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Margaret E. Reidy,
Musical Director
Margaret E. Reidy is the current director of bands at
Minnechaug Regional High School in Wilbraham, Massachusetts. Since
arriving at Minnechaug in 1991 she has increased the enrollment of the
high school band from 68 members to 180. Over the 2002-2003 school year
band students from Minnechaug were selected to participate in the
Massachusetts Western District Senior Music Festival, the Massachusetts
All-State Music Festival, the Plymouth State College All-New England
Honor Band, and the National Wind Ensemble. The concert band, symphonic
band and honors wind ensemble from Minnechaug all traveled to Virginia
to participate in the nationally known Dixie Classic Music Festival
where the groups received ratings of both excellent and superior, and
the wind ensemble has been invited to this year’s national championship.
In addition to these bands Ms. Reidy also directs two after-school jazz
ensembles featured in the annual MRHS Jazz Showcase (in its 11th year,
founded by Ms. Reidy) as well as a flute choir, percussion ensemble and
holiday brass ensemble. The Minnechaug bands have recorded an average of
3 CDs per year since 1998, have been featured on the local WGGB
television station and are often invited to perform for ceremonies in
the greater Springfield area. Ms. Reidy has done the stage and musical
direction for three musicals at the high school including, “Leader of
The Pack”, “Once Upon A Mattress” and “Little Shop of Horrors” and has
directed adult community theater as well. Currently Margaret is hard at
work with a committee to bring a marching band program to Minnechaug!
As a horn player Margaret has played principal horn in the
Metropolitan Wind Symphony of Boston, been a member of the Massachusetts
Wind Orchestra and a founding member of the Quabbin Woodwind Quintet.
Among Margaret’s fondest memories as a music student herself in high
school, she lists conducting her high school select choir at the state
ACDA competition during her director’s maternity leave (Thanks Mrs.
Black!!!) playing her horn in festivals under such great directors as
Walter Chesnut, Larry Livingston, Max Culpepper, Benjamin Zander, and
Dr. William Rovelli, and traveling to The Netherlands with the Quabbin
Community Band as part of a musical exchange with the BATO band from
Haarlem, Holland.
For the past eighteen years Margaret has been very active in
administrative roles on the state and district levels acting as ensemble
manager, festival coordinator and adjudicator for a number of events
including the Massachusetts All-State Band and the Great East Music
Festivals. A member of MENC, The National Bandmasters Association and
immediate past-president of the Quabbin Valley Music Educators
Association, Margaret recently completed writing the music curriculum
component to a teachers guide for the widely acclaimed PBS series,
“Martin Scorsese presents: The Blues”. The guide includes lessons for
music, english and social studies classes and has been distributed to
75,000 school districts across the nation. A graduate of Northern
Illinois University, Ms. Reidy was named last June as the 2003 Western
Massachusetts Music Educator of the Year.
Copied from the United Stated Youth Ensemble Site
with permission
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