Collaborative Co-Directors Cultivate Community for MPS Biennial Music Festival
By Meaghan Heinrich
WMEA Southeast Vice President
For two nights every alternating spring, thousands of people from across the city of Milwaukee fill the UWM Panther Arena for a concert that truly defines community: The Milwaukee Public Schools Biennial Music Festival. This year, the 51st festival will take place on May 6 and 7. The event is free and open to the public, and brings together 3500 students in grades 3-12 from 75 schools to perform as part of districtwide choral and instrumental ensembles. The Overture Orchestra and Overture Band feature players new to their instrument, and the Overture Choir is open to all MPS 4th and 5th graders. The Festival Orchestra, Band and Choir offer more challenging repertoire for middle school students, while in the Honors Orchestra, Band and Choir top high school musicians join together, inspiring the younger players. The festival also features a districtwide Modern Band and World Drumming Ensemble. Each ensemble is co-directed by two MPS Music Educators, nominated by their colleagues. Before a mass trumpet fanfare begins the concert, MPS student compositions can be heard in the arena, and small groups of piano and harp students perform in the lobby.
I am incredibly excited to co-direct the Overture Choir for the second time – two years ago, leading nearly 1,000 4th and 5th graders each night in Harry Belafonte’s Turn the World Around was pretty much the highlight of my musical life. But I’m also especially honored to work alongside a phenomenal team of fellow music educators, each one bringing their own superpower to the mix. At our own schools, we’re so often the ONE in control all the time, so leading a large ensemble in collaboration with another person can be a tricky balance. I interviewed several of my fellow directors to find out more about how they work together – and as you’ll see, they fully embrace and embody the spirit of collaboration!
What do you enjoy most about being an ensemble director for the MPS Biennial Festival?
OVERTURE ORCHESTRA
Gretchen Leanna: I love seeing students from all the different schools come together and make music. I love seeing them support and help each other. We have a unique ensemble because it includes students from elementary school through high school, so seeing the older students encouraging and supporting the younger students is really heartwarming. I also really cherish hearing the pieces improve from week to week and seeing students’ confidence grow as they become more comfortable. Since this is my third time being an Overture Orchestra Director, it’s also been a real pleasure to see kids again and have that trust and respect already built. Knowing that students feel comfortable asking questions, voicing concerns, and can play their best – no matter where they are at – makes me really proud.
OVERTURE BAND
Roman Jagodzinski: Being an alumnus of Milwaukee Public Schools and growing up and participating in the Biennial Festival, it is a full circle moment to be an ensemble director to a festival in which I participated multiple times as a student.
Katie Topp: I enjoy getting to work with motivated student musicians who want to represent MPS music.
FESTIVAL CHOIR
Lauren Schell: I have really enjoyed getting students from across the district together. It is awesome to see the amount of passion for music from all over our great city of Milwaukee! It’s been a delight to have them all together and see all the work the students and music educators have put into making this event happen.
FESTIVAL BAND
Jennifer Neumann: It is great to be a part of an honored tradition in Milwaukee! I love meeting new students from all over the city and having fun making music with them.
Emily Reinholz: Being part of a city-wide musical event where we celebrate the amazing music our students make in this city.
HONORS ORCHESTRA
Ben Titus: I like the chance to work with a larger ensemble since it’s a different sound and texture from what I’m used to. It’s cool to see how other students are progressing and see how the learning process works from their respective schools through working with them.
MODERN BAND
Sean Koga: I like to see how well other directors are teaching the music. When I see students from other schools sound so good, it’s very cool.
WORLD DRUMMING
Bony Plog-Benavides: What I enjoy the most about being a director for Biennial Festival is the opportunity to present rhythms and styles from other cultures as the students involved in the World Drumming Ensemble do. Also, to give students the opportunity to experience this great festival. It’s an experience that they will remember for the rest of their lives. Even when they get nervous, they really enjoy it and make the most of this experience.
What repertoire did you choose for your ensemble and why?
OVERTURE ORCHESTRA
Gretchen Leanna: The pieces for Overture Orchestra are Ambition by Stephen Spottswood and Welcome To San Juan by Dion Morales. We picked the pieces based on accessibility for the students and how engaging the pieces are. We also were very intent on picking music that reflected the diversity of our students and are very excited to have music that so beautifully connects to so many of our young musicians.
OVERTURE BAND
Roman Jagodzinski and Katie Topp: We chose Tambora for the wide variety of opportunities to have students be fully engaged in the repertoire. Tambora involves body percussion elements, which we found to be great with engaging our students in the ensemble. It’s kind of a tradition for bands to play marches, and Troll March is a fun, accessible march for beginners where each instrument group gets featured at some point. As for The Locomotion, we figured it was also important to give our beginning students something challenging to work on, and what a better way to challenge them with a piece in E-flat major! We also found the importance of finding music from other types of genres, steering away from the typical “concert band” repertoire out there.
FESTIVAL CHOIR
Lauren Schell: We chose Climb Higher by Pinkzebra and Rhapsody by Rollo Dilworth. We wanted to pick pieces with contrasting styles that we felt the students could connect to and enjoy singing. We also wanted to make sure one of the pieces was off of the WSMA solo & ensemble list.
FESTIVAL BAND
Jennifer Neumann: I chose The Great Locomotive Chase because it’s a “you have to play it once” classic with so many great color parts, voices, expressive lines, and a great story behind it. This piece is also really full circle for me. I was debating quitting band at the end of middle school, but I got along with my high school director and I heard the older band play this piece. I was SOLD. I credit this piece to keeping me in music and giving me the career I have today.
Emily Reinholz: I chose the other two pieces. One is a funkier piece by JaRod Hall with relevance to today. It’s got funky rhythms, minor licks, and really plays on the feelings we can get when things feel hopeless/dark, yet we still find that light. Darklands March by Randall Standridge is just fun. Stately, catchy, up-tempo, minor, and all of the magic that Mr. Standridge brings to concert band literature.
HONORS ORCHESTRA
Ben Titus: We chose pieces that would either be familiar (Also Sprach Zarathustra has been in 3000 commercials, and Jupiter- Bringer of Jollity has been popularized through Bluey) or just cool sounding (Gravitas has echoes of The Dark Knight throughout) so that kids and audiences alike would get hooked.
MODERN BAND
Sean Koga: Sean Lennon and I chose a variety of different pop/rock artists that vary in style, lyrics content, and difficulty to blend 6-12th grade students together.
WORLD DRUMMING
Bony Plog-Benavides: We are performing two rhythms from Bahia, Brazil called Samba Reggae Avenida, which is a traditional style from this region of Brazil, and Batidao, a fun arrangement by my mentor Marcus Santos that combines Hip Hop grooves with Afro-Brazilian.
How are you and your co-director working together through the planning and rehearsal process to provide the best possible experience for the students?
OVERTURE ORCHESTRA
Gretchen Leanna: Patrick (Wade) and I were at UWM at the same time, so we’ve known each other for a long time and are having a great time working together. We met a couple of times before rehearsals started to make musical decisions and plan out rehearsals, and we touch base before every rehearsal to go over the lesson plan and just make sure we’re on the same page.
OVERTURE BAND
Roman Jagodzinski and Katie Topp: The first thing we did was try to pick music that would be enjoyable for our musicians as well as push them to grow a little bit. We did a lot of planning over winter break, set a template for rehearsals, integrated some games into rehearsal, and planned some sectional rehearsals to give students more personalized feedback.
FESTIVAL CHOIR
Lauren Schell: My co-director and I have been meeting and planning since last spring. Along every step of the process from selecting music, to analyzing scores, to planning rehearsals, we have been focused on how to give the students of MPS a challenging AND fun experience. We have tried to be intentional about what will bring the students together as one ensemble and feel pride in their performance.
FESTIVAL BAND
Jennifer Neumann: I am so lucky to work with Mrs. Reinholz. We have always been great collaborators and friends, even before coming to MPS! We plan our rehearsals together and try to give each other equal time. We aren’t offended when the other chimes in during one of the other’s pieces to give feedback. We value each other’s knowledge and expertise and it results in a better experience for the students! I keep telling my students at Golda how lucky they are to work with Mrs. Reinholz, and I know she does the same at Burdick. It makes our students feel comfortable, knowing that their directors get along and cheer for each other!
Emily Reinholz: We collaboratively plan before rehearsal and share/create slides. I think that the best part of our particular group is that Mrs. Neumann and I make great co-teachers. We are both constantly assisting each other, fixing problems, chiming in, giving conducting feedback, joking around, and I feel that we really click in a way that keeps the directorship collaborative. Nothing ever feels punitive and it always feels creative.
MODERN BAND
Sean Koga: All of the modern band directors have been collaborating via email and text to cover content questions. We speak to each other as much as possible during rehearsals or anytime we see each other.
WORLD DRUMMING
Bony Plog-Benavides: Since it’s a smaller ensemble, I’m the only director. I have worked with the Biennial planning team to make sure our students are ready and set to go with their rehearsals at school and at the arena. The World Drumming Ensemble always brings the energy up in the audience. They love the groovy rhythms, the dance moves, and the visuals.
Participants:
Gretchen Leanna, MPS Traveling Strings Teacher
Roman Jagodzinski, Walt Whitman School
Katie Topp, IDEAL School
Lauren Schell, Milwaukee Parkside School
Jennifer Neumann, Golda Meir School
Emily Reinholz, A.E. Burdick School
Ben Titus, Milwaukee School of Languages
Sean Koga, River Trail School
Bony Plog-Benavides, MPS Traveling Percussion Teacher
51st MPS Biennial Music Festival
May 6 and 7, 6:30 p.m.
UWM Panther Arena, Milwaukee WI
Free and open to the public
More Info…
