North Carolina Music Educator Winter 2023

Middle School Choral
Emily Turner, Chair
Across the Districts
I’m so grateful to the middle school choral membership
for electing me as chairperson and entrusting me with this
important role. I would like to take a moment to thank our
outgoing chairperson, Carla Reid, for her leadership over the
past two years, particularly with all the changes the pandemic
presented us during her term.
Her leadership and calm demeanor allowed us all to focus on
the elements of teaching that we were able to control. She stayed
up to date with the latest research, informing us all so that we
could be the best possible teachers for our students. I’m thankful
to have such a wonderful resource in our past chair position.
For those who may not know me, my name is Emily
Turner and I am the vocal music director at Cary Academy, an
independent school in Cary. I teach choral music to grades six
through twelve, and prior to teaching at Cary Academy, worked
for nine years in Wake County Public high schools.
I am also the associate artistic director of the newly renamed
Raleigh Youth Choir. I believe my experience in public, private,
and community settings, as well as my experience with both
middle and high school choral students, will provide a unique
perspective that can help find commonalities to bridge the middle
and high school choral programs in our state. I have served
the NCMEA Middle School Choral board since 2016, first as
secretary, then as chair-elect.
As we start back to the routines of rehearsals and
performances this new year, I want to encourage you to take part
in the student activities available to us this year, which are full
of valuable musical experiences for you and your students. Each
event provides lasting memories that will continue to build and
strengthen your relationships and will encourage student bonding
that is so needed in your ensembles.
I hope you are already poring through your repertoire to find
your two contrasting pieces for Music Performance Adjudication
(MPA). Remember, each group you take to MPA will be required
to participate in sight reading, but don’t let that scare you! You
can choose the sight reading level that works best for your
ensembles, regardless of their experience. You and your students
will grow tremendously by going through the process of preparing
for, and participating in, MPA. The calendar of MPA dates for the
entire state can be found on the MS Choral page of the NCMEA
website under Student Events.
Please be aware of the March 1 deadline for All-State student
registration. All-State will be held at the Greensboro Coliseum on
April 14 – 15. Our clinicians this year are Alex Gartner, Dr. Eric
Johnson, and Dr. Bridget Sweet. Our general meeting will be held
on Friday evening, when we will announce the Honors Chorus
audition piece for 2023. All All-State questions should go to our
coordinator, Angel Rudd, at middleschoolallstate@gmail.com.
I’m looking forward to spending the next two years as
your chairperson. Please feel free to reach out to me with any
questions, comments, or thoughts at mschoral_chair@ncmea.net.
District 2
Welcome from District 2, which includes counties in
the Southeastern part of our wonderful state. I’m Bob
Norem, the current District 2 president. I’m currently
in my 27 th year of teaching, 21 of those being at Topsail Middle
School in Hampstead.
I hope those who came to our annual conference in November
came back to school refreshed and recharged. It was inspiring
hearing the music of Randall Standridge, Omar Thomas, uplifting
keynotes from Dr. Peter
Boonshaft and attending the
wonderful performances and
informances. Thanks goes out
to David Stroud, band director
of Newport Middle School,
who brought his beginning
sixth grade band to conference
and took them through a
typical rehearsal. I also hope
all the countless performances
throughout your first semester
and holiday season went well.
The 2022 – 2023 year is, for
many of us, our first “normal”
year since 2017. In the past five
years many of us dealt with
Hurricane Florence and then
surviving the “P” word which
changed our lives, and our
students lives forever. School
bands, orchestras and choruses were decimated during the
pandemic and we’re building back.
Our programs were destroyed by the pandemic, but we’re
finally able to start rebuilding them.
Many of us are just beginning to see the numbers in our
programs rise back to pre-pandemic levels and are optimistic that
trend will continue. This fall, we saw this new normal in action
through many concerts and events. In the Orchestra world, we saw
the New Hanover All-County Orchestra’s clinic and performance.
In the band world, many marching band competitions took place
including those at Havelock, White Oak, Northside, Greene
Central, and Topsail high schools. Many wonderful Veteran’s Day
performances were held such as Laura Black’s students’ program at
Rocky Point Elementary.
Southeastern North Carolina is also full of many extracurricular
ensembles our students can perform in. Just in the
Wilmington area we have several choral groups: The Girl’s Choir
of Wilmington, Sandy Errante, director; Wilmington Boys Choir,
Ronnie Wise, director; UNCW-CMA Chorus, Wendi Kittlaus,
director; and the Coastal Community Youth Choir, Amanda
Allred and Bethany Borden, directors.
In the Instrumental
World, we have the following
ensembles: Carteret Collective,
Andy Wright, Mike Self, David
Stroud, Jason Robison, directors;
The Wilmington Symphony
Orchestra Junior Strings, Lisa
Gattuso, director; and the
Wilmington Symphony Youth
Orchestra, Linda Estep, director.
If you have students interested
in any of these ensembles, send
me a message and I can send you
their contact information.
I hope your programs
continue to grow during this
second half of the school year.
Good luck to all those working
on music for your annual Music
Performance Adjudications,
students performing in the Southeastern and Eastern District
All-District Bands clinics, Eastern Region Orchestras and the
countless All-County ensembles throughout the district. Music is
indeed alive and well in Southeastern North Carolina!
Bob Norem
District 2 President
District2@ncmea.net
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