I was first introduced to choral singing in high school. It was life-changing. I had finally found a community who shared my passion for music and made the work of learning music challenging and fun! Music and the community it offers, has always been a source of joy for me, but also an uplifting way of processing difficult emotions and events in my life. I feel fortunate to have stumbled onto this at a young age. How fortunate that science now backs this up. When I first moved to DC, I sang with the National Cathedral choir. But my growing family and career soon became my primary focus. Music took a back seat for many years. When my desire for being in a choral community was once again possible, I joined the River Road Congregational choir. I sang with them for more than a dozen years, and its where I learned about Encore. I needed no convincing to get involved. The Encore mission is so important and so vital…I can’t imagine life without it! I was born and raised in the Midwest and even after living in the DC area since 1985, I still consider myself a Midwesterner at heart. I attended graduate school in Architecture at the University of Minnesota and subsequently moved to DC where work in my field was plentiful. In 2000 I started my own firm, Meditch Murphey Architects, with my work partner and spouse, John Murphey. Our firm specializes in environmentally sustainable residential design. At 73, I’m still designing but am spending more and more time developing my musical interests. I briefly studied classical piano as a child but had never been exposed to jazz as a youth.  About 10 years ago, I decided to start taking jazz piano lessons, something that I had been wanting to do for years. Oh, what a joy to learn the blues and be exposed to the full breadth of the jazz genre and its history! My jazz piano teacher encouraged me to start writing my own music. So, with the help of an Encore University music composition class (taught during Covid by Jonathan Kolm) I’ve discovered a new passion. My greatest joy, outside of music, is my family. I’m lucky enough to have a delightful husband two wonderful children, each with their own individual passions that they are pursuing. And I’m fortunate to have a really fun extended family. We gather every summer at the family cottage on the shores of Lake Michigan. I love sharing the “Encore gospel” wherever I go. I’m looking forward to helping Encore further expand its presence in the Midwest. -Marcie Meditch