Merry Tuba Christmas

Sponsored by For A Song & A Story, the 7th annual Clinton County MERRY TUBACHRISTMAS was held in conjunction with “Wilmington's Hometown HoliDazzle". It was held November 28th and was held at the Historic Murphy Theater in downtown Wilmington, Ohio.

Director for the second year was Gary Tirey. Professor Gary Tirey is nationally recognized as the Director of Instrumental Music and tuba professor at Otterbein College where he has served for over 35 years. A native of Anna, Ohio, he is an alumnus of both Capital University and VanderCook College of Music. In 1990 Tirey was named an honorary alumnus of Otterbein. He is an active member of the Columbus Federation of Musicians, the Ohio Music Educators Association (OMEA) and the Music Educators National Conference (MENC). Mr. Tirey has held several leadership positions in OMEA, and has served as regional student advisor to MENC. He is currently president of Phi Beta Mu, an honorary fraternity for band directors. In 1982, he was named by former Governor James Rhodes as chairman of "Merry TubaChristmas Columbus". An original member of the Brass Band of Columbus, Tirey also has performed with the Columbus Symphony and faculty brass quintets. Currently he is a member of the TubaShop Quartet, a professional tuba quartet which features Harvey Phillips. Similar plans are being made for Clinton County’s 8th Merry TubaChristmas, scheduled for the Saturday after Thanksgiving, on November 27, 2010.  www.tubachristmas.com

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Junior Music Experience (JME)

Clinton County’s first JME event was held at For A Song & A Story on April 24th, 2010.  Three piano instructors and their 17 students participated in the event.   

The JME program is for young people in the Cincinnati, Ohio and Northern Kentucky area. Established in 1982, the program is designed to encourage young piano students to continue their studies and to reward them for their efforts.

Not a "contest," JME enables even young, beginning piano students to participate in student-friendly evaluations in a one-on-one environment with a piano teacher like their own. Junior Music Experience welcomes all Greater Cincinnati area piano teachers to enter their students in a JM Evaluation. There are no membership dues, however, to maintain the high quality of JME Evaluations participating teachers are required to judge one half day twice a year or all day once yearly.

Junior Music Experience Evaluations are held in April and November each year. The next JME Evaluations are scheduled for November 20, 2010. The registration fee per student is $25. Entries must be submitted by participating teachers. 

Evaluations last approximately 15 minutes. Participants are evaluated on musical criteria appropriate to the curricular format of their lessons: how well they play and - according to the student's experience - including timing, dynamics, accuracy and fingering. Students are not judged on the style of music they play. The Directors believe that all forms of music should be encouraged - classical, popular, religious, country, rock, jazz and so on. Students receive a written evaluation in each of the competency areas with appropriate comments from the judge, who also awards an over-all score of one to five points. Each participant will also receive a ribbon representing their point total as well as a personalized certificate.

For additional information, or to be put on the JME mailing list to enter students, please visit the JME website-- www.jmex.org --or call 513.683.1766.

Brown Bag Lunches

Join us at The Brown Bag lunches, sponsored by Main Street Wilmington
(www.mainstreetwilmington.com) Held in the Lobby at The Murphy Theater during June & July and the first two weeks in August, from 11:30 to 1:00pm. Free! Bring your lunch and enjoy the music by local musicians!

2010 Brown Bag Lunch - Entertainer Schedule:
June 3rd	Celtic	Hitchhikers
June 10th	Guitar	Abby Williams
June 17th	Cello & Violin	Viva La Strings
June 24th	Guitar Trio	Running Out of Time
July 1st	Song & Dance	Main Street Swing & Murphy Spotlight Singers
July 8th	Guitar	George Carrington
July 15th	Oldies	The Murphy Basement Band
July 22nd	Keyboard	Barbara Dennis
July 29th	Guitar	Phil Ray
August 5th	Jazz Combo	So What!
August 12th	Women's Barbershop	Mosaic