Members

L-R:  Maarten van Ryckevorsel / Vikki Day / Deborah Farnham / Karen Chickering / Jose Schmidt / 
Clara Cavitt / Jay Banta / Judy Rosenbaum


Maple Jam Bios

Fifteen years ago, Jay Banta moved to Vermont from Nebraska, with his wife Linda and two dogs, sans a job or a place to live. 
"We knew one person in Vermont." He comes to Maple Jam with a long resume of music behind him, from singing in many choruses, 
musical theatre, as an ensemble singer and soloist. He has been a member of The Voices of Mel Olson, and the Nebraska Choral 
Arts Society in Nebraska. Since moving to VT, he is currently a charter member of the VSO Chorus and Trillium, a new hospice chorus 
in Rutland. He also sings folk music with his wife Linda. Jay has a daughter Shelby, a dental hygienist living in Seattle, WA., and 
a son Matthew, an insurance adjuster and singer/songwriter in Council Bluffs, Iowa. He is the proud grandfather of three grandsons 
and loves skiing, snowshoeing, walking, photography and playing with his 90 lb. yellow lab Monty. 


Clara Cavitt began her musical studies with the violin, eventually moving on to the piano, folk guitar, and a brief stint 
with the organ in college. She sang in high school and college choruses, occasionally composing for college competitions, 
and played violin in the high school orchestra for four years. She still enjoys composing and arranging in her spare time. In 
addition to singing with Maple Jam, Clara performs with Oriana Singers and the VSO Chorus. She and her life partner, Paul Mattos, 
reside in Jericho, and enjoy cooking, hiking, gardening, snowshoeing, watching movies, and playing with Dozer, their Black Lab. 


Karen Chickering is a Vermonter by choice, having moved here from Chicago in 1987. She considers herself a singer first, in 
Maple Jam, the VSO Chorus, and over the years in other groups including Counterpoint and Friends, Oriana Singers, Melisma, Bella Voce, 
Musica Propria, and the Bluegrass Turkeys. She earned a degree from Northwestern University in church music and organ. Her other 
passions include cooking, biking (she just completed a bicycle trip to DC, Cycles to Peace, a grassroots effort to raise awareness of the 
connection between voting and achieving peace), gardening, and traveling to New Zealand for quality time with her brother and nephew. 


Native Chicagoan Vikki Day is no stranger to the a cappella scene. It's in her blood! Her father is a champion barbershop quartet 
bass (twice!) Since moving to Vermont in 1990 Vikki and her husband Allan, a piano technican, live in Williston and both are very active in 
Burlington area choral organizations. Vikki's daughter Emily also sings and teaches jazz vocals and is currently earning her Masters Degree 
in Liverpool, England. Vikki is a free-lance graphic artist and has designed many of Maple Jam's promotional materials. 


Judy Rosenbaum has really taken to Vermont, having moved here in 1994 from Los Angeles. She has sung with the 
VSO Chorus and Chamber Chorus, Oriana Singers, the Burlington Choral Society, celestial Sirens, Kolot B'Rinah, the Berkshire Festival 
Chorus, as well as numerous choral groups on the west coast. Daughter Hannah is also a musician, a graduate of the New England Conservatory 
of Music in Boston with a degree in vocal performance who now resides in NYC, pursuing a career in opera. 


Born and raised in the really Deep South (aka Argentina), Jose Schmidt sang his way through Engineering School with the 
National Symphony Chorus. After immigrating to Canada in '87, he sang with the Cantata Singers of Ottawa until 1991. He moved to 
Vermont in 1996 and joined the VSO Chorus upon wife Maria's encouragement ("please find something to do outside the house"). 
Besides the VSO Chorus, he has sung with Melisma, celestial Sirens, Oriana, Counterpoint and Syrinx before finding his true musical 
home in Maple Jam. Jose's daytime job is as a software engineer with GE Healthcare, formerly IDX. He and Maria have two children: 
Jeffrey and Stephanie. 


Though he started out playing a mean guitar in his high school garage band, Maarten van Ryckevorsel's musical interest 
switched from rock 'n' roll to jazz while attending the University of Leiden in his native Netherlands. He gigged on guitar, drums, 
bass guitar, banjo and harmonica before co-authoring a musical and presiding over the orchestra pit. In Burlington since 1990, 
Maarten has sung with the Burlington Choral Society, the Vermont Choral Union, jazz a-cappella group Calloway Taxi and now with 
Maple Jam.  His wife Sarah enjoys attending Maarten's performances, although she insists on being called a roadie rather than a groupie. 



Maple Jam Alums

Wendy Bill is Maple Jam's "silver fox." A native Vermonter, she graduated from UVM in Mechanical Engineering, has retired
from IBM, and is currently employed by Analytical Services, a microbiology lab. Wendy has had a lifelong interest in music. She 
especially enjoys singing in choral groups, including the VSO Chorus and the Vermont Choral Union (25 years!), and playing the 
French horn in the Vermont Philharmonic. She and her husband John have 8 children and 15 grandchildren. 



Allison Coyne Carroll studied music at the Manhattan and Crane Schools of Music, with a Music Education/French horn
concentration. She works at the Middlebury College Center for the Arts as Events and Residency Manager, and resides in Hinesburg
with her husband Jim (see below), two Maine Coon cats, and their young son Aidan, tenor-in-training. Her local singing credits 
include the VSO Chorus, In Accord, Melisma, Trillium, South County Chorus, and the Randolph Singers. 



Jim Carroll is a software developer at MicroBrightField, Inc. by day, has been singing since high school, and is currently active 
with In Accord. He previously sang in the VSO Chorus, Melisma, Trillium, Oriana, Burlington Choral Society, and professionally at the 
Unitarian Universalist Society. Jim is married to alto Allison Carroll, whom he met through singing, years after first meeting her at a 
wedding where he applied the garter to the woman who caught the bouquet (Allison)! 



Deborah Farnham thanks her mom for instilling a lifelong love of music. She has sung in various groups while residing in 
Vermont, New York, the Virgin Islands, and Japan. The venues have ranged from concert halls, to coffee houses, to weekly 
bluegrass concerts at Shakey's Pizza in downtown Sapporo, to St. Paul, MN where she performed with the celestial Sirens on 
Garrison Keillor's Prairie Home Companion "Talent From Towns Under 2000" contest. She and her husband, the proud 
grandparents of 4 grandkids, divide their time between Tunbridge and S. Starksboro. 


Tim Guiles, the founder of Maple Jam, has spent most of his musical life at the keyboard, having been the musical 
director for shows like "Sweeney Todd" and "A Little Night Music" at Montpelier's Lost Nation Theater, and "Les Mis" 
at Barre's Spaulding High School. Schooled, and initially employed as an engineer, he discovered his love of close harmony 
singing with barbershop music in 1982. Shortly thereafter he discovered the rich, 8-voiced harmonies of Gene Puerling, which 
started him on a quest to find people who loved this kind of singing, and had the time, energy, and musical ability to bring this 
kind of music to life. 


Paul Morrow is a man of leisure, having recently retired from his post as Chief Medical Examiner for the State of Vermont, 
leaving him time to pursue singing, traveling, running marathons, and rowing. He currently is employed in Sydney, Australia, as a
medical examiner. He has sung previously with the VSO Chorus and Musica Propria. When in the States, he lives in his childhood home 
in Shelburne with his wife Emily and daughter Lilly. 



Jay Sames has sung programs with the VSO Chorus, The Handel Society of Dartmouth College, The 
Crown's Delight (8-voice madrigals), the Manchester (NH) Choral Society, the New Hampshire Symphony Orchestra, the Dartmouth 
Chamber Singers, and the Burlington Discover Jazz Festival. At the University of Delaware he sang with an all-engineer barbershop 
quartet called The Logarithms. Jay is currently following his life's passion by exploring some of the most exotic corners of the world, 
but spends much of his time in Quebec visiting his favorite B&B;, or rather, its lovely proprietor. 



Honorable Mention

Tom Felgen AKA "Coach Tom", AKA "Vikki's Dad", has lent his 50+ years of expertise to coach the Jammers on several occasions 
and work with them to help hone their intonation and stage presence. He started singing barbershop in college with his classmates 
and went on to earn two International Championship titles, once in 1965 with "The Four Renegades" and again in 1980 with 
"The Chicago News". In the early 80's he branched out and sang jazz tunes with a mixed quartet called "The Fabulous Forties", most famous 
for their "588-2300" jingle for Empire Carpets (come on, you KNOW it!). He's still singing and competes on a national level in a 
Baltimore-based "senior" quartet. Tom lives with his wife Jayne in southern Pennsylvania. The man is an absolute LEGEND in the Barbershop 
world and we are grateful for his advice and council.




(Jammers: please enter the Member's Only pages)