Chapter Officers
Julia Tucker
Dean
An Alabama native, Julia Tucker holds a Doctorate of Musical Arts in Organ Performance from Arizona State University where she studied with Kimberly Marshall. She also holds a Masters of Organ Performance and Masters of Piano Performance from Syracuse University where she studied with Dr. Annie Laver, as well as an undergraduate degree from Auburn University. Julia keeps an active performing schedule as an organist, collaborative pianist, and choral singer, both in the United States and in the UK. She has been serving as an organist since she was an early teenager, and has been active as a professional church musician for over a decade. She is particularly passionate about performing and advocating for the music of under-represented composers in the classical canon. Julia is Senior Assistant Director of Enrollment at the Savannah College of Art and Design and sings soprano with Spectra, a Savannah-based feminist treble choir. She is also Sub-Dean for the Savannah Chapter of the American Guild of Organists. She and her husband Joel Morehouse reside in the area with their two cats.
Tripp Hardee is the Minister of Music and Organist at St. Thomas. Tripp is a native of Baxley, Georgia. He received his formal training in piano beginning during his childhood. He has studied piano and organ, along with undergraduate studies in education and music at South Georgia State College and Brewton Parker College. Tripp has previously served as the pianist at Graham United Methodist Church and St. Thomas Aquanis Episcopal Church, as well as Director of Music/Organist at First United Methodist Church of Baxley. He is a member of the American Guild of Organists - Savannah Chapter. He also works full time as a licensed funeral director and embalmer at Baker McCullough Funeral Home, Hodgson Memorial Chapel.
Tripp Hardee
Sub-Dean
David Rigsby spent the majority of his musical career in the Southern California, Los Angeles and Hollywood areas, both in the sacred and secular musical fields. He comes with years of experience in many genres of keyboard and vocal excellence and sang for twenty-one years with the professional chorus Pacific Chorale of Orange County. He is a newly retired choral music educator now living in Savannah, Georgia. He looks forward to getting reconnected with the music and arts scene in Savannah, the lowcountry, and the Southeast US.
David Rigsby
Secretary/Treasurer
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Jackson Borgess
Member at Large
Jackson Borges serves as Organist & Minister of Music for Statesboro First United Methodist Church and Adjunct Professor of Music at Georgia Southern University, both in Statesboro, Georgia. Active as a recitalist, silent movie accompanist, composer, and vocalist, Jackson has performed extensively in important venues both at home and abroad, such as the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart (New Jersey), Grace Cathedral (San Francisco), Longwood Gardens and The Kimmel Center (Pennsylvania), The Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine (NYC), Washington National Cathedral, Harvard University (Boston), and has been featured on WWFM (New Jersey) in recital from Princeton University Chapel. Jackson holds the Bachelor of Music, Master of Music, and Doctor of Musical Arts degrees in Organ Performance from San Diego State University, Westminster Choir College, and The University of Alabama, respectively. His major teachers have included Robert Plimpton, Alan Morrison, Tom Hazleton, and Faythe Freese, and he has studied improvisation with Bruce Neswick and Stephen Tharp. Jackson is represented by Concert Artist Cooperative and more info may be found at Dr. Borges’ YouTube channel, which is @JacksonBorgesDMA, and www.jacksonborges.com.
Jim Adams
Past Dean
Jim Adams is a public school music teacher by training and church musician by avocation. He received music education degrees from Virginia Commonwealth, Florida State, and Georgia Southern Universities, with piano as his major instrument. Jim began playing organ as many church musicians do, by necessity. His organ training has solely been through AGO and Presbyterian music conferences -- and the guidance of helpful colleagues. After teaching elementary general music for 40 years, Jim retired in 2020. His church positions in south Georgia have been at Flemington Presbyterian, First Presbyterian Savannah, and since 2014, White Bluff Presbyterian. When not practicing or planning worship, Jim enjoys travel, yard work, and reading.