Bio
Mike Whitebread is a composer, performer, music producer, and music director based out of Houston, TX.
As a performer, Mike has played and toured throughout the world appearing stateside on ABC World News and CNN while appearing internationally on BBC World News, BBC4, German and French TV, Reuters, and Egyptian media. Other notable performances include include the Miri Country Music Festival (Malaysia), backing up Broadway sensation Audra McDonald (Houston, TX), and appearances in Canada, Washington D.C., Chicago, and Indianapolis (Orchestra of America/Indianapolis Symphony). He has also performed at such landmarks as inside the Old City of Jerusalem, along the Nile river in Cairo, and Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate, with recent festivals in Texas including River Revival (New Braunfels) and Woodlands Waterway Festival (The Woodlands).
As a composer, Mike’s work has been performed in regional equity theatres including multiple productions at the Alley Theatre (Houston, TX) and at the Colorado New Play Festival (Steamboat Springs, CO), where he served as music director and guitarist while composing original music for the festival’s performance. Recent compositions include 14 arrangements of modern pop music for an Italianate baroque and classical mandolin/accordion duo in an original 2023 adaptation of Servant of Two Masters (translated by Rob Melrose), and most recently a 2025 release of four country music songs as a part of poet Janet Lowery’s newest play, Midwinter at The Dancehall. Mike has also through-composed musical settings for Shakespeare’s Winter’s Tale (awarded best sound design, Broadway World), including setting and adapting the Bard’s written songs to vintage Texas country music. Other compositional work includes both songs and incidental music for over 20 staged productions, as well as arrangements for touring jazz, country, and pop groups. Other collaborations include performing original works by Broadway composer Gregg Coffin, and new play festival workshops of an adaptation of the 1983 movie Tender Mercies with Hallie Foote, Daisy Foote, and director Michael Wilson.
In the studio, Mike has co-produced and collaborated with Grammy winning Dan Workman in producing Houston Grand Opera soloist Alicia Gianni for her debut jazz release. Other production credits include rootsy/folk artist Craig Kinsey’s album, American Roots and Machines and Kinsey’s first album, The Burdener, which garnered Texan “Best Song” and “Best Album” awards including a ‘Best 12 Texas Albums’ of the year award in the Houston Chronicle. Mike has produced, performed, engineered, and mixed dozens of projects including jazz, swing, rockabilly, country, bluegrass, and gypsy styles.
Mike also works as an educator, having taught at Houston’s University of St. Thomas Music Preparatory School and at the Texas liberal arts school, Western Academy. He has additionally served as choral conductor and music director for various educational theatre and musical performances. Mike holds a Masters of Music in jazz conducting from the Moores School of Music and two undergraduate degrees in composing and performance. Mike’s current instrument list includes guitar, upright and electric bass, percussion/drum set, piano, accordion, recorder consort, pump organ and electric organ, banjo, ukulele, mandolin, as well as voice (tenor).