Meet the talented WordPress community musicians who will be entertaining you during the lunch break!
Catch their performances in the Yukon track at 11:30am PDT/2:30pm EDT.
Ameni
Ameni is a NYC based musician. He is a pianist, vocalist, and composer. After initially rejecting piano lessons several times, he began to train himself submitting to the beckoning of a dormant piano. Noticing the progress, his mother provided formal training from Kevin Porter. The path up to this point has been similar to many musicians – church then stage. Prior to Covid you might have come across Ameni in the subways of NYC. He is currently building his website FunkyNubianRepublic.com with WordPress.
Ben Dwyer
As roots entwine in the dirt and rivers twist and turn to the sea, Scruffian weaves words and melodies into a jumble of songs that belong around a campfire. When he’s not playing music Scruffian plays for Automattic.
Ben Meredith
What makes a guy with a bachelors degree in Religious Studies and no formal web training into a web developer with hundreds of thousands of downloads of his projects, and then has the audacity to get him a career in technical support and management?
WordPress does.
Ben is a developer and technical support lead, focused on the human interaction with WordPress. He thrives on making users (and their sites) play nicely with developers (and their products), like an ambassador from one to the other.
A graduate of the University of North Carolina and a lifelong Southerner, Ben lives in South Carolina and is a father of three and a husband of one very patient wife. He works full-time as the Director of Customer Service and Support for GiveWP a Liquid Web Brand, where he spends his time wowwing customers, cracking jokes, and solving problems.
When he’s not working, he’s likely parenting and reminiscing about having free time to play disc golf and guitar.
Fun facts: Once he gave a Bible to a drunken former KGB agent who was nearly naked. He flew east all the way around the world (with the help of commercial airlines) one summer. He used to have significantly more hair. To an embarrassing extent.
Blake Bays
I’m 29 and have been a musician for over 18 years. I got my start playing cello in orchestra and moved on to guitar at 13, then picked up bass a few years later. I listen to a wide variety of genres but my core inspiration for my music stems progressive metal, jazz fusion, and classical music. “Postures I” was my first official solo release and I intend the Postures series to explore these different genres and influences in a way that speaks to me. I started with Automattic in May of this year as a Happiness Engineer after spending a few years as a web developer with a small web firm. It has been an amazing experience so far and it’s been a privilege to join such an amazing organization!
Brad Miller
Brad Miller is a Creative, Strategist, Entrepreneur, & Executive at 10up, Currently residing in Tampa, FL; Christian, passionate family man, singer & songwriter, and pop culture enthusiast.
Brad has over 16 years of experience in building teams for remote work, full-service digital strategy, user experience design, business management, business development, project management, creative direction, and. building experience in WordPress. He’s had the pleasure of working with some fantastic partners & customers over the years including Disney, AMC Networks, AMC tv, IFC, Sundance, BBC, WE tv, WCG Clinical, Facebook, Publix, Frito-Lay, Microsoft, Sara Lee, Allergan, HID Global, Chewy, GoDaddy, Encompass Health, Tenaris, and many others.
Brad loves creating new user experiences, providing excellent customer service, coaching others, and building long-lasting relationships. Brad is know for starting Lift UX, a full-service digital design agency focused on UX and WordPress, which was acquired by 10up in 2017. As part of the acquisition of Lift UX, Brad joined the fantastic team at 10up, where he is now the Vice President of New Client Strategy. Outside of strategy and consulting work at 10up, Brad is a musician and songwriter, ghost writing for musicians in Nashville, Tennessee, Atlanta, Georgia, and California.
Christie Chirinos
Christie Chirinos leads partnerships with plugin and theme authors, agencies, hosts, and more, at Codeable.io. Before this, Christie was the product manager for Managed WooCommerce hosting at Liquid Web, and the co-founder of Caldera Labs, whose flagship plugin, Caldera Forms, gained over 200,000 active installs before being acquired by Ninja Forms. Christie is a passionate advocate of online business owners, having spoken at conferences nationwide and internationally on topics of digital product strategy, WordPress, and WooCommerce. She also created The Open Source Economist podcast, which defines and highlights the changes open source software is driving. Christie has a Master of Business Administration degree from Florida State University. When she is not working, you probably find can find her by the closest pool or ocean, writing songs and playing chess.
Eric Noden
Eric Noden is an award winning acoustic blues and roots musician based out of Chicago, Illinois. Eric’s virtuosic fingerpicking guitar blends perfectly with his honey and whiskey tinged voice. Noden’s music is both a tribute to the past and a reflection of current times. From barrelhouse blues to New Orleans grooves to dazzling guitar instrumentals Eric’s live performances are festive and celebratory events. Eric has been featured on music festivals in over 15 countries and 3 continents. He has released 9 albums including his duo work with harmonica master Joe Filisko and blues legend Billy Boy Arnold.
Fausto Papaqui
I am a Mexican guitar player that plays the Spanish guitar and I am also a WordPress Developer working remotely for a Colombian company called Cafeto Software.
All my songs are born as an improvisation and then I take the main idea and develop a song.
Estoy tocando la guitarra por el mundo.
Keanan Koppenhaver
Keanan is the CTO at Alpha Particle where he helps publishers build and modernize their technology platforms.
Mel Choyce-Dwan
Mel Choyce is a product designer based in Philadelphia, PA. Not only is Mel a WordPress Core Committer and former Release Lead, she is a regular core contributor and speaks frequently at WordCamps on design, typography, and user experience. When Mel isn’t designing products at Automattic, she enjoys cold brew coffee, craft beer, and rocking out on drums. Say hi to her on Twitter at @melchoyce, and visit her site at choycedesign.com.
Scott Kingsley Clark
Scott is the Product Manager for Paid Memberships Pro, the Lead Developer of the Pods Framework, and contributes to other projects as often as possible. They spend most days working with PHP, MySQL, React, and doing code reviews. They share lessons learned through experiences by speaking at WordCamps, Meetups, Conferences, and on Podcasts to help other people. Pay it forward, ya’ll!
The Han Solo Project
The Han Solo Project hails from a galaxy far far away… in Iowa. Chronicling the stories of the Star Wars Universe in song, they capture the stories, fan theories, and unique perspectives that bring fans around the world together. While the band crosses a wide range of genres from funk to country, fans of Modest Mouse, Blur, and Beck will enjoy (at least) some of their songs. Putting out albums *almost* as fast as Disney pumps out movies, the band has released five full-length albums with a 6th on the way.