Everything Band Podcast

Anthony Mazzaferro was the band director at Fullerton College for 29 years. He joins the show to talk about his current career and his current gig at the Orange County School of the Arts.

Topics:

• Anthony’s background and the story of how he ended up with a Navy surplus tuba and a career was born.
• Studying conducting with John Paynter at Northwestern and some tips for score study.
• Earning his doctorate at Arizona State University and studying tuba with Dan Perantoni and conducting with Richard Strange.
• Teaching elementary music in Palo Alto, California and the move to Southern California to teach at Fullerton College.

Links:

• Orange County School of the Arts
• Bennett: Symphonic Songs for Band
• LoPresti: Elegy for a Young American
• Reed: Armenian Dances

Biography:

Dr. Anthony Mazzaferro was born and raised in San Francisco. He received his Bachelor of Music degree from San Francisco State University. During his undergraduate years, he served as the Principal Tubist in the Symphonic Band and Symphony Orchestra. In addition to this he was the Assistant Conductor for both the Symphonic and Concert Bands. After graduating with honors in 1978, Dr. Mazzaferro attended Northwestern University. He pursued a Master of Music degree in Instrumental Conducting where he studied with John P. Paynter. In 1986 he received his Doctor of Musical Arts degree from Arizona State University.

His guest conducting and adjudication assignments have included Honor Bands and Orchestras throughout the Western United States, Canada, Singapore and New Zealand. In 1994, 2001, and 2014 Dr. Mazzaferro was selected to conduct the California All-State Honor Band. In 2007 Dr. Mazzaferro also conducted the California All-State Junior High Symphonic Band. Dr Mazzaferro has also conducted the Alberta, Canada All-Provincial Honor Band and the Singapore “Junior College” National Honor Band. As a clinician, Dr. Mazzaferro has worked with Concert Bands and Orchestras from The United States, Japan, Singapore, New Zealand, Canada, and China.

Dr. Mazzaferro is the 2007 recipient of the California Music Educators Association (CMEA) “Don Schmeer/Byron Hoyt Band Educator Award for excellence in Band Education and Performance”. Dr. Mazzaferro is active in several other musical affiliations outside of Fullerton College. His most recent activities include serving on the Advisory Board for the Cazadero Performing Arts Camp in Northern California and serving as an Assistant Conductor for the Orange County Youth Symphony Orchestra (OCYSO).

Dr. Mazzaferro recently retired after 29 years as a full time faculty member of the Music Department at Fullerton College. Dr. Mazzaferro currently is the Conductor of the Frederick Fennell Wind Ensemble at the Orange County School for the Arts, Conductor of the Orange County Wind Symphony, and is Principal Tuba in the Symphony Irvine, Corona Symphony, and Dana Point Symphony Orchestra.

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Are you planning to travel with your group sometime soon? If so, please consider my sponsor, Kaleidoscope Adventures, a full service tour company specializing in student group travel. With a former educator as its CEO, Kaleidoscope Adventures is dedicated to changing student lives through travel and they offer high quality service and an attention to detail that comes from more than 25 years of student travel experience. Trust Kaleidoscope’s outstanding staff to focus on your group’s one-of-a-kind adventure, so that you can focus on everything else!

David Biedenbender is an Assistant Professor of Composition at Michigan State and a member of the Blue Dot Collective. He joins the show to talk about his music and share his thoughts about composing for band.

Topics:

• David’s background growing up in Michigan and learning music by watching his mother play organ, and how a high school band director gave him his first big break that led to him studying music.
• Studying at Central Michigan University and how he didn’t write a single band piece while studying with David Gillingham
• The story of how he wrote Melodius Thunk and bringing in popular elements such as jazz and rock and roll into the concert band medium.
• Influences on his compositional style, a conversation about development in band music, and why he self-publishes his music and distributes it through Murphy Music Press.

Links:

• David Biedenbender
• Murphy Music Press
• Biedenbender: Melodious Thunk
• Beidenbender: Cyclotron
• Abide With Me

Biography:

David Biedenbender (b. 1984, Waukesha, Wisconsin) is a composer, conductor, performer, educator, and interdisciplinary collaborator. David’s music has been described as “simply beautiful” [twincities.com], “striking” and “brilliantly crafted” [Times Argus] and is noted for its “rhythmic intensity” [NewMusicBox] and “stirring harmonies” [Boston Classical Review]. “Modern, venturesome, and inexorable…The excitement, intensity, and freshness that characterizes Biedenbender’s music hung in the [air] long after the last note was played” [Examiner.com]. He has written music for the concert stage as well as for dance and multimedia collaborations, and his work is often influenced by his diverse musical experiences in rock and jazz bands as an electric bassist, in wind, jazz, and New Orleans-style brass bands as a euphonium, bass trombone, and tuba player, and by his study of Indian Carnatic music. His present creative interests include working with everyone from classically trained musicians to improvisers, acoustic chamber music to large ensembles, and interactive electronic interfaces to live brain data.

David has had the privilege of collaborating with many renowned performers and ensembles, including Alarm Will Sound, the PRISM Saxophone Quartet, the Stenhammar String Quartet (Sweden), the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, the Aspen Contemporary Ensemble, the United States Navy Band, the Philharmonie Baden-Baden (Germany), VocalEssence, the Eastman Wind Ensemble, the Music from Copland House Ensemble, Detroit Symphony Orchestra bass trombonist Randall Hawes and pianist Kathryn Goodson, the Juventas New Music Ensemble, the Washington Kantorei, the Atlantic Chamber Ensemble, the Boston New Music Initiative, Ann Arbor Dance Works, Composer’s Inc. (San Francisco), and the Grand Valley State New Music Ensemble. dsc_3680Recent recognition for his work includes two ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Awards (2011, 2012) and the 2012 Suzanne and Lee Ettelson Composers Award. His music has been heard in many diverse venues, including Carnegie Hall, Gaudeamus Muziekweek/TivoliVredenberg (Netherlands), Symphony Space (New YorkCity), the Smithsonian Museum, the German Embassy (Washington, DC), the Antonín Dvořák Museum (Prague), the Old First Church (San Francisco), Harris Hall (Aspen Music Festival), the Interlochen Center for the Arts, Hill Auditorium (Ann Arbor, MI), the University of Michigan Museum of Art, as well as at numerous universities and conservatories, and it has been broadcast on NPR stations around the country, including on WNYC’s Soundcheck with John Schaefer and on Center Stage from Wolf Trap. David’s music can also be heard on many commercially available recordings, including recent albums by the U.S. Navy Band, Akropolis Reed Quintet, H2 Saxophone Quartet, Khemia Ensemble, PUBLIQuartet, and the North Texas Wind Symphony. Recent and upcoming commissions and projects include works for yMusic, the New York Virtuoso Singers, the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music, San Francisco Symphony principal trombonist Tim Higgins, the Albany (NY) Symphony Orchestra, the Edge Ensemble, the Donald Sinta Saxophone Quartet, the Akropolis Reed Quintet, Kevin Sedatole and the Michigan State University Wind Symphony, and pianist Jeannette Fang.

In addition to composing, David is a dedicated teacher. He is Assistant Professor of Composition in the College of Music at Michigan State University, and he previously taught composition and theory at Boise State University, Eastern Michigan University, Oakland University, Madonna University, the Music in the Mountains Conservatory, and the Interlochen Arts Camp. He has also taught an interdisciplinary course in creativity and collaboration in the Living Arts program at the University of Michigan. His composition students have achieved regional and national recognition for their creative work, including numerous awards and acceptance into renowned summer music festivals and undergraduate and graduate composition programs.

He received the Doctor of Musical Arts and Master of Music degrees in composition from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor and the Bachelor of Music degree in composition and theory from Central Michigan University. He has also studied at the Swedish Collegium for Advanced Study in Uppsala, Sweden with Anders Hillborg and Steven Stucky, the Aspen Music Festival and School with Syd Hodkinson, and in Mysore, India where he studied South Indian Carnatic music. His primary musical mentors include Stephen Rush, Evan Chambers, Kristin Kuster, Michael Daugherty, Bright Sheng, Erik Santos, Christopher Lees, David R. Gillingham, José Luis-Maurtúa, John Williamson, and Mark Cox.

Damien Crutcher is the founder of Crescendo Detroit and the conductor of the Farmington Community Band, Civic Concert Band, and the Detroit Community Concert Band. He joins the show to share the stories of the remarkable people in his life and the decisions to help make his home city of Detroit an even better better musical place.

Topics:

• Damien’s early story growing up in Detroit including going to the legendary Cass Technical High School and meeting a horn teacher that changed the course of his career.
• The story of why Damien decided to become a music teacher and how he ended up at Michigan State for his undergraduate.
• How an act of kindness from a graduate student at Michigan State helped Damien become a better conductor.
• Studying with H. Robert Reynolds at the University of Michigan and the lessons that he learned.
• How the decisions to not pursue a doctorate and to leave his high school job ultimately found the remarkable Crescendo Detroit.
• Damien’s ensembles.

Links:

• Damien Crutcher
• Crescendo Detroit
• Farmington Community Band
• Detroit Symphony Civic Youth Ensembles

Biography:

Damien Crutcher is a native Detroiter and a graduate of Cass Technical High School. He holds a Bachelor's Degree in Music Education from Michigan State University, and a Master’s in Conducting from The University of Michigan. Damien studied horn with Bryan Kennedy and Doug Campbell and Conducting with Dr. Ronnie Wooten and Profesor H. Robert Reynolds.

After graduating from The University of Michigan, Damien served as Director of Bands and Orchestra at Southfield-Lathrup High School. Under his direction the Southfield-Lathrup ensembles, including the Lathrup Symphony Band have performed in San Francisco, Chicago, the Bahamas, the White House and Carnegie Hall. Many of his students from Southfield Lathrup are currently professional musicians, music teachers and artists across the country.

He is currently the co founder and CEO of Crescendo Detroit. Crescendo Detroit is a nonprofit who’s mission is to transform the lives of school age children, ages 5-18, in Detroit, by engaging kids in intense instrumental music, vocal music and dance programs that promote artistic excellence and character building. It is the goal of Crescendo Detroit to create a neighborhood to college pipeline using the arts.

Damien is a frequent quest conductor and clinician throughout Michigan and Ohio and also serves as the conductor of the Farmington Community Band. Damien is in his third season as conductor of the Civic Concert Band and the Detroit Community Concert Band.

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Are you planning to travel with your group sometime soon? If so, please consider my sponsor, Kaleidoscope Adventures, a full service tour company specializing in student group travel. With a former educator as its CEO, Kaleidoscope Adventures is dedicated to changing student lives through travel and they offer high quality service and an attention to detail that comes from more than 25 years of student travel experience. Trust Kaleidoscope’s outstanding staff to focus on your group’s one-of-a-kind adventure, so that you can focus on everything else!

For this special episode, I recorded live from the New Jersey Music Educators Association Conference in Atlantic City. During the conference, I had the opportunity to speak with seven music teachers in the state and asked them about community. A special thank you to Kaleidoscope Adventures for making this possible.

Guests and Topics:

• Philip Aguglia of PaGu batons and a high school band director in Buffalo, New York talks about some of the ways he builds community in his program, leaving a footprint behind, and tells us about his batons.
• Larissa Skinner, a music teacher in the Passaic School District and a Ph.D. student in Urban Education at Rutgers University talks about some of the activities that she uses to help build community to help her students feel successful.
• David Taylor is a 28 year teacher at Northern Burlington Regional High School who joined me to talk about the community of our profession.
• Yale Snyder is the district percussion specialist and band director in the Monroe Township School District. He talked about building relationships that can last forever.
• Heidi Haderthauer teaches 6-12 band in New Milford, New Jersey. She talks about the three levels of community.
• Scott Visco teaches at Point Pleasant Borough High School. He talked about the importance of the high school band in a small town and how a quality program can become the artistic center of a community.
• Melissa Clark teaches 7-8 grade orchestra and 4-6 grade string players in the Lawrence Township Public Schools. She shared her experiences of living in the community where she teaches and how that helped her feel more connected to her students.

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Are you planning to travel with your group sometime soon? If so, please consider my sponsor, Kaleidoscope Adventures, a full service tour company specializing in student group travel. With a former educator as its CEO, Kaleidoscope Adventures is dedicated to changing student lives through travel and they offer high quality service and an attention to detail that comes from more than 25 years of student travel experience. Trust Kaleidoscope’s outstanding staff to focus on your group’s one-of-a-kind adventure, so that you can focus on everything else!

Robert W. Smith is a prolific composer, educator, and publisher. He joins the show to tell his stories, share some advice, and talk about copyright. If you want to know the importance of making connections, then this is the episode for you!

Topics:

• Robert’s background growing up in a military family and the story of an extraordinary piano teacher that had an indelible influence on Robert’s early music education.
• How music educators are keepers of knowledge for a long line of musicians that spans centuries.
• How Robert has come full circle from student to professor at the Troy University and the influences of John M. Long and Paul Yoder on his career, particularly on his decision to write for band.
• Robert’s first teaching job, his move to Tampa to teach at Pinellas Park and Clearwater High Schools, and of course Suncoast Sound.
• RWS Music Company, C.L. Barnhouse, music publishing, copyright law, and why we can’t legally copy parts for our kids.
• The advice Robert gave his daughters as they embarked upon their careers as music educators.

Links:

• Robert W. Smith
• RWS Music Company
• Suncoast Sound 1984
• Robert W. Smith: The Divine Comedy
• Robert W. Smith: The Tempest

Biography:

Robert W. Smith (b. 1958) is one of the most popular and prolific composers in America today. He has over 600 publications in print with the majority composed and arranged through his long association with Warner Bros. Publications and the Belwin catalog.

Mr. Smith’s credits include many compositions and productions in all areas of the music field. His original works for winds and percussion have been programmed by countless military, university, high school, and middle school bands throughout the United States, Canada, Europe, Australia, South America and Asia. His Symphony #1 (The Divine Comedy), Symphony #2 (The Odyssey), Symphony #3 (Don Quixote), Inchon and Africa: Ceremony, Song and Ritual have received worldwide critical acclaim. His educational compositions such as The Tempest, Encanto, and The Great Locomotive Chase have become standards for developing bands throughout the world.

Mr. Smith’s music has received extensive airplay on major network television as well as inclusion in multiple motion pictures. From professional ensembles such as the United States Navy Band, United States Air Force Band, Boston Pops and the Atlanta Symphony to school bands and orchestras throughout the world, his music speaks to audiences in any concert setting. As a conductor, clinician and keynote speaker, Mr. Smith has performed throughout North America, Asia, South America, Europe and Australia. His music has been recorded by various ensembles and is available on CD and download through iTunes, Amazon, and other recorded music outlets.

Mr. Smith is the President/CEO of RWS Music Company, exclusively distributed through C. L. Barnhouse. In addition, he is currently teaching in the Music Industry program at Troy University in Troy, Alabama. His teaching responsibilities are focused in music composition, production, publishing and business.

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Are you planning to travel with your group sometime soon? If so, please consider my sponsor, Kaleidoscope Adventures, a full service tour company specializing in student group travel. With a former educator as its CEO, Kaleidoscope Adventures is dedicated to changing student lives through travel and they offer high quality service and an attention to detail that comes from more than 25 years of student travel experience. Trust Kaleidoscope’s outstanding staff to focus on your group’s one-of-a-kind adventure, so that you can focus on everything else!

Amy Knopps is the Associate Director of Bands and the Director of Athletic Bands at the University of Missouri, Columbia. In this episode, Amy shares her story of growing up in the Kansas City area and how she found her way to her dream job as the director of the Marching Mizzou.

Topics:

• Amy’s background growing up in Lee’s Summit through her college experience as a student at the University of Missouri.
• Amy’s first job, the connections that made her first teaching job in Kansas City so special, and her first college teaching job at Eastern Michigan University.
• Some lessons that we can apply to our own teaching from her story.
• The Marching Mizzou, leadership, community, and the advantages of being the athletic band director at the flagship university of her native state.
• The challenges of being a female band athletic band director and words of encouragement for young female band directors.

Links:

• Amy Knopps
• The Marching Mizzou
• Grainger: Irish Tune from County Derry

Biography:

Amy M. Knopps is the Associate Director of Bands and Director of Athletic Bandsat the University of Missouri where she directs Marching Mizzou, Mini Mizzou, Symphonic Band, and teaches courses in the music education curriculum of the School of Music. Prior to her appointment in the fall of 2017, Dr. Knopps served for seven years as Associate Professor of Music, Associate Director of Bands, and Director of Athletic Bands in the School of Music and Dance at Eastern Michigan University. While at Eastern Michiganshe was a Faculty Spotlight Recipient, theEastern Michigan University Thank-A-Teacher InauguralRecipient, and featured in a historicexhibition titled, "In Her Shoes: Forging Paths at EMU" as she was the first woman to direct the Eastern Michigan University Marching Band and serve as Associate Director of Bands.

Dr. Knopps earneddegrees from The University of Georgia (DMA), the University of Kansas (MM), and the University of Missouri (BS, Ed.) where her principal conducting teachers were Dr. John P. Lynch and Dr. Dale J. Lonis. While at Georgia and Kansas she held conducting associate positions that involved conducting both concert and athletic bands as well as teaching courses in the music curriculum. During her time at TheUniversity of Georgia, Dr. Knopps received the Hugh Hodgson School of Music Director’s Excellence Award and at the University of Kansas she received the Russell L. Wiley Graduate Conducting Award.

Additional teaching experience includes numerous years as Director of Bands at Center High School and Center Middle School in her hometown of Kansas City, Missouri where she guided all aspects of the diverse and award winning band program. While in the Center School District, Dr. Knopps received the 2003Missouri Fine Arts Outstanding Teacher Award and the 2004You Make the Difference Award for her dedication and commitment to excellence in education. As an advocate for new wind music she solely commissioned and premiered Jonathan Newman’s1861for concert band in 2003and continues her commitment to contributing to the wind band repertoire through additional commissions for Symphonic Band at the University of Missouri.

Dr. Knopps continues to be an active conductor, clinician, and adjudicator across the United Statesand internationally having worked and performed throughout Asia, Australia, Canada, Europe, and South America. Each summer she servesas a clinician/instructor at the Smith-Walbridge Clinics held in Charleston, Illinois working with high school and college drum majors from across the country. Dr. Knoppsis also known for her published contributions as she has authored several articles forSchool Band and Orchestra Magazine, and has contributed to seven volumes of theTeaching Music Through Performance in Bandseries. In addition to her published articles she has completed extensive research on American-Sponsored overseas secondary band programs in the People’s Republic of China.

Dr. Knopps maintains professional affiliations with the College Band Directors National Association (CBDNA), currently serving on the CBDNA Athletic Bands Committee,World Association for Symphonic Bands and Ensembles (WASBE), the National Association for Music Education (NAfME), National Band Association (NBA), currently serving as the Missouri State Chair, Phi Beta Mu, Tau Beta Sigma,Kappa Kappa Psi, currently serving as the sponsor for the Eta Upsilon chapter, the Griffiths Leadership Society for Women, currentlyserving on the ExecutiveCommittee,and QEBH, the oldest of six secret honor societies at the University of Missouri.She currently resides in Columbia, Missouriwith her two cats Buddy and Rocky.

Mary Kate McNally is the Director of Athletic bands at Ohio Wesleyan University, a co-founder of the And We Were Heard project, and a tireless advocate for diversity, equity, and inclusion in the band community.

Topics:

• The band program at Ohio Wesleyan University, Mary Kate’s musical origin story, and a high school band director that had a tremendous influence on her career.
• Gender stereotypes in musical instruments and what we can do to help our boys feel comfortable with playing any instruments.
• Advice for working with transgender and nonbinary students and creating meaningful dialogues to best serve all of our communities.
• The Twin Bands of Kent State in the 1940s and being willing to learn from our mistakes and grow as music educators.
• Mary Kate’s experiences teaching in rural Eastern Colorado and some strategies for differentiating instruction when you have homogeneous students at different levels.
• A report on And We Were Heard a year after its founding.

Links:

• Ohio Wesleyan University
• And We Were Heard
• Ray Chapa’s Clarinet Gymnastics
• Holst: Second Suite in F

Biography:

Mary Kate McNally has been the Director of Athletic Bands at Ohio Wesleyan University since the fall of 2017. Under her leadership, the university's marching band performed in the fall of 2018 for the first time in almost six decades. Mary Kate earned her Bachelor of Music Education summa cum laude and with honors from Henderson State University in 2012 and her Master of Music in Wind Band Conducting from Kent State University in 2017. She was a public school teacher in Colorado for three years, where she was the K-12 music teacher for a small rural school district. She is an active member of the professional band directing community with memberships in the National Association for Music Education, the Ohio Music Education Association, and the College Band Directors National Assocation. She is also a board member for And We Were Heard, a digital recording project dedicated to promoting wind band works by underrepresented composers. Mary Kate is a self-professed crochet addict and lives with her hedgehog, Maestro.

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Are you planning to travel with your group sometime soon? If so, please consider my sponsor, Kaleidoscope Adventures, a full service tour company specializing in student group travel. With a former educator as its CEO, Kaleidoscope Adventures is dedicated to changing student lives through travel and they offer high quality service and an attention to detail that comes from more than 25 years of student travel experience. Trust Kaleidoscope’s outstanding staff to focus on your group’s one-of-a-kind adventure, so that you can focus on everything else!

Mary Kate McNally is the Director of Athletic bands at Ohio Wesleyan University, a co-founder of the And We Were Heard project, and a tireless advocate for diversity, equity, and inclusion in the band community.

Topics:

• The band program at Ohio Wesleyan University, Mary Kate’s musical origin story, and a high school band director that had a tremendous influence on her career.
• Gender stereotypes in musical instruments and what we can do to help our boys feel comfortable with playing any instruments.
• Advice for working with transgender and nonbinary students and creating meaningful dialogues to best serve all of our communities.
• The Twin Bands of Kent State in the 1940s and being willing to learn from our mistakes and grow as music educators.
• Mary Kate’s experiences teaching in rural Eastern Colorado and some strategies for differentiating instruction when you have homogeneous students at different levels.
• A report on And We Were Heard a year after its founding.

Links:

• Ohio Wesleyan University
• And We Were Heard
• Ray Chapa’s Clarinet Gymnastics
• Holst: Second Suite in F

Biography:

Mary Kate McNally has been the Director of Athletic Bands at Ohio Wesleyan University since the fall of 2017. Under her leadership, the university's marching band performed in the fall of 2018 for the first time in almost six decades. Mary Kate earned her Bachelor of Music Education summa cum laude and with honors from Henderson State University in 2012 and her Master of Music in Wind Band Conducting from Kent State University in 2017. She was a public school teacher in Colorado for three years, where she was the K-12 music teacher for a small rural school district. She is an active member of the professional band directing community with memberships in the National Association for Music Education, the Ohio Music Education Association, and the College Band Directors National Assocation. She is also a board member for And We Were Heard, a digital recording project dedicated to promoting wind band works by underrepresented composers. Mary Kate is a self-professed crochet addict and lives with her hedgehog, Maestro.

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Are you planning to travel with your group sometime soon? If so, please consider my sponsor, Kaleidoscope Adventures, a full service tour company specializing in student group travel. With a former educator as its CEO, Kaleidoscope Adventures is dedicated to changing student lives through travel and they offer high quality service and an attention to detail that comes from more than 25 years of student travel experience. Trust Kaleidoscope’s outstanding staff to focus on your group’s one-of-a-kind adventure, so that you can focus on everything else!

Larry Neeck has written or arranged over 150 works for C.L. Barnhouse and is now retired after a 32 year career as a middle school band director in Rochester, New York.

Topics:

• Larry’s musical background growing up in Pennsylvania and how he passed on a chance to be a varsity quarterback to instead play bells in the band.
• Larry’s journey from cocktail hour pianist to middle school band director in Rochester, New York.
• The story of how Larry got his start as a composer writing jazz charts for his own students and some advice for composers about getting their music played.
• Advice and perspectives on teaching middle school including some excellent advice about being yourself in your classroom.
• The challenges of changing from a 7-9 junior high school to a 6-8 middle school.

Links:

• Silvestri: Back to the Future Theme
• Bernstein: Symphonic Dances from West Side Story
• Neeck: Glacier Express (performed by the Rochester New Horizons Band)

Biography:

Larry Neeck is an internationally recognized composer, with more than one-hundred fifty works for concert band, jazz ensemble, and orchestra published by C.L. Barnhouse Company and Arco String Publications. He is frequently commissioned to write for schools, bands, and festivals, and often works as a guest conductor and clinician.His CDs, “Swing Machine,” recorded by the Studio A Big Band, and “Midnight Escape,” recorded by the Washington Winds are available from Walking Frog Records. His music has been heard on PBS television, andhe has received numerous ASCAP awards for his compositions.


In addition to his work as a composer, Mr. Neeck had a successful career as a middle school band director, retiring after thirty-two years from the Webster (NY) Central School District. He directed concert bands, jazz ensembles, taught wind and percussion classes, and co-founded the Willink Middle School Student/Parent Band, now in its twenty-fifth season.The years he spent as a school band director have informed his composing style, resulting in works that engage students and audiences alike.


Mr. Neeck holds a B.A. in Music from the University of Pittsburgh, and an M.M. in Music Education from the Eastman School of Music. He is a member of the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP), National Association for Music Education (NAfME), New York State School Music Association (NYSSMA), and the New York State Band Directors Association (NYSBDA).

Larry Neeck has written or arranged over 150 works for C.L. Barnhouse and is now retired after a 32 year career as a middle school band director in Rochester, New York.

Topics:

• Larry’s musical background growing up in Pennsylvania and how he passed on a chance to be a varsity quarterback to instead play bells in the band.
• Larry’s journey from cocktail hour pianist to middle school band director in Rochester, New York.
• The story of how Larry got his start as a composer writing jazz charts for his own students and some advice for composers about getting their music played.
• Advice and perspectives on teaching middle school including some excellent advice about being yourself in your classroom.
• The challenges of changing from a 7-9 junior high school to a 6-8 middle school.

Links:

• Silvestri: Back to the Future Theme
• Bernstein: Symphonic Dances from West Side Story
• Neeck: Glacier Express (performed by the Rochester New Horizons Band)

Biography:

Larry Neeck is an internationally recognized composer, with more than one-hundred fifty works for concert band, jazz ensemble, and orchestra published by C.L. Barnhouse Company and Arco String Publications. He is frequently commissioned to write for schools, bands, and festivals, and often works as a guest conductor and clinician.His CDs, “Swing Machine,” recorded by the Studio A Big Band, and “Midnight Escape,” recorded by the Washington Winds are available from Walking Frog Records. His music has been heard on PBS television, andhe has received numerous ASCAP awards for his compositions.


In addition to his work as a composer, Mr. Neeck had a successful career as a middle school band director, retiring after thirty-two years from the Webster (NY) Central School District. He directed concert bands, jazz ensembles, taught wind and percussion classes, and co-founded the Willink Middle School Student/Parent Band, now in its twenty-fifth season.The years he spent as a school band director have informed his composing style, resulting in works that engage students and audiences alike.


Mr. Neeck holds a B.A. in Music from the University of Pittsburgh, and an M.M. in Music Education from the Eastman School of Music. He is a member of the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP), National Association for Music Education (NAfME), New York State School Music Association (NYSSMA), and the New York State Band Directors Association (NYSBDA).