Southeastern Louisiana University

Students fine tune music skills at Southeastern Music Festival

Contact: Christina Chapple

7/27/06

Captions ...
(1) GUITAR GIRLS – Southeastern Louisiana University guitar instructor Patrick Kerber, left works with Becky Mannino, an eighth grader at Holy Ghost School in Hammond, center, and Hilary Carter, a Mandeville High School ninth grader, during the university’s annual Summer Music Festival.

     HAMMOND – More than 80 students from Baton Rouge to Slidell fine tuned their music skills this summer at the Southeastern Louisiana University Community Music Schools's Southeastern Music Festival, July 10-21.

     “This was our highest enrollment ever,” said Kenneth Boulton, director of the university’s Community Music School, the camp’s sponsor.

     Now in its 13th year, the festival offers instruction on all orchestral and band instruments, piano, voice, and guitar, all styles. Young musicians ages 8-17 receive private lessons, masterclasses, chamber music studies, and theory classes. They also perform in large ensembles and on stage in nightly concerts for parents and the public. 

     “We had terrific enrollment for every instrument,” Boulton said. “No one instrument was more popular than another. We seek to be everything to everyone.”

     Boulton said an enrollment-boosting factor of this year’s festival was the 15 performance scholarships offered to musically advanced high school students. Students were awarded scholarships averaging $100 after being nominated by their high school band directors or private teachers and submitting audition tapes. The festival also continued its partnership with the area physician Ted Hudspeth’s Northshore Endowment for the Arts, which provides financial need scholarships, Boulton said.

     To accommodate the larger number of music campers, the festival also boosted the number of its faculty. Students follow individual curricula designed around their choice of primary and secondary instruments.

     “I love music so much,” said Holy Ghost School eighth grader Becky Mannino, pausing during a guitar lesson with Patrick Kerber, instructor in the Southeastern Department of Music and Dramatic Arts guitar program. “Dr. Kerber was a great teacher. I’m ready to come back next year,” she said.

     A guitar student for two years, Mandeville High School ninth grader Hilary Carter admitted that her participaton in the Southeastern Music Festival was her mom’s idea – originally.

     “Yes, my mom made me,” she laughed, “but it has really been fun. I’ve already learned a new song.”

     Boulton said the Summer Music Festival is a great way to introduce students to the Community Music School, which offers individual music lessons throughout the year at the Pottle Music Building and Southeastern’s St. Tammany Center in Mandeville. The program will soon expand into new facilities at the Livingston Literacy and Technology Center in Walker.

     For additional information about the Community Music School, visit http://www.selu.edu/cms or call 985-549-5502