Dr. Jeffery Ames

Belmont University
​Director of Choral Activities

Jeffery L. Ames serves as Director of Choral Activities, and is a Full Professor within the School of Music at Belmont University.  His prior appointments include Assistant Director of Choral Activities at Baylor University and Choral Director at Edgewater High School and Lincoln High School in Florida.
As a choral clinician, Dr. Ames has conducted senior and junior high school mixed and male choirs at the state and regional conventions of the American Choral Directors Association and the Music Educator’s National Conference, including the inaugural Florida Male All-State Chorus, and annually at Carnegie Hall with the National Youth Choir.  He has performed and guest conducted internationally in the countries of Costa Rica, Germany, Italy, Latvia, Estonia, South Korea, and the Republic of Ghana. 
An accomplished accompanist, he has performed and collaborated with well-known conductors such as André Thomas, Jo-Michael Scheibe, Lynne Gackle, and Anton Armstrong. Additionally he has collaborated with well-known celebrities such as Trisha Yearwood, Laura Bell Bundy, CeCe Winans, Connie Smith, Ricky Skaggs and The Whites, internationally acclaimed mezzo-soprano Denyce Graves, Michael W. Smith, Kathy Mattea, Sheryl Crow, and legendary rock band the Rolling Stones.
With a reputation as a distinguished and well-respected composer and arranger, Dr. Ames’ music has been premiered by the Florida Music Educators Association, the Florida American Choral Directors Association, the Southern Division of ACDA, at National ACDA Conferences, and on the 2017, 2015, 2013, and 2011 telecasts of Christmas at Belmont. His compositions and arrangements are published with Colla Voce Music, Earthsongs, Santa Barbara Music Publishing, and Walton Music Corporation.
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Professor Ames holds the Ph.D. in Choral Conducting/Choral Music Education and a Master of Choral Music Education degree from The Florida State University, and a Bachelor of Music degree, with a double major in Vocal Performance and Piano Accompanying, from James Madison University.  He holds the honor of being the first recipient of the National ACDA James Mulholland Choral Music Fellowship, as well as being the first African American to represent the United States in the ACDA International Conductor Exchange Program. He lives in Nashville with his lovely wife and three children.

Dr. Allen Hightower

The University of North Texas
​​Director of Choral Studies​

Allen Hightower is a seventh generation Texan, and resides in McKinney, Texas with his wife, Dr. Kristin Hightower and their two daughters Caroline and Julianne.  As the director of Choral Studies at the University of North Texas, Allen leads the master’s and doctoral programs in choral conducting, and oversees a comprehensive choral program of eight ensembles. Allen serves as the conductor of the UNT A Cappella Choir, and the UNT Grand Chorus which collaborates annually with the UNT Symphony Orchestra in performances of major choral-orchestral works. As a member of UNT’s Early Music faculty, he leads the vocal ensemble Vox Aquilae and its artistic partner the UNT Baroque Orchestra. 
 
Since arriving at UNT in 2016, the A Cappella Choir has received invitations to perform for the Texas Music Educators Association in 2020, the National Conference of the American Choral Directors Association in 2021, the Southwestern Division of ACDA in 2022, and the National Conference of the American Choral Directors Association in 2025. Vox Aquilae and the UNT Baroque Orchestra were featured at the January 2022 conference of the National Collegiate Choral Organization. In June of 2025, the A Cappella Choir won First Prize at the Marktoberdorf 19th International Chamber Choir Competition in Germany.
 
As a teacher and conductor, Dr. Hightower has visited 30 states, Asia, and Europe. His students hold positions of leadership as choral conductors in public schools, colleges and universities, and churches and community choirs throughout the United States. 
 
Prior to his appointment at UNT, Dr. Hightower held the Weston Noble Endowed Chair in Music at Luther College in Decorah, Iowa, where he served as conductor of the renowned Nordic Choir and artistic director of Christmas at Luther. As Luther’s Director of Choral Activities, he gave leadership to a choral program that included four conductors, six choirs, and over 530 singers. Under Dr. Hightower’s direction, the Nordic Choir performed at the 2014 North Central Division of ACDA, recorded six compact discs, made annual concert tours throughout the United States, and toured Europe on two occasions.
 
From 2000-2010, Dr. Hightower served as Professor of Music and Director of Choral Studies at Sam Houston State University. During his tenure, the SHSU Chorale toured Europe, performed for the 2007 National Convention of the American Choral Directors Association, the 2010 Southwestern Division of ACDA, and the 2003, 2006, and 2010 conventions of the Texas Music Educators Association. His high school teaching career included tenures at Klein High School in Spring, Texas and at Odessa Permian High School in Odessa, where he led the PHS Kantorei and Satin Strings in performance at the 1996 TMEA convention. 
 
Outside of his work in the academic setting, Allen has served as the Artistic Director of the Houston Masterworks Chorus and Orchestra, leading an annual concert series of choral-orchestral masterworks. As a deeply committed church musician, he has served Baptist, Congregational, Methodist, and Presbyterian churches in Texas, California, and Minnesota. He currently serves on the music staff of Stonebriar Community Church in Frisco, Texas, and has served as the Church Music Vice-President of the Texas Choral Directors Association. Dr. Hightower was as an Adjunct Professor of Conducting at the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas. Dr. Hightower served as the interim Chorus Director of the Houston Symphony Orchestra preparing the Chorus for conductors such as Juraj Valčuha, Itzhak Perlman, Matthew Halls, and Jeannette Sorrell.
 
As a conducting student of the Texas choral legend Bev Henson, Allen earned his undergraduate degree in music education and piano from Sam Houston State University.  He went on to earn a master’s degree in choral conducting from the Eastman School of Music where he was a student of Baroque scholar Alfred Mann, and a master’s degree in orchestral conducting from Baylor University, where he served as assistant conductor to Stephen Heyde and accompanist to Donald Bailey and the Baylor Chamber Singers. Allen earned his doctorate in conducting from the University of California, Los Angeles, where he served as assistant conductor to Donald Neuen. Hightower pursued additional orchestral conducting studies with Jung-Ho Pak at the University of Southern California, additional choral conducting studies with Joseph Flummerfelt at Westminster Choir College, and choral-orchestral conducting with Helmuth Rilling at the Oregon Bach Festival.  After winning first prize in the graduate division of the American Choral Directors Association’s Conducting Competition in 1997, Allen served as assistant to Paul Salamunovich, conductor of the Los Angeles Master Chorale.

Dr. Deanna Joseph

Georgia State University
​Director of Choral Activities

Deanna Joseph is Professor of Music and Director of Choral Activities at the Georgia State University School of Music where she conducts the University Singers and leads the master’s program in choral conducting.  A recent review of her work states, “[t]he choir sings with great musicality, excellent intonation, clear diction, and a healthy and beautiful pallet of tone colors…” (The Choral Scholar).
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Dr. Joseph’s teaching and scholarship has been recognized with several awards, including the Georgia State University College of the Arts Outstanding Faculty Achievement Award in 2021, and in 2019, the Georgia State University Alumni Distinguished Professor Award, a university-wide award given to “a model of the teacher-scholar ideal.”  In 2015, she was selected from over 800 faculty members to receive the College of Arts and Sciences’ Outstanding Teacher Award

Under Dr. Joseph’s direction, the Georgia State University Singers have been invited to perform at two national conferences of the American Choral Directors Association (ACDA), in 2021 and in 2025, and perform regularly at ACDA regional and Georgia Music Educators Association state conferences.

In April of 2023, the Georgia State University Singers performed two concerts at the World Symposium on Choral Music in Istanbul, Turkey.  In May of 2017, the University Singers under won first place in the renowned Marktoberdorf International Chamber Choir Competition while on a concert tour of Austria and Bavaria.  In May of 2013, the University Singers competed in La Florilège Vocal de Tours where the choir placed second overall in the mixed choir category and Dr. Joseph was honored with the Prix du chef de choer (conducting prize).

During Dr. Joseph’s tenure, the Georgia State University Choirs have been hired to sing two productions of David Bintley’s Carmina Burana with the Atlanta Ballet: in 2013 (North American premiere performances) and 2017 as well as several collaborations with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, the Atlanta Opera, the Atlanta Baroque Orchestra, and Andrea Bocelli.
The choir’s three professional recording, Evening Hymn, Heavenly Display: Songs Inspired by Shaker Tunes, and Requiem (Gothic Records), are distributed internationally by Naxos.  The American Record Guide review  of Evening Hymn states “There are no runts in the repertory litter…[and] [t]he Georgia State choir of 40 is very good at all of it: radiant as dusk approaches, but hushed and sensitive to the coming darkness as shadows deepen and fall.” All three disks have been featured several times on National Public Radio’s program, With Heart and Voice.

Dr. Joseph is an active guest conductor and headline clinician and has conducted all-state and honor choirs in more than twenty-five states. She is a frequent conductor of choral-orchestral repertoire and has led performances of Mendelssohn’s Elijah, Beethoven Mass in C, Mozart’s Requiem, Duruflé Requiem, Haydn’s Creation and Lord Nelson Mass, Handel’s Dixit Dominus, Schubert’s Mass in A-flat and Bruckner’s Mass in D Minor.

Dr. Joseph’s research in 19th-century choral-orchestral performance-practice has led to invited presentations on the topic at several division conferences of the American Choral Director’s Association and at the national convention for the National Collegiate Choral Organization. In October of 2012, she was selected as one of 25 presenters from ten countries to speak at the Lund Choral Festival in Sweden.

Prior to her appointment at Georgia State University, Dr. Joseph served on the faculties at Smith College, the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and Hobart and William Smith Colleges.

Dr. Joseph holds conducting degrees from the Eastman School of Music, where she was awarded the Walter Hagen Conducting Prize.  She is the founder and artistic director of the Atlanta Summer Conducting Institute (ASCI), a weeklong, summer conducting master class that draws conductors from across the country.