Token Creek Chamber Music

Sarah Schaffer

Sarah Schaffer has worked in arts administration and concert management for more than three decades. She has been artistic manager of the Token Creek Festival since 1997, is founder and artistic director of Summer Sundays in the Garden (a jazz series presented in a Madison botanical garden since 2016), is board advisor to Salon Piano Series in Madison, and curated the Chancellor’s Concert Series at UW Madison. She was director of Pro Arte Quartet’s recently-concluded centennial anniversary celebration, creating, financing, and curating the half-million dollar, multi-year project, and she continues to serve as the quartet’s manager. She also manages The Aspen String Trio. While at UW-Madison she served as executive producer for the School of Music recordings label. She was President of the inaugural Board of Directors of the Oakwood Chamber Players and vice president of the Board of Directors of the Madison Symphony Orchestra League, where she led the long-range planning team. Primarily, Sarah Schaffer has been assistant to composer John Harbison for twenty-five years, handling commissions, publications, residencies, concert appearances, and recordings. Her graduate degrees are from Indiana University, where she received masters’ degrees in musicology and music librarianship, and the Ph.D. in music theory. She is active as a freelance cellist, and is a founding member of the Madison society quartet Quartessence. She also designs and maintains the gardens of Token Creek.