Laura and David Ash moved to Seattle in 1986 and soon joined what is now St. Patrick's 10:00 choir, becoming its co-directors in 1989. Their collaboration on compositions grew out of a need for more responsorial psalms. Three of their songs have been published on a national basis by Oregon Catholic Press or Unity Music Press, a division of Lorenz. Laura and David have written more than 100 liturgical pieces and have self produced cassettes, CDs and sheet music for three albums.

Laura began playing piano at the age of five and went on to complete 15 years of study, as well as sing and play flute in high school. During two years at Seattle University she sang in the chorus. After earning her B.S. in Spanish at Georgetown University, Laura went on to earn a Teaching Certificate in Music (choral with piano emphasis) from the University of Washington. She taught piano for six years.

David recently earned a Masters degree in liturgical music with an emphasis in composition at Santa Clara University, studying with Rev. Jan Michael Joncas, Fred Moleck, and Lynn Shurtleff. One of his academic papers on contrafacta was published in the Spring 1996 GIA Quarterly.

These days, Laura is Pastoral Assistant for Music at St. Patrick's while David is Pastoral Assistant for Music at St. Catherine of Siena parish in Seattle. They met at Georgetown University, singing together in the G.U. Singers, G.U. Madrigals, and the prestigious Paul Hill Chorale at the Kennedy Center. They also co-founded and directed the Renaissance Revelers, a 16-voice Washington, D.C.-area madrigal group which is still alive and singing professionally. The Ashes' interest in musical styles and cultures is broad. They have performed in the University of Washington Indonesian gamelan Ki Muncar on several instruments. They studied Celtic Harp under Philip Boulding of Magical Strings. They are also one-half of Kitchen Sync, an a cappella professional quartet singing hits from the 1920's to 1990's which has performed at the Bite of Seattle and the Puyallup Fair. David and Laura's best collaborative work to date, their son Benjamin, is eleven years old.