Leadership
Michael Harrison — Founder & Artistic Direction
Marina Harrison — Co-Founder & Board President
Marina Harrison — President & Director of Development
Roman Skakun — Treasurer & Secretary
Catherine Despont
Johnny MacMillan
Board
Marina Harrison
Marina received her undergraduate degree from Columbia University and completed her graduate studies in the history of glass at The Parsons School of Design. She has written about art and the role of the collector and spent much of her career working with discerning buyers of vintage Steinway pianos, about which she is very knowledgeable.
She has been singing in choirs since childhood and has presided over and served on the boards on several non-profit charities supporting music lessons to underserved children and benefiting communities in need. She also created and ran a summer music camp for underserved children on Manhattan’s upper west side.
Marina offers her expertise to the Michael Harrison Foundation for Just Music while retaining the role her husband lovingly described as, “my most loyal and persistent advocate.” She oversees the completion of Michael’s Raga Cycle Project.
JOHNNY MACMILLAN
Johnny MacMillan is a Canadian-American composer and pianist who began studying piano at the Royal Conservatory at the age of four, and composition at the University of Toronto at eleven, going on to complete Bachelor degrees in both Composition and Piano Performance at the Jacobs School of Music with a minor in film scoring.
Johnny completed a Master’s in Composition at Juilliard and is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Composition at the Eastman School of Music. He also studied with Marc Sabat and Catherine Lamb in Berlin during the 2025-26 academic year on a Fulbright Scholarship.
Johnny’s work is deeply inspired by his passion for cinema, literature, history, musicology, and philosophy, as well as his love of other musical traditions, including those of India and Ireland, film music, ambient music, and jazz. His music reconciles a deep love of tradition with extended just intonation, spectralism, rare instruments, unusual instrumental techniques, and electronics—all present in his most ambitious work, Ödipus der Tyrann, a setting of Hölderlin’s translation of the Sophoclean drama for nineteen players.
His music has been performed in Canada, the United States, Australia, England, Spain, Ukraine, and Austria, by ensembles including the JACK Quartet, Decoda, Bergamot Quartet, and the Mivos Quartet. He has scored multiple films by filmmakers from the London Film School, the Sydney Film School and the Columbia College Chicago.
Our Team
Roman Skakun
Roman Skakun earned a Master of Music Composition and a Master of Business Adminstration focusing on finance and international business from The University of New Orleans. His music studies focused on counterpoint, conducting and writing for string quartets. He also studied privately with Michael Harrison.
Roman's business expertise concentrates on finance and international markets with a focus on commodities.
He lives in the New York area with his wife and two children.