Meredith Lavitt is thrilled to be named the new executive director of the Song Summit Foundation, the nonprofit wing of the Park City Song Summit, a multi-day event that focuses on music and wellness, including recovery.

“I am thrilled to join Song Summit Foundation and continue its incredible work supporting programs that use the transformative power of music for wellness,” she said. “I am excited about our educational opportunities with music and wellness that will raise awareness and provide tools to help people understand, create empathy and navigate the challenges of mental health, trauma and substance abuse.” 

Lavitt comes to the Song Summit Foundation with more than 30 years of experience in the independent film sector.

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Not only is she a filmmaker and producer. Lavitt is also the founder of Swirl Productions and former president of Original Thinkers, a media company out of Telluride, Colorado, that curates new, thought-provoking programming for new voices, artists, thinkers, storytellers and visionaries.

There is so much power in storytelling, and that transfers to music as well because music, like all art, is about storytelling.” Meredith Lavitt, Song Summit Foundation executive director

She has also spent more than 20 years at Sundance Institute focusing on program development.

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During her tenure there, Lavitt was instrumental in establishing the institute’s Documentary Film Program. 

She also instigated and directed such programs as Sundance Ignite, which identifies and supports new voices and talent from the next generation of filmmakers, ages 18-25, and fosters fresh audiences for independent storytelling, as well as Sundance Film Forward, a traveling program where Sundance took filmmakers around the world to show their films.

“Sundance and Original Thinkers both are focused on connecting artists and audiences that allow artists to thrive in their creative pursuits,” Lavitt said. “A lot of what I did while at the Sundance Institute was developing programs for the youth and community.”

Lavitt plans to use the skill set she tapped into to create the different programs at Original Thinkers and Sundance to continue the Song Summit Foundation’s mission, Lavitt said.

“The Foundation is doing the same thing Sundance did for filmmakers and audiences but within the music and wellness sphere,” she said. “There is so much power in storytelling, and that transfers to music as well because music, like all art, is about storytelling.”

The Song Summit Foundation supports the wellness village with programming that includes sound baths, yoga, massages, stretching and meditation during the Park City Song Summit, which is scheduled for Aug. 15-17 this year, Lavitt said.

“We also support all the labs, the discussions with the singer-songwriters who talk about their wellness journeys and their creative process journeys,” she said. 

Some of the stories include personal accounts of addiction recovery, recovery from trauma and how music is a way to heal any health modalities, according to Lavitt.

“These singer-songwriters tell their stories, and people in the audience are able to relate to those stories,” she said. “Sometimes the people in the audience will realize they aren’t alone or realize they know people who have similar stories.” 

Lavitt found her way into the mission-based nonprofit sector through filmmaking after she graduated from Brown University.

“It wasn’t that I said I’m going to work for a nonprofit when I graduated college,” she said. “Since I had a passion for film and filmmaking, it was more like I gravitated to work that interested me after I graduated from college.”

That love for film opened doors for her at the Sundance Institute.

“I started there back in 1993 and worked on and off there for 20-plus years,” she said. “That’s when I fell in love with mission-based work. Once you dip your toes into mission-based work, it’s intoxicating because you’re really making a difference.”

The difference people make while working in the mission-based sector causes a ripple effect, according to Lavitt.

“You can make a difference for so many people because you’re supporting artists and creating outlets for them to get their works shown,” she said. “In exchange, the artists are getting their works seen and the audience gets a window into new worlds and new perspectives they may not have seen or heard of before.”

Lavitt, who lives in Park City with her children and husband Chris Reddish, discovered the Song Summit Foundation, formerly the More Than Music Foundation, through last year’s Park City Song Summit.

“It was my first Song Summit, and I fell in love with the energy, mission and what they were doing,” she said. “I got in touch with Courtney Caplan, the Song Summit Foundation’s board chair, and said I would love to get involved in some way.”

At that time, there wasn’t a position open, but Lavitt and Caplan connected with Lavitt’s past work developing programs that nurture and support artists’ creative visions, “empowering their voices and finding ways to connect them with audiences in meaningful ways,” according to Lavitt. 

“I put it out there and left it at that, and then this position opened up,” she said. “I hopped on the opportunity to apply. And I’m happy I did. I am looking forward to bringing my past experience and working in collaboration with the amazing board to grow the foundation’s meaningful work.”