Sarah Gilbert | Operations Manager
sarah@taikocommunityalliance.org
Sarah is relatively new to the taiko community, having started her musical career as a western-trained percussionist at the Crane School of Music in upstate New York. In 2012, while pursuing an MA in TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages), Sarah joined Stony Brook University’s resident group, Taiko Tides, under the guidance of Joan Miyazaki, Eva Nagase, and Joe Dvorak. Since then, she has had the opportunity to play taiko in Japan as a performing member of Towada Suijin Kaminari Daiko in Aomori prefecture and Uminari Daiko in Taneichi, Iwate while serving as an Assistant Language Teacher in the JET Program. After returning to New York, Sarah became a performing member of Soh Daiko and served as the group’s Technology and Archival Chair with a focus on building up media assets and communications best practices. It was around this time that she began volunteering with the Taiko Community Alliance, and was soon after contracted as TCA’s Salesforce Administrator and Technology Consultant. Outside of TCA, Sarah served as an advisor with Taiko Tides in planning the East Coast Taiko Conference at Stony Brook University and taught high school mathematics and English to non-native speakers.