Profile

Melissa C. Brunkan joined the music education faculty at the University of Oregon in 2017. She holds degrees from the University of Minnesota, Northwestern University, and The University of Kansas and most recently taught at Louisiana State University as assistant professor of vocal music education. Prior to her work at the university level, she taught in public and private schools in the Minneapolis/St, Paul, Milwaukee, and Chicago areas for twelve years, teaching students from pre-K through adult with an emphasis on secondary choral/vocal music. Other experience includes private voice teaching as well as conducting, musical theater directing, post-surgical vocal pedagogy consultation, and workshop facilitation.

Dr. Brunkan has sung and conducted professionally with choirs, opera and theater companies and churches throughout the United States. Vocal performance has taken her to places such as Denver, CO, New York, NY and Chicago, IL. In recent years, she founded a community choir for adults with intellectual disabilities, a community children’s choir for underserved populations, and an online choir for caregivers of children with chronic illness. Her choirs have sung with artists and conductors from places such as China, Venezuela, and Indonesia, performing in various venues from the Minnesota State Capitol to the Kennedy Center.

Her primary research interests include the use of gesture in choral/vocal pedagogy, lifespan voice pedagogy, singers with medical conditions affecting the voice, conductor gesture and behaviors, and the adolescent voice. She has presented research at regional, national, and international venues in such places as Philadelphia, Tucson, Newfoundland, and Greece. Brunkan has published articles in various journals including Journal of Research in Music Education, International Journal of Research in Choral Singing, and The International Journal of Music Education: Research.  She has held leadership roles in professional organizations such as the American Choral Directors’ Association, serves on the Board of Directors for the VoiceCare Network, and has served as guest reviewer and editorial assistant for IJME: Research.