Alyssa Morhardt-Goldstein
Alyssa Morhardt-Goldstein is a conservatory-trained soprano, award-winning poet, and passionate educator, guiding her students and collaborating as a music director and vocal coach with Laguna Blanca School. After 12 years in NYC, she moved to Santa Barbara to create Wildwood — truly a home for the arts.
Alyssa is Santa Barbara’s Center Representative for the historic Royal Conservatory of Music, offering internationally recognized examinations for singers and instrumentalists from preparatory to professional levels. She is currently writing a comprehensive book series of in-lesson curriculum specifically for vocal students.
While in NYC, Alyssa performed in a variety of mediums including singing, poetry, and experimental performance. She also worked as a private and group teacher of music and poetry in NYC music and Montessori schools; as the Director and Marketer for Tone Academy of Music, for which she developed their Orff Schulwerk, group music curriculum; as the VP of Program Development and Design for The Poetry Society of New York, for which she created the NYC Children's Poetry Festival; and began developing the mission and curriculum for Wildwood. Alyssa was also the President of the SB Chapter of the American Orff Schulwerk Association, and is certified by the Music Teachers’ Association of California, founded in 1897.
As a singer and musician, Alyssa's musical passions lie in classical, choral, folksong, and musical theater. She is currently performing with the Adelfos Ensemble, singing a broad repertoire of music from ancient chant to contemporary pieces. From a lineage of singers, born into a family half musicians and artists and half scientists, she began performing in operas at the age of seven, and has toured internationally, singing choral works throughout Europe.
As a poet, Alyssa is the author of Nympholepsy (Inside the Castle, 2018), which was a finalist for the 2017 Tarpaulin Sky Book Prize selected by Bhanu Kapil. Excerpts from Nympholepsy are also published in the Best American Experimental Writing 2020, selected by Joyelle McSweeney and Carmen Maria Machado. Alyssa is also the author of Quiet (The New School University Press, 2013), which was the winner of The New School University Press contest selected by Matthea Harvey; and semifinalist for the 2015 Tarpaulin Sky Book Prize for her collection, Forniphilia, which is forthcoming from Dancing Girl Press in 2021. Her work can also be found in Sporklet, Prick of the Spindle, Front Porch, and others.
Alyssa is the Founder and Artistic Director of Diorama, a hybrid-life poetry series with events hosted by Atlas Obscura and the Portland Institute for Contemporary Art; and the Founding Editor of [saUnd] Literary Magazine, the cross-genre publication on contemporary musico-poetics.
Alyssa is a member of the Music Teachers’ Association of California, and holds certifications in Heart-Based Singing, and Orff Schulwerk, studying at the NYCAOSA under Danai Gagné, Laura Koulish, and Katie Traxler for Level I, and at the LACOASA under Patrick Ware, Mika Inouye, and Richard Lawton for Level II.
Alyssa received her MFA in Creative Writing with a focus in poetry from NYC’s The New School, and her BM in Classical Vocal Performance and concurrent BA in English Literature from the world-renowned Mannes conservatory.
contact: alyssa@wildwoodsb.com