Wisconsin State Journal: The Resonance program not only teaches middle and high school students how to compose music, but also how to recruit musicians and arrange and direct rehearsals to premiere the students’ work before a community audience.
The Resonance 2018 concert on Saturday at the Sun Prairie Performing Arts Center was the final component of the music composition program created and taught by Jon Nelson and William Smith.
“I knew nothing about composing when I walked in the first day. I got all the way to here somehow,” said Ryan Sellek, a freshman at Cardinal Heights Upper Middle School, before the concert. “I’ve had a lot of fun building up everything I know from the ground up.”
Sellek premiered his composition, which was a quartet for piano and percussionists. The other students and their compositions were Jacob Couch, junior at Sun Prairie High School, sonata for cello and piano; Hans Fuerst, senior at Waunakee High School, string quartet and tuba; Miles Gleason, sixth-grader at Patrick Marsh Middle School, chorale for brass ensemble performed by Sun Prairie’s music faculty in the district; and Isaac Meyer, sophomore at Sun Prairie High School, brass ensemble with piano.
Read the complete article on the Sun Prairie student music compositions.