Fiddlin' Around - The Creative Team

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 As a music educator for over thirty-five years, Mrs. Palmer is the Fine Arts Director in the Normandy Schools Collaborative. She holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Music Education from the University of Missouri-Columbia and a Master of Education Administration from the University of Missouri-St. Louis.

Maestra Suzanne Palmer is the artistic director and conductor of the 

Community Gospel Choir of St. Louis and is the founder of The Fellowship of Souls Gospel Ensemble.

Mrs. Palmer has blazed a trail not only as a prolific music educator but also as a professional singer and music director. 

Mrs. Palmer has put her talent to work to teach many people in her words- the transformative, life affirming, spiritual power of music to bind, cleanse and heal the soul.

She has received many awards and is the recipient of The St. Louis Arts and Education Council-Arts Educator of the Year-Legacy Award 2023.

Suzanne is a member of Tau Beta Sigma Music Sorority, The Missouri Music Educators Association, The Music Choral Directors Association and has been called to serve as an educational consultant focused on diversity, equity and inclusion for both The Bach Society of St. Louis, and Opera Theater of St. Louis. Suzanne Palmer is also a proud member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc.

  Blake Hernton is a concert violinist/violist from Black Jack, Missouri (North County St. Louis). Hernton is a Truman State University graduate with a Bachelors in Music (2014) and a Masters of Arts in Education (2016).  Practicing and performing string pedagogy since the age of 10, 

Hernton has a reputation in the St. Louis Area for his career as a musician and music educator throughout several local school districts and private studios.  Currently, Hernton teaches orchestra at Ritenour High School in Overland, Missouri.  Despite the fact that many students in the community come from low income families and access to arts education is limited, Hernton prides himself on providing exposure to music education to students that would not otherwise be able to participate in public school orchestra programs.  

Hernton has featured and performed background string productions in the St. Louis music scene with local artists including The Holy Posers, NandoSTL, and Stringz EMB. As a member of the Ophelia String Quartet, Hernton performs for wedding ceremonies and in several local venues hosting concerts in the community to offer free classical and contemporary experiences to students and members of the St. Louis Area. Hernton is best known for the release of his 2020 EP, Concert Black also featured in the Chamber Project of St. Louis as part of their “Groove” Concert November 18, 2022 at Washington University.

Hernton’s greatest passion is for his local high school orchestra students who enjoy learning a multitude of genres including traditional Classical Music, Neo Soul, Gospel, and Hip-Hop.  As an educator and recording artist, Blake is no stranger to sharing the joy and love of music whether with students or with an audience, passion is priority.

Diane McCullough taught music at the Laboratory Schools University of Chicago for eleven years and in the St. Louis Public Schools for twenty years at Marquette and Carr Lane Visual and Performing Arts Middle Schools, retiring in June, 2007. Since earning her Masters in Voice from Washington University in 1963, her musical career has combined teaching with singing opera and playing ethnic music. 

She combined professional singing (art song, opera and 20th century chamber music) with teaching for 13 years in the Chicago area then spent 7 years in Germany (6 at the Nationaltheatre Mannheim) singing opera. She returned to teaching in St. Louis in 1987 and continued her relationship with opera as a cooperating teacher with the Opera Theatre of St. Louis Education Department. She guided her sixth and seventh grade students in writing their own operas for 7 years at Carr Lane. In 2000, Opera Theatre of St. Louis produced one of these operas, Sukey and the Mermaid, on their main stage. Diane has been a national trainer for the “MUSIC! WORDS! OPERA!” curriculum since 1996. She continues M!W!O! work for Opera Theatre of St. Louis as a music consultant, writing listening guides for the operas they present in schools. Missouri Music Educators Association St. Louis Metro District Eight awarded her the 2006 Merit Award and the 2008 Hall of Fame Award for Outstanding Service to Music Education and to Metro District Eight. 

She has been a founding director for three nonprofit organizations – 1) Karumanta, an Andean flute band, 2) The St. Louis Scottish Games, and 3) Scottish Partnership for Arts and Education (SPAE). SPAE was her brainchild and she is their artistic director and grants administrator. SPAE, founded in 2006, provides free Artist in Residence workshops in Scottish traditional fiddle, Scots and Gaelic song, poetry and their connections to American music and poetry, and professional development workshops for teachers, including a STEAM lesson on felting.

She received an “Ageless Remarkable St. Louisan” award from the St. Andrew Charitable Foundation in 2022.

Besides doing work for SPAE and leading the band “Peat Fire Flame”, Ms. McCullough volunteers as:

· Co-chair of the Docents Committee for Opera Theatre of St. Louis’s Guild. 2008-2020 

· Chair of the Entertainment and Sound Committee for the St. Louis Scottish Games. 2007-2017

· Chair of the Advocacy Committee for Opera Theatre of St. Louis’s Guild 2020-present

· Serves as an Elder at Webster Groves Presbyterian Church and is active on the Presbytery of Giddings-Lovejoy Dismantling Racism and White Privilege Committee (DRAWP). The DRAWP Committee successfully submitted “An Overture of Apology to African Americans for the Sin of Slavery and its Legacy” to the Presbyterian Church USA General Assembly in 2022. It is now an official statement of apology from the PCUSA.