Our People

Rosalind Buda

Rosalind Buda is a versatile and diverse performer and educator, playing and teaching music on Scottish smallpipes, Highland bagpipes, whistle, and classical bassoon. Rosalind is passionate about teaching musicians of all ages, and her years of experience in both classical and folk music give her a unique perspective and a multi-faceted, holistic approach to learning. She brings her musically encouraging approach to her private students, college students, and to workshops around the country.

As a bassoonist, Rosalind is an avid performer of chamber music and orchestral music in the Southeast. Her annual bassoon quartet concerts, with the cheeky title, “Welcome to the Bassooniverse,” have made new fans of the bassoon and been a platform for sharing music both old and new. As a performer of celtic music, Rosalind freelances and tours regularly with the celtic/appalachian pipe and harp duo, The Reel Sisters, on smallpipes, whistles, and vocals. The Reel Sisters have toured from New Mexico to New York and revel in sharing traditional tunes and stories. In addition to her duo, Rosalind performs regularly as a multi-instrumentalist, singer, and reader with various ensembles including Houston-based Istanpitta Early Music Ensemble as well other bagpipe-centric bands. Rosalind received her MM in bassoon performance from the New England Conservatory.

www.rosalindbuda.com

Sasha Enegren

Sasha is a freelance bassoonist in Orlando, Florida. She has had a diverse and rich musical career including playing with orchestras, opera companies, chamber music, solo recitals, university teaching/administration, journal publications, conference presentations, community outreach, research and collaboration, event hosting, and prolific commissioning and world premieres. Across the country and around the world, sharing the creative process with collaborators, colleagues, community, and students has been truly joyful.

A native of Kansas, Sasha lived/worked in New York City for nearly two decades. Having lived in Paraguay, Chile, Mexico and working summers in Italy, she deeply values other cultures. One leg of her research includes creating and making publicly accessible a database of chamber music by South and Central American composers.

Voices in the Wood is important to Sasha because it is a group of professionals who, through actions, lift each other up musically, professionally, and emotionally. It is a beautiful combination of friendship and musical collaboration.

Read more at sashabassoon.com

Amber Ferenz

Amber Ferenz is a nonbinary and queer bassoonist, visual artist, and award-winning composer and arranger. Inspired deeply by the beauty, magic and mystery of the natural world, they often write pieces that weave together melodies and healing songs given by Nature with their own musical ideas. They also delight in tackling emotionally challenging material, and feel that their music serves as a catalyzing vehicle for the universal energies of transformation, catharsis, and healing.

Amber composes for orchestra and chamber ensembles. Their most recent compositions include “Stand UP!”, commissioned by Dr. Lorraine Duso-Kitts as an anti-bullying piece; “Clown Car”, commissioned by the Mississippi Arts Council; “Rarely Seen”, a wind trio commissioned by Terry Ashley featuring endangered plants and trees of NC and GA; “The Things We Say to Death” for the Asheville Symphony Orchestra, honoring all those who endured loss during Hurricane Helene in 2024; “Ad Astra Per Aspera” for the NY-based chamber group Chrystallum, which honors the aeronautical achievements of Lt. Col (ret.) Eileen Collins; “Concerto for Bassoon and Orchestra”, which received its World Premiere with the Western Piedmont Symphony in Hickory, NC on May 16, 2024, with the composer as the featured soloist; and “Burn It Down!”, a bassoon trio with piano, commissioned by the Paul family, which delves into sacred female rage.

They are a founding member of Elektra Winds, Queen City Winds, and the bassoon and viola collective Voices In the Wood. They have been second bassoonist with the Asheville Symphony for more than 15 years. They have been the Camp Coordinator for the Glickman-Popkin Bassoon Camp since 2007. TrevCo Music publishes Amber’s entire wind music catalogue in the U.S., and in Europe their works are published by Accolade and Emerson. Some of their works can be heard on the PARMA and MSR labels, and on the albums by Voices In the Wood.

amberferenz.com

Kathleen Moniaci

Kathleen Moniaci enjoys a multi-faceted career as a performer, teacher and repair woman in Indianapolis. She grew up in the metro Detroit area and earned degrees from the University of Michigan where she studied with Richard Beene and the University of Cincinnati where she studied with William Winstead.

After graduate studies Kathleen decided to pursue instrument repair. She attended the well known Band Instrument Repair program in Red Wing, Minnesota. After repair school she moved to Indianapolis to begin an apprenticeship with the renowned bassoon restorative artist Paul Nordby. Kathleen maintains this apprenticeship as well as her own repair business, Moniaci Woodwinds.

Kathleen performs frequently throughout the greater Indianapolis area with the Carmel Symphony, Lafayette Symphony, Danville Illinois Symphony Orchestra, Anderson Symphony, Kokomo Symphony and woodwind quintet Impressaria Winds. Kathleen plays Heckel bassoon #6,799, named “Reginald Van der Veer.” When not playing the bassoon Kathleen is an avid reef aquarium hobbyist and cat owner.

Staci A. Spring

As a professional bassoonist, educator, and arts advocate, Staci A. Spring believes in the transformative power of the arts to create meaningful change in society. Based in Chattanooga, TN, Dr. Spring maintains a private bassoon studio, teaches at several local universities, and is a faculty artist for the Tennessee Governor’s School for the Arts. An active freelancer, she can be heard playing bassoon and contrabassoon as a frequent guest musician with the Knoxville Symphony, Chattanooga Symphony & Opera, Huntsville Symphony, and Nashville Symphony orchestras, and in other creative collaborations with musicians across the region. In 2016 she founded the Scenic City Bassoon Ensemble for bassoonists of all ages and skill levels to perform in community settings and to raise funds for charitable organizations. Through the UTC-Wolf Trap Teaching Artist program she collaborates with teachers to integrate arts-integrated learning strategies in early learning classrooms.

Other experience includes a decade of performing and teaching in Texas, participating in numerous conferences and festivals, and serving on the organizational team for the internationally renowned Meg Quigley Vivaldi Competition & Bassoon Symposium. When not on stage or in the classroom, you can probably find her outside hiking a trail with her pup, Harper!

More info can be found at stacispringmusic.com.