Many of us know and admire Rena Roussin and have benefited from her kindness, insights, and dedication to intersectional justice, equity, and community.

For those of you who are not familiar with her and her work, Rena studies Classical music’s historic and contemporary relationships to issues of equity and social justice, with particular research specialties in constructions of gender and disability in eighteenth-century music, and the current emergence of Indigenous-led opera in Canada.

She is a first-generation student of European settler and Haida and Métis Indigenous heritage, who is actively working to reconnect with her Indigenous communities; she also lives with invisible illness. These identities inform her teaching and research, as well as her commitment to making musicology and post-secondary music education an accessible, welcoming place for people from all walks of life.

I (Andrew Dell'Antonio) am taking this initiative on the fundraiser because of my admiration and esteem for Rena, and my conviction that she will give back manyfold what she receives in numerous ways. I’ve had the privilege of working alongside Rena in several contexts over the last few years.

With me, Rena is currently one of the current leaders of the American Musicological Society Music and Disability Study Group (DisMus); she was the leading proponent of the emergent Music and Disability Community of Practice that expands scholarship and advocacy on disability beyond that particular Society.

Rena’s work is also unique in the ways it bridges scholarship on disability, gender, race, coloniality, and anti-colonial efforts across musical genres and across diverse historical time periods. She also joins this work to a commitment to anti-racist and accessible course design, and to public musicology and outreach projects , including work on anti-colonial and social justice initiatives with the Canadian Opera Company, Soundstreams Canada, and the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir .

In our work together for DisMus, and in attending her conference presentations, I have been consistently impressed with her intellectual focus and also extraordinary courage in bringing forth her intersectional identity-based experience and wisdom. Her determination has helped me as well as other disabled scholars, both junior and senior, continue and renew our intellectual and advocacy efforts for greater access and equity in musicology.

Rena’s professional recognition and established fluency in speaking to the essential need for equity through the collaboration of historically marginalized identity groups is manifest in her publications and multiple recent presentations, both invited and refereed, on Indigenous perspectives and questions of decolonization in North American opera and concert music.

Thank you for considering joining me in a donation to support Rena’s final push to the doctorate!