child in Lee Hoiby’s Bon Appetit with Opera Praktikos.

Equally active as a concert performer, McAvoy has recently made her Greene Space recital debut in a concert broadcast to WQXR with pianist Alison d’Amato. She has also appeared as guest soloist in Ravel’s Shéhérazade with the Baton Rouge Symphony Orchestra and as a soloist at Opera Ithaca in performance of Molly Joyce’s YouSaidHeSaidSheSaid. 

In addition to her work in opera and concert, McAvoy is writing a full-length concert work, Wholly Unwinding, which explores her experiences with cerebral palsy and rediscovering her own sense of embodiment and empowerment through the Alexander Technique. Wholly Unwinding has appeared in workshop form at the Hogfish Regenerative Arts Festival in Portland, ME and with Spiral Songs in Plymouth, NH.

As a performer with the neurological condition cerebral palsy, McAvoy is committed to making the performing arts more inclusive for all. She recently published essays on accessibility in AGMAzine and Our Singing Bodies and she has appeared as a panelist on accessibility forums with such organizations as the Metropolitan Opera, Opera Ithaca and Opera NexGen. To learn more about McAvoy’s singing and Cerebral Palsy, visit www.haileymcavoy.com

THIS SUMMER AT HOGFISH

SVADBA
Zora
July 26 & 30 at Halo, Thompson’s Point in Portland, ME

Kegs & Roses
June 28th in the Beckett Castle Rose Garden

Regenerative Arts Seed Project
Personal Regenerative Arts Project - Wholly Unwinding
July 14th at 317 Main Community Music Center

Wholly Unwinding is a multimedia concert work which combines my original music and lyrics with drawings and movement that explore my experiences growing up with cerebral palsy, the disconnect I felt from my own body, and the way I have been able to rediscover and come to love my physical incarnation through Alexander Technique. Training to teach Alexander Technique has been a profoundly beautiful and challenging experience, and these songs have been pouring out of me since beginning the training. I hope that in sharing them, they will also bring other people into a more compassionate relationship with their own bodies.

Kim Mendez

BIO

Mx. Kim Mendez (they/them) is a versatile mezzo-soprano, producer, and arts leader with over 30 years of experience in opera, musical theater, and choral performance. Their work is deeply rooted in collaboration, community, and a lifelong commitment to equity and representation in the arts. A proud nonbinary, queer, and Latine artist, Kim is dedicated to transforming classical music into an inclusive space. Known for their expressive vocalism and rich storytelling, notable roles include Major General Stanley (The Pirates of Penzance), Sor Rafaela (Juana, world premiere), Baba (The Rake’s Progress), and Marcellina (Le nozze di Figaro).

Kim has sung with esteemed ensembles such as Seraphic Fire and the Long Beach Camerata Singers, and appears on the Grammy-winning Naxos recording of The Passion of Yeshua with the UCLA Chamber Singers and Buffalo Philharmonic. They also featured as a soloist on Maria Newman's Misa de Pacem premiere with Artes Vocales. Currently, Kim serves as Executive Director of Adoro Music Ensemble, a chamber vocal group in Los Angeles, as well as a section leader at The Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, and as a staff singer with the Long Beach Camerata Singers. In addition to performing, they are a lead educator with Camerata Children's Music Academy.

They hold Associate Degrees from Pasadena City College and both Bachelor and Master of Music degrees from UCLA’s Herb Alpert School of Music.

THIS SUMMER AT HOGFISH

SVADBA
Ljubica
July 26 & 30 at Halo, Thompson’s Point in Portland, ME

Kegs & Roses
June 28th in the Beckett Castle Rose Garden

Regenerative Arts Seed Project
Personal Regenerative Arts Project - Breaking Cycles, Cultivating Futures
July 14th at 317 Main Community Music Center

This regenerative arts project explores the terrain of otherness and the transformative power of breaking harmful family cycles. Centering the experiences of trans, nonbinary, and gender-expansive (TNBGE) people, the work reclaims and reimagines the "rules" passed down through generations—rules that often enforce silence, shame, and conformity. As inevitable cycle-breakers, TNBGE individuals disrupt patterns of harm not only for ourselves, but for our chosen families and families of origin.

Through the collaborative development of choral music and art song, the project weaves personal and ancestral narratives into collective expression—honoring rupture, resilience, and the regenerative possibilities of sound. By voicing what was once unspoken, we seed new pathways for healing, belonging, and shared liberation.

Shelby Rhoades

Bio

Shelby Rhoades maintains an active schedule as opera coach, pianist and music director. She is currently a member of the music staff with Palm Beach Opera, where she has completed two seasons. She is frequently a private coach for international singers engaged at the Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Washington National Opera, Seattle Opera, Vienna Staatsoper, Oper Frankfurt, English National Opera, in addition to varied regional houses in the US. 

Shelby previously maintained the position of Principal Coach and Director of Emerging Artists Program at Virginia Opera, from 2013-2020, and Charlottesville Opera, 2009-2019. She has also been a member of the Vocal Arts Faculty at the Juilliard School, from 2008-2013.

Other previous engagements include Central City Opera, Seattle Opera, Tacoma Opera, The Duffy Institute (Virginia Arts Festival), Yale University, Aspen Opera Theater, University of Washington, and Pacific Lutheran University, as well as festivals throughout the Pacific Northwest and Commonwealth of Virginia.

Among her various activities as an opera coach, Shelby specializes in New Music. She has prepared premieres by composers such as Spears, Corigliano, Heggie, Henze, Muhly, Ades, and Saariaho. Other highlights include preparing counter tenor Anthony Roth Costanzo for his album “ARC”, which was nominated for a Grammy in 2019 for Best Classical Solo Vocal Album, and the premiere of “Kept”, a chamber opera for the Virginia Arts Festival, with tenor Bill Burden. She has also appeared as pianist in concert with tenor Lawrence Brownlee on multiple occasions since 2004.

Shelby has worked with conductors such as David Effron, Gary Thor Wedow, Ari Pelto, John DeMain, Andrew Bisantz, Ann Manson, Julius Rudel, and George Manahan. She holds a B.A. in Piano Performance, (Anderson University), and an M.M. in Chamber Accompanying and Vocal Performance, (Ball State University.)

Shelby is a member of the music staff for Palm Beach Opera, where she has completed two seasons.

THIS SUMMER AT HOGFISH

SVADBA
Music Director & Conductor
July 26 & 30 at Halo, Thompson’s Point in Portland, ME

Kegs & Roses
June 28th in the Beckett Castle Rose Garden

Regenerative Arts Seed Project
Pianist for all Regenerative Arts Projects
July 14th at 317 Main Community Music Center

Keith Wehmeier

Bio

Countertenor Keith Wehmeier is a native of St. Louis, Missouri and is quickly carving out a niche for himself in the “Bravura” roles of Händel and Vivaldi. Praised by the San Diego Story for his “bright, agile vocal technique”, he most recently performed the role Bertarido in Handel’s Rodelinda at Opera NEO, as well as the Sorceress in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas while in his Post-Graduate studies at the New England Conservatory. In his debut season, Keith played the role of Oberon in Benjamin Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Miami Music Festival to great acclaim. The South Florida Classical Review said of his performance, “Keith Wehmeier’s countertenor voice was both strong and dulcet and he phrased the text with subtlety.” 

Other festival credits include Farnace in Mozart’s Mitridate, Ulisse in Porpora’s Polifemo. Among his opera performances, Keith appeared in the world premiere of Champion: an Opera in Jazz by Terrence Blanchard, at Opera Theatre of St. Louis. While in residence in St. Louis, Keith has also performed as an alto soloist with the St. Louis Symphony for Vaughan Williams’ Serenade to Music and Bernstein’s Chichester Psalms.

On the concert stage, Keith is regularly singing around the country. Last season, he debuted with the Borealis Chamber Artists in Duluth and Houston’s Harmonia Stellarum. He looks forward to making more music this year and pursuing a career in concert works and on the operatic stage with engagements in Houston, Duluth, and in the Twin Cities.

THIS SUMMER AT HOGFISH

SVADBA
Nada
July 26 & 30 at Halo, Thompson’s Point in Portland, ME

Kegs & Roses
June 28th in the Beckett Castle Rose Garden

Regenerative Arts Seed Project
Personal Regenerative Arts Project - 50 mile an hour lemonade and other life lessons from childhood
July 14th at 317 Main Community Music Center

An exploration into the art of comedic songs, generated from life lessons from childhood.