TGBP Announces the 2024 Scholarship Winners
For its fifth year, The Gena Branscombe Project is thrilled to announce the winners of our three scholarships in conducting, composing, and arts administration. Please join us in recognizing conductor Braeden Weyhrich, composer Emily Clements, and arts administrator Maclain Hardin-Kurza! These well-deserving individuals were chosen by our panel of judges from an array of accomplished students and professionals alike.
Thank you for the many thoughtful applications that were submitted, and congratulations to our 2024 winners!
Braeden Weyhrich | Conductor
Braeden Weyhrich is a Master of Music student and graduate assistant at Georgia State University, where she studies wind band conducting with Dr. Robert Ambrose. Prior to graduate studies, she was the Band Director at Hinton Community School in northwest Iowa, where she taught and administered all aspects of the band program for students in grades 5-12. She was also the Associate Conductor of the Siouxland All-America Concert Band, Librarian for the Sioux City Municipal Band, and a member of several district and state-wide committees of the Iowa Bandmasters Association. Braeden is a part of The Access Collective, a program piloted in Iowa and soon to expand nationally which works to assist band directors in connecting their students to other people and cultures through music.
Braeden holds a Bachelor of Music in Music Education and an Honors College Degree from Oklahoma State University, where she graduated magna cum laude and was recognized as an OSU Alumni Association Outstanding Senior. Her organizational affiliations include Tau Beta Sigma, Sigma Alpha Iota, Iowa Bandmasters Association, and Women Band Directors International.
Emily Clements | Composer
Soprano and Composer Emily Clements is a Vocal Performance graduate of the University of Mississippi. The American Prize described Clements’ music as “Tuneful, direct, youthful, and emotionally raw.” Opera Las Vegas included Clements’ award winning opera, Letters to Lily, in its 2022 Women Composers Festival to great acclaim in Las Vegas. This performance won first place in The American Prize division for new works with ‘Social Justice’ themes and third place in the category of ‘Opera/Theater/Film/Dance at the University/College level.’ Clements has workshopped opera scenes in the University of Nevada, Las Vegas’s Opera Scenes showcase, NEXTET, and at the University of Mississippi’s Opera Scenes showcase. Some of her recent singing credits include: ‘Flora’ from Turn of the Screw, ‘Morgana’ from Alcina and ‘Serpina’ from La Serva Padrona. She has presented and performed at the National Opera Association conference, performed opera roles with the Harrower Program, Druid City Opera, Originated ‘Felicity’ in Lister’s State of Grace premiere with UNLV Opera, performed with Opera Las Vegas, Vegas City Opera, and Musik Theatre Bavaria. Ms. Clements plans to attend Binghamton University for a second Masters degree in Music Composition.
Maclain Hardin-Kurza | Arts Administrator
Maclain Hardin-Kurza is Executive Director of the award-winning Tallahassee Community Chorus, one of the largest non-auditioned choral ensembles in the United States with 250 singers each season. She holds an MA in Arts Administration from Florida State University (FSU) and a BM in Voice Performance from Westminster Choir College. As Adjunct Professor of Arts Administration and a PhD candidate at Florida State University, her research centers around choral administration practices and nonprofit organizational resilience.
Maclain remains active as a presenter, consultant, and performer of choral music. While a member of the Westminster Symphonic Choir, she collaborated with world-renowned orchestras and conductors such as Simon Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic, Alan Gilbert and the New York Philharmonic, and Yannick Nézet-Séguin and the Philadelphia Orchestra. She served as a choir member and section leader of the GRAMMY®-nominated Westminster Williamson Voices, with whom she recorded three full-length choral albums: Hole in the Sky (GIA Publications), Carolae: Music for Christmas (Naxos Records), and Silence into Light (GIA Publications). Also, with the Williamson Voices, she sang as a member of the choir-in-residence at the Choral Institute of Oxford University, in Oxford, UK.
In her practice as an arts administrator, educator, and performer, she aims to uphold Gena Branscombe’s mission of equity and connection across the music profession.
