Australian Music Centre

Music in Me Summit presenter

Dr Joanna Drimatis is a highly-respected champion of Australian music, contributing comprehensively through her output as a conductor, performer, music director, researcher and educator. Joanna currently the Music Education Specialist for the Australian Music Centre, Music Director/Chief Conductor of the Beecroft Orchestra and Resident Conductor of the NSW Doctors’ Orchestra in Sydney.

After initial studies in Music Education, Violin Performance and Orchestral Conducting in Australia and the USA, Joanna graduated with a PhD in Musicology from the University of Adelaide and was awarded the Inaugural Doctoral Research Medal in 2009. Joanna has also guest conducted numerous orchestras and festivals throughout Australia and New Zealand which include Australian Doctors’ Orchestra, the Sydney Youth Orchestra, Steel City Strings, Orange Symphony Orchestra and ensembles for the Orange Chamber Music Festival. 

In recent years, Joanna has enjoyed conducting productions for young Sydney-based opera companies The Cooperative and Gente Gente productions. As a violinist/violist Joanna has played professionally as an orchestral and chamber musician both in Australia and overseas and has been a participant in the conducting programs at Aspen Music Festival (USA) and the American Symphony League’s Donald Thulean Conducting workshop.

Joanna has also given presentations on string and orchestral pedagogy with emphasis on the use of Australian repertoire for training orchestras. This work culminated in an invitation for her to present on this topic at the 2019 Mid-West Band and Orchestra Clinic in Chicago, USA.  Joanna has worked as a sessional academic at the University of Adelaide/Elder Conservatorium and the Sydney Conservatorium of Music and prior to her role at the AMC was Head of Strings at MLC School Sydney. In 2020 Joanna was awarded an APRA AMCOS Art Music NSW Luminary Award for her advocacy, programming and performance of Australian music. 

https://joannadrimatis.com/

Music in Me Summit presenter

Meeghan Oliver is a descendant of the Awabakal peoples from Muloobinbah (Newcastle, NSW) and is the librarian and ATSI Liaison at the Australian Music Centre, Australia’s national nfp organisation that supports art music creators via publishing, promotion, commissioning and industry support. In addition to music librarianship, Meeghan is a composer, experimental sound artist and bass player.

Their background includes live sound, national and international touring and performances in multiple independent bands, music publishing, archiving and documentation, and policy writing.

Music in Me Summit presenter

Adam Manning is a Kamilaroi musician, composer, and educator based in Newcastle, NSW. His creative practice sits at the intersection of music, rhythm, sound, and visual art, with a strong focus on Indigenous methodologies, listening practices, and relational approaches to making. Adam works across composition, performance, and sound design, often integrating clapsticks, percussion, electronics, and spatial sound into contemporary contexts.

He has collaborated with organisations including the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, Sydney Symphony Orchestra, Australian Art Orchestra, ABC Classic, and the Melbourne International Jazz Festival. Adam is a lecturer at the University of Newcastle, where he teaches music, sound, and visual media, and his work frequently explores how First Nations perspectives can be meaningfully embedded in contemporary music education and practice.

Music in Me Summit presenter

Nicole Smede is a warrimay multidisciplinary artist, composer and poet of cross-cultural ancestry, living and creating on Wadi Wadi Dharawal Country. Working across sound, voice, poetry, and installation, her practice explores the interrelationship between land, language, and memory, guided by ancestral knowledge. Through immersive soundscapes and poetic works, she invites deep listening as a form of connection and return to Country.

Her compositions have been commissioned by leading festivals and ensembles including Canberra International Music Festival, Ensemble Offspring, and River City Voices. Her voice features on award-winning soundtracks such as Goldstone and Black Cockatoo Crisis, and her poetry appears in Guwayu: For All Times and Australian Poetry Journal, amongst others. In 2025, she premiered Nyiirun Yiiga, a mass choral work in Gathang language, and solo exhibition Bagandha yanggamba-ngga at Shoalhaven Regional Gallery. Nicole is a member of Mudjingaal Yangamba choir, and her works are held in national collections.