Annie Ray

Annie Ray Speaker Biography

Annie Ray currently serves as both the Orchestra Director and Performing Arts Department Chair at Annandale High School (AHS) in the Fairfax County Public School (FCPS) system. Annie is an advocate for providing universal access to quality music education and is known for founding and developing creative opportunities to make music accessible to students of all demographics.

Her establishment of the FCPS Parent Orchestra teaches about 200 caregivers annually to learn to play their student’s instrument and provides mentorship to upcoming music teachers. Annie also founded the Crescendo Orchestra program to make Orchestra curriculum accessible to students with significant developmental or intellectual disabilities. In January 2022, this program was featured and acclaimed on the cover of the Metro section in The Washington Post. TEDx invited Annie to give a talk in April 2022, The Sounds of Success, based on her approach in the classroom and how to meet all students where they are at.

She is a regular keynote speaker at numerous national/international conferences and guest lecturer at colleges, and was named the 2024 GRAMMY Music Educator Award recipient and the 2023 FCPS Outstanding Secondary Teacher of the Year for her work on equity in education. Annie is one of the co-founders of Motherhood and Music Education and is a member of the StringRise professional development team.

Her mentors include Dennis Langevin, Brian Coatney, Dr. Elizabeth Chappell, Dr. Jaymee Haefner, and Naoko Nakamura. She is an active professional harpist and currently resides in Arlington, Virginia with her husband Dr. Irving Ray and their daughters Eloise and Millie. Annie is an adventurer at heart, and her biggest bucket list item is to one day win The Amazing Race.