Kendra Taylor

Kendra Taylor is a PhD candidate in Music Education at the University of Oregon. She holds a Master of Arts in Teaching and a Bachelor of Science in Music from Southern Oregon University. She holds an Oregon K-12 teaching license (music). Before working as a graduate teaching assistant at the UO, she taught concert choir (2018-2020) and choral methods (2020-2021) at Southern Oregon University, and has taught bands, choirs, and orchestras at the elementary level through high school. She has served as guest conductor for the Eugene Gay Mens Chorus and currently serves as music director at Central Presbyterian Church (Eugene, OR).

Her interests include vocal pedagogy, vocal health, pedagogic language use, and conducting. She has presented at multiple Oregon Music Education Association conferences; the University of Oregon: Graduate Research Forum, C-NAfME, & THEME (Theory, History, Ethnomusicology, and Music Education); Bethel school district (professional development); and at the national American Choral Directors Association (ACDA) conference.
Current Research 

Kendra presents her award-winning poster at the Graduate Research Forum 2023.

Kendra’s current research includes her dissertation, Effects of Literal and Metaphorical Language Use on Acoustic and Perceptual Measures of Choral Tone, and the related study Effects of Fresh Rose Inhalation and Imagined Rose Inhalation on Singer Tone Quality. She recently won the Outstanding Poster Award for her category with her presentation of the rose study at UO’s Graduate Research Forum, and will be presenting it again at this year’s national ACDA conference in Cincinnati.

Musicking

Kendra is also involved in this year’s Musicking Conference, and will be leading a session with other conducting students, teaching Heinrich Schütz’s “Das Blut Jesu Christi” (SWV 298). This session will center historic text pronunciation, culturally informed performance practices, and will culminate in an evening performance of the entire work, Musikalische Exequien, later that evening.