WHO WE ARE
brian ó hAirt
Board interim-president Brian is a community organizer and has worked collaboratively with non-profits such as the Mícheál Ó Domhnaill Branch of Oregon (CCÉ), Corrib Theatre, Language Hunters, North American Association for Celtic Language Teachers, and Slighe nan Gàidheal supporting Irish culture and minority language communities. As an undergrad at the University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee they co-founded the Sean-nós Milwaukee Festival with Celtic Studies chair John Gleeson, which inspired the development of the Sean-nós Northwest Festival. He has performed professionally as a musician touring North America and Ireland gaining many awards and accolades in the process as solo, duet, and ensembles acts. Brian has taught the Irish language at Washington University, Portland Community College and many language intensives around the US, as well as online with Let’s Learn Irish and Gaelchultúr. They hold degrees from the Universities of Galway and Limerick and continue with academic research through a decolonial lens.
Kimberly goetz
Board auditor Kimberly Goetz is an award-winning public speaker and has been reciting poems and telling stories longer than she’s going to admit. She has performed for a variety of audiences, including at the Ocean Shores Celtic Festival and was a founding instructor at Olympia’s Shakespeare Experience. Kimberly honed her event organizational skills as the Golf Production Team Leader for the Richard Karns StarDays Celebrity Golf Tournament. In her real life, she is a Legislative policy analyst bent on saving the world from toxic chemicals and climate change. She is a former member of the Washington State Bar Association Disciplinary Board and currently serves as a Commissioner for the City of Lacey Historical Commission. She is a fan of Captain Grammar Pants.
Seán Williams
Board member-at-large Seán Williams has been studying the Irish language and sean-nós singing since the 1970s. In addition to being the President of ICSPNW, she teaches singing workshops at our festivals. Sean worked closely with the great sean-nós singer Joe Heaney in the final years of his life, and has recently co-written with Lillis Ó Laoire a critical and award-winning biography of Heaney’s life and works (Bright Star of the West: Joe Heaney, Irish Song-Man from Oxford University Press). A previous book, Focus: Traditional Irish Music (Routledge 2010) is currently in use in a number of universities in Ireland and North America. And her The Ethnomusicologists' Cookbook: Complete Meals from Around the World was named one of the New York Times’ Top 20 Cookbooks of 2006. Her current book projects include The Performance of Liminality: Sacred, Alluring, and Dangerous (a monograph); Musics of the World (a textbook); When Musicians Speak: Interviews in Ethnomusicology (an edited volume with Julia Byl); and Blood Harmony (a murder mystery). She is a professor of Irish Studies and ethnomusicology at The Evergreen State College and has a Facebook alter-ego named Captain Grammar Pants.