Artistic Staff

Karen Areheart Ives, Accompanist

Karen Areheart Ives is the Director of Music at St. Stephen Lutheran Church in Williamsburg. Mrs. Ives holds a Bachelor of Piano Performance degree from Wittenberg University (Springfield, Ohio) and her master’s degree from the University of South Carolina (Columbia, S.C.). She also has a degree in vocal performance from Columbia College where she was the faculty staff accompanist. Mrs. Ives accompanied Columbia’s Sandlapper Singers, a semi-professional choral ensemble specializing in American music. Mrs. Ives was Director of Music and organist at several Lutheran churches in Columbia before moving to Arden, N.C., where she served Lutheran Church of the Nativity as Cantor. Moving to Williamsburg in 2017, Mrs. Ives sang with the Choral Guild before becoming its accompanist in 2018.  She is also the accompanist for the Williamsburg Women’s Chorus.  Mrs. Ives assists Augsburg Fortress Publishers with music clinic events around the U.S. She is a member of the American Guild of Organists and the Association of Lutheran Church Musicians.