Laura Byarley Harris

Bitter Jester Music Festival Judge

Laura Byarley Harris, whose primary instrument is the viola, is a University of Illinois, Urbana, School of Music graduate and also attended Rice University, Houston.  She is a recipient of the String Educator Award at UIUC.  Ms. Harris also has her Masters degree in Education Leadership from Concordia University, Chicago.

She has conducted orchestras for Illinois Music Educators Association Junior District festivals and Illinois Summer Youth Music at University of Illinois Urbana Champaign.  Ms. Harris has served as adjudicator in middle school and high school organizational and solo festivals.  She has also served as guest lecturer in string pedagogy at Concordia.

Ms. Harris has enjoyed the privilege and honor of sharing music in performance with her students during her thirty year career as an orchestra director in the northwest suburbs of Chicago and for the majority of those years, as Director of Orchestras in Mount Prospect School District 57.