Our Team
Charles Beale, Ph.D.
Charlie Beale is an international choral director, jazz educator, arranger and author, who lives with his husband Yuwrajh in New York City.
A passionate campaigner for social justice and stylistic diversity through activist choral singing, he spent 12 years as Conductor and Artistic Director of New York City Gay Men’s Chorus, while also supporting GALA Choruses as its Vice President. He is published by Oxford, Hal Leonard, Faber and ABRSM Publishing, and penned the chapter on LGBTIQ+ choral singing in the recent Oxford Handbook of Choral Pedagogy.
After receiving his Ph.D. from the Institute of Education, London University, Charles taught jazz at the Royal College of Music in London and went on to work in jazz education in both the UK and the Asia Pacific. He has long relationships with many choirs around the world, including the London Gay Men’s Chorus, Coro Gay Ciudad de México and the Sydney Lesbian and Gay Choir.
Charles is passionate about music as a way to unify, heal and bring people together in turbulent and uncertain times and to that end is a key figure in the development of the Global Alliance of Queer Choirs.
Martin Brophy, MBE
Martin was born in England in 1954 and has progressed from living in fear of exposure, prosecution and rejection to living openly with his husband, Raphael Lennon.
An active advocate and supporter of the bears movement, he was an activist for 15 years before joining London Gay Men’s Chorus. Seven years on the leadership team led to Martin taking the Chair and leading the choir through significant change and success both in London and internationally.
Martin was the founding Director of the first UK and Ireland Association of LGBT choirs, which morphed into Proud Voices. His work with queer choral associations around the world has led to collaborations on major events such as the Gay Games, the London Olympics, Millennium Eve at The Dome and ongoing representation for the LGBTIQA+ community across Europe.
For his services to music and our community, Martin was made a Member of the Order of the British Empire by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II in 2013, and he continues to serve the queer choral community as President of Legato, the European Association of Queer Choirs and through his support of the fledgling Global Alliance of Queer Choirs.
Hsien Chew
Hsien Chew is the co-ordinator of Proud Voices Asia. He started singing as a youth in his church choir in Singapore and followed this hobby of choral performance through university in the UK. On graduation he joined the Pink Singers, London’s LGBT+ community choir, which ignited in him a passion for combining LGBT+ community activism with singing. He set up Proud Voices Asia on a return trip to Singapore in 2013 to spark collaboration between Asian queer choirs.
Hsien helped bring members of the Beijing Queer Chorus and G-Major Chorus to Various Voices, the European LGBT+ choir festival in Dublin in 2014, which served as a catalyst for the first Hand in Hand Asian queer choral festival in Taipei the following year. Hsien’s main interest is in how group singing can create communities in culturally diverse and challenging environments, how this knowledge can be shared and leveraged by sexual orientation and gender identity/expression (SOGIE) minorities in Asian countries and how this contributes to a unique pan-Asian queer identity.
Robin Godfrey
Robin has served as the Executive Director of GALA Choruses since 2007 and maintains a private accounting practice. Major achievements during her tenure at GALA have included the redesign of the quadrennial festival to expand delegate performance opportunities and allow member choruses to present more of their most innovative work at the event, the introduction of the 411 consulting program which provides access to experienced arts organization consultants as a benefit of membership and expansion of the programs for the support of queer youth.
Her 25 years of experience in accounting and finance was primarily in the electric power and related industries prior to beginning her work in arts management with the Renaissance City Choirs in 2002. Robin resides in Pittsburgh, USA with her partner, Sue; and German shepherd, Luke.
Mel and Sarah Penicka-Smith
With over 30 years’ combined experience in the arts and entertainment industry, Event Manager Melanie Penicka-Smith and conductor Sarah Penicka-Smith create powerful art and memorable experiences. They met working with Sydney Gay & Lesbian Choir, where they produced concerts, choral festivals, regional and international tours, opera, musicals and cabaret, and performance art installations in Hobart’s MONA.
Alongside Director Sharna Galvin and singer Bernard Leon, the Penicka-Smiths produced six operas for boutique chamber opera company Opera Prometheus, including PromFest, a festival of new Australian chamber operas.
In 2016, they founded Pacific Pride Choir, a biennial touring choir contributing to the visibility & acceptance of LGBTQI+ people in countries where homosexuality is legalised, but not fully recognised. With the help of KIConcerts, Pacific Pride Choir has run two tours, to Germany & Poland (2017), and Vietnam & Cambodia (2019).
Gianluca Ragazzini
Gianluca Ragazzini was born and grew up in Milan, Italy, but has been living in Canada for the past 25 years and is also a Canadian Citizen.
He has been a member of the Chœur Gai d’Ottawa Gay Men’s Chorus for 6 years, as well as President and Board member, and has also been singing in Tone Cluster—Quite a Queer Choir since 1999. With Tone Cluster, he has served in the Board and was also President of the choir.
Following his life-long dream of bringing the Unison Choral Festival to Ottawa and to form a Canadian non-profit organization, in 2010 he was elected President of Unison Ottawa 2014 and, after that Festival, he continued serving in the Board and has been connecting with the Italian LGBTQ Choral Festival Cromatica.
From 2014 to 2021, he was also Board member of GALA Choruses and he is excited to be now part of the Global Alliance of Queer Choirs.
Trevar Skillicorn-Chilver
Trevar is an arts and education professional with a background in theatre and communications. He has written feature length and short plays for the stage, which have been performed in Canberra, Sydney, Brisbane, Hollywood and London, and he volunteers regularly at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe as well as for schools in East Timor.
A passionate advocate for the power of the arts to build mental health and social capital, Trevar discovered the joy of singing with a queer choir when he joined Canberra Qwire, and became deeply committed to the organisation’s success. He served as their communications officer and was part of the team that organised the 2019 Out & Loud festival in Canberra.
Trevar is a father of three splendidly weird offspring, and husband to one wicked drag queen. He works in a theatre, several schools, and a community house; and he is also an authorised celebrant. Based in South Gippsland, Australia, he is not currently close enough to a queer choir to sing with one, but relishes the opportunity the Global Alliance of Queer Choirs offers to remain engaged with the queer choral movement.
Oscar Urtusástegui
Oscar Urtusástegui is the Executive Director of the Coro Gay Ciudad de Mexico. He was born in Mexico City and is still living there. Oscar’s love for the beauty of arts came from the big influence of his father and his grandmother Waltraut, but his biggest love is music: choral music as well as opera. Oscar developed a career in tourism, always trying to find a space to include art in what he was doing or planning.
Eight years ago, his life changed when he was invited to participate in chorus: Oscar is in having one of the happiest times of his life doing what he loves the most, singing and activism through art. Amo la música y amo ser parte de este gran movimiento internacional de Coros.