VoiceJam 2024 Judges
Deke Sharon
Deke Sharon has been performing professionally since the age of 8. As a child he toured North America and shared the stage performing in operas with the likes of Pavarotti. Heralded as “The Father of Contemporary A Cappella” this performer, arranger, music producer, author, producer and coach is responsible for the current sound of modern a cappella. While at college, he pioneered the dense vocal-instrumental sound that we today take for granted as the sound of contemporary a cappella and has spent his life since then performing and popularizing it.
He has arranged thousands of songs, produced dozens of award-winning albums, and written seven books.He was the vocal orchestrater and a producer of the first a cappella musical on Broadway “In Transit” and the opening number of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s new musical “Unmasked.” He’s a frequent emcee at events and gives corporate speeches on business lessons from vocal harmony to companies like Google and Facebook. He has an annual concert at Carnegie Hall each spring, and has shared the stage with countless music legends, including Ray Charles, James Brown, Crosby Stills & Nash, Run DMC, The Temptations, LL Cool J, and The Four Tops, as well as performed the televised “Monday Night Football Theme” with Hank Williams Jr. through the 2011 NFL season.
Dr. Erin Hackel
Dr. Erin Hackel is an Associate Professor at the University of Colorado, Denver. Her award winning a cappella groups, MIX and Lark have traveled across the United States and Europe competing and performing. Both groups have been BOSS and SOJAM champions, are recipients of multiple performance awards, and have won multiple Contemporary A cappella Recording awards (CARAS). MIX and Lark have been praised for their innovation and professionalism and have been singled out for their boundary changing work in collegiate a cappella. Dr. Hackel’s ensembles have collaborated with the Swingle Singers, headlined the National A cappella Convention, and won the Most Innovative Group award at the Aarhus Vocal Festival in Aarhus, Denmark.
Dr. Hackel’s research and publication history centers on the lives of female composers and performers. Her original research on Norwegian musicians Agathe Backer Grøndahl and Nina Grieg has appeared in articles in the Journal of Singing, and her work on contemporary vocalists Dame Vera Lynn and Yvette Guilbert has appeared in the Journal Women in Music. Dr. Hackel maintains an active profile as a presenter of workshops and classes at vocal festivals around the country on healthy contemporary singing, collaborative arranging techniques for vocal ensembles, and demystifying the pedagogy of modern singing styles.
Take 6
Receiving praise from luminaries including Ray Charles, Ella Fitzgerald and Quincy Jones – who called them “the baddest vocal cats on the planet” – the multi-Platinum® a cappella sextet Take 6 has collaborated across genres and toured the globe with their funky grooves that bubble into an intoxicating brew of gospel, jazz, R&B and pop. Winners of 10 Grammy Awards®, 10 Dove Awards, a Soul Train Award and a place in the Gospel Music Hall of Fame, everyone is taking note of Take 6. Don’t miss their Northwest Arkansas premier debut as the 2024 VoiceJam A Cappella Festival Headliner!
Jia-Ching Lai
Jia-Ching Lai is the founder of the multi-award winning O-Kai Singers, scoring first place at the Taiwan International Contemporary A Cappella Competition just two months after its founding and is the current record holder for most awards won by any vocal group in Taiwan, winning a total of 23 domestic and international awards. He is the producer of the O-Kai Singer’s debut album which won several awards including “Best Jazz Album” for Contemporary A Cappella Recording Awards (CARAs)(USA), “Best Group”, “Best Indigenous Album”, and the “Jury Award” for the 24th Golden Melody Awards (Taiwan), and the “Ten Best Albums of 2012” by the Chinese Musicians’ Association (Taiwan).
As the organizer of the first A Cappella course in the university, he also started the first A Cappella radio show in Taiwan and is currently assistant professor at the Applied Music Department of Tainan National University of the Arts. Jia-Ching is often invited to judge at international a cappella competitions, including the VoiceJam A Cappella Competition (USA), the Asian Cup A Cappella Competition, the Taiwan International Contemporary A Cappella Competition (TW) , The Sing-off (China) , the Hong Kong A Cappella Competition (HK) , and the China A Cappella Competition.
Trist Ethan Curless
A resident of Glendale, CA, Trist grew up in Cheyenne, WY where he became addicted to vocal harmonies! He attended Northwest College and the University of Northern Colorado, majoring in music education. In 1995, he co-founded the pop-jazz vocal group m-pact. Trist has also been known to work on the other side of the microphone, as an audio engineer for several vocal groups and bands, including Pentatonix, Straight No Chaser, VoicePlay, Accent, and Take 6. When he's not performing and mixing, Trist also finds time to participate as a clinician and adjudicator in clinics and festivals worldwide which enable him to share his love of music with others. Trist is having the time of his life making music and feels fortunate to have performed with m-pact, Take 6, Bobby McFerrin, New York Voices, The Swingle Singers, Vox Audio, Naturally 7, and for 10 years as a member of The Manhattan Transfer.