Band Directors
Jeff Heid is the Head Band Director at Muscatine High School in Muscatine, Iowa. He speaks here about rebuilding a program, that was once numbering in the two-hundreds, by focusing on retention and offering options to students.
Charles Staley is the Fine Arts Chair at Neuqua Valley High School in Naperville, Illinois. He speaks about growing as an educator and the importance of placing students first to provide for successful music-making and education.
Frank Lestina has taught for eleven years at Vernon Hills High School in Vernon Hills, Illinois. He speaks here about attracting and retaining students and about the importance of visibility to incoming middle school students.
John Espy teaches at Milford Exempted Village Schools in Milford, Ohio, where he teaches music at the elementary, middle, and high school levels. Here, he speaks about transitions into middle and high school music programs and about how to retain students by continually seeking and showing the...
Barbara Siler is the Assistant Director of Bands at Bellbrook-Sugarcreek Schools, a small but growing school system. She teaches grades six through twelve. At the beginning of her career, she served as a long-term substitute teacher. Here, she talks about the interview process for music educators...
Don Banks was a band director who felt he could have more of an impact on music makers by providing them with quality instruments. In 1967 he opened Don Banks Music in Tampa, Florida to serve the local school bands. Over the years he expanded the store to include a full line of product offerings...
Mitchel Banks has been working in the music store his father established as far back as he can remember. After serving as a band director, Don Banks formed his retail store in Tampa in 1967. Mitchel worked side by side with his father and took an active role in band instrument repair as well as...
John F. Edmunds began arranging music as a high school student, when he found that commercially available arrangements were not suitable for his band of non-standard instrumentation. After college and a stint as a US Navy bandsman, John became a college professor, first as assistant director of...
Ronnie Drumm has had a full and fulfilling life in music! As a child he picked up the trumpet, which he used during his time as a big band leader, musical director and educator. Ronnie worked with a who’s who of entertainers such as Steve Allen, Bob Hope and Jack Benny as well as a long stint as...
Enrico Weller is a historian of the musical traditions of Markneukirken Germany. In fact, Dr. Weller wrote an informative volume outlining the many important contributions and innovations by the music industry located in Markneukirken. The book is called “Der Blasinstrumentenbau im Vogtland von den...