About Dr. Lisa Billingham
Dr. Lisa A. Billingham is the Director of Choral Studies at George Mason University. Since 2003, she has been a Professor of Choral Music Education and Director of Graduate Studies. Here she conducts the 80-100 voice University Chorale, teaches a wide range of courses in choral music education at the undergraduate and graduate level as well as advising doctoral students with their dissertation research. She is active as a Faculty Senator at Mason and chairs the Organizations and Operations Committee as a member of the Executive Board for the Senate. Starting in 2020 as a response to educational changes with COVID-19, Dr. Lisa A. Billingham joined as a representative for the College of Visual & Performing Arts (CVP) on the Mason Instructional Continuity Committee.
As the first choral conductor in the United States to become a Certified Laban/Bartenieff Movement Analyst through the Integrated Movement Studies Program under Janice Meaden and Peggy Hackney, she has published A Complete Conductor’s Guide to Laban Movement Theory available from GIA. Her research incorporates all aspects of Laban’s Theories with a focus on the Bartenieff Fundamentals as a core concept.
Dr. Billingham is the current advisor for the GMU student chapter for The American Choral Directors Conference (ACDA). She is the Past-President for the Virginia State Chapter of the American Choral Directors Association and is a planning committee member and campus liaison for the Annual Voices United Conference hosted by VA, MD-DC and DE chapters of ACDA. She was the National Chair for Communication and Education for ACDA. She is also an active member of the Faculty Senate.
As a clinician for choirs and conferences throughout the US, Europe and South America, Dr. Billingham focuses on the basics of Laban pedagogy as a way to foster communication skills in the classroom and create a healthy, balanced and efficient conducting gesture set for the choral rehearsal.
She has presented clinics and poster sessions for The American Choral Directors Association, The International Society for Music Education (in Bologna, Italy and Porto Alegre Brazil), The Society for Music Education and the Virginia Music Educators Conference.
Dr. Billingham holds a DMA in Choral Conducting from the University of Arizona, an MM in Choral Conducting from the University of Missouri-Kansas City Conservatory of Music and a BME in Choral Music Education from Indiana University (Bloomington). Her conducting mentors include Bruce Chamberlain, Eph Ehly, James Jordan, Maurice Skones and Volker Hempfling.