Bios

Maddie Sifantus

Maddie Sifantus founded the Golden Tones in Fall 1988 and continues as their director. She is a professional singer who has performed many styles of music during her career. She performs widely as a singer for churches, weddings, funerals and in oratorio work. In addition, she is a founding member of TVS (The Vocal Section) which performs in nightclubs and in recording studios. Her work can be heard on the soundtracks of "Dick Tracy" and "The Secret of Roan Inish", as well as on multiple recordings, most recently on the latest CD of the Love Dogs. She has also conducted a number of choirs and is a former music director of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Reading (MA).

Maddie has a BS and a MA from Lesley University with a specialization in Elder Studies. She also has a Masters in Divinity from Andover Newton Theological School and is an ordained Unitarian Universalist minister in affiliation with the First Parish in Wayland. She is the co-president of the Society for the Larger Ministry, an organization of community ministers.

Lina Turner MacNeill

The Golden Tones have had the good fortune to be accompanied by pianist Lina Turner MacNeill since its founding in 1988 until her semi-retirement from the piano bench in 2003. She continues to begin and end each concert, before passing the keys to one of our stable of competent accompanists and taking her seat with the singers. It took five pianists and an accordian player to fill her shoes! Before her marriage to Harold MacNeill in 1948, she was a concert pianist and piano teacher, educated at the Faelton Pianoforte School which was located in the Copley Square area of Boston. Two of her teachers were Egon Patrie and Edward Currie. During World War II she performed in France and Germany as part of a touring company of the USO. For many years she accompanied church groups on the piano and organ. In her elder years she studied jazz theory and composition. She composed the group's theme song, "We Are the Wayland Golden Tones", which starts each performance. And, most importantly, she is Maddie's mother!

Deborah Foner

Deborah officially joined the Golden Tones in July 2005, bringing a combination of business experience and musical savvy to our active enterprise. In addition to directing rehearsals and concerts as needed, her responsibilities include contributing to all areas of managing our busy non-profit organization.

Although music was always important in her life, it was journalism school that lured Deborah to Boston from her native Pennsylvania. Initial jobs in public relations and fundraising fostered her interest in graduate work toward a career in arts management. In the MBA program she discovered a knack for computer logic and took a turn toward an information systems career, working as a systems analyst for two large banks, and then in software development, customer support, and technical sales support for two software firms. After hours, she sang with the prestigious Zamir Chorale of Boston, performing all over the country, including in Carnegie Hall.

When her two sons were born, she sought a musical endeavor that would fit around the life of her family. To fill this need, she founded In the Moment, a 7-voice all-female a cappella group (www.inthemomentsings.com). Being musical director of In the Moment led Deborah to many other professional musical endeavors: from running “music time” for a nursery school, to teaching music in a Boston public high school, by her description, “one of the most frustrating and exhilarating jobs I have ever had.”

With a life-long devotion to promoting singing for all ages, Deborah finds directing and performing with the Golden Tones to be a joyful experience. She feels privileged to have found part-time work that draws on her management and marketing experience. The combination makes her new position with the Golden Tones, in her words, “a perfect fit.”

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