50 state string orchestra project

MICHAEL MCNAMARA + RIDGEFIELD HIGH SCHOOL

ridgefield, connecticut


The Ridgefield High School Symphonic Orchestra is a nationally award winning, select group that performs collegiate and professional level repertoire.  It is open to all string playing students in grades 10-12 who have participated in Concert Orchestra and passed an audition process. The focus of this class is for students to play advanced orchestral literature and be exposed to some of the iconic works from the most famous composers. It is a curricular course and meets as part of a student's normal schedule.  

The orchestra performs at the winter and spring concerts, festivals, and throughout the community.  It rehearses in class as just strings.  On a few evenings per concert cycle, the orchestra combines with Symphonic Winds to create a full orchestra.  

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Michael McNamara, known to his students as "Mr. Mac" or even just "Mac" began his career as a musician at the age of 15 years old.  He taught himself to play the guitar from books and learning songs by ear throughout high school, then double majored in Accountancy and Jazz Guitar Performance Providence College, graduating in 2000. Returning to school in 2002, Mr. Mac took the necessary credits to become a certified teacher and received another bachelor's degree in Music Education from Providence College in 2004.  He taught full time guitar lessons for 5 years from 2000-2005 during this time and also taught general music at a K-8 private school in Barrington, RI. Several of his students went on to become music majors. Mr. Mac was first very active as a performer in his home state, playing in a variety of rock and blues bands and maintaining a guitar studio of 55 students.  

In 2006, Mr. Mac began working at East Ridge and Scotts Ridge Middle Schools as the middle school orchestra director.  There he founded the district wide Symphonic Orchestra, which began winning awards since its inception in 2009.   In 2008, Mr. Mac joined the board of directors for the Western Connecticut Youth Orchestra, serving as interim president and then president from 2009-2011.  He resigned from the board just prior to the birth of his daughter.  In 2013, Mr. Mac earned his Masters Degree in Music Education from Western Connecticut State University. In 2019, Mr. Mac earned his administrator’s certificate at Sacred Heart University and then his sixth year second master’s degree in Educational Leadership in the spring.

After 6 years at the middle schools, in fall of 2012 Mr. Mac moved to Ridgefield High School where he directed the Symphonic Orchestra, Concert Band and its sister classes Percussion and Jazz Band ensembles.  Currently, Mr. Mac only teaches orchestra courses.  At the time he came to RHS, the orchestra had not been a full symphonic orchestra with winds in over 20 years.  Their inaugural concert under Mr. Mac's direction included a performance of the entire Symphony No. 5 by Beethoven, resulting in a 5 minute standing ovation.  Since then, the Symphonic Orchestra has performed all original, un-arranged material such as Danse Macabre and Bacchanale by Saint-Saens, the finale movements of both Dvorak's 8th and 9th Symphonies, Beethoven's Coriolan Overture and Egmont Overture and 3 movements from the 7th Symphony, the finale movements to Tchaikovsky's 2nd and 5th Symphony, March Slav, and Romeo and Juliet Fantasy Overture, Respighi's Pines of Rome, and the 4th and 5th movements of Mahler's 5th Symphony.  In April 2014, the orchestra was selected to participate at the All State Festival as an Honors Ensemble...one of the highest honors a school group can achieve.  

Mr. Mac has also helped to grow both the orchestra and band program significantly with the help of middle school Band Directors Hilary Brown and Andrew Clavi, and orchestra director Shane Peters.  Both groups have doubled in size, resulting in the creation of a new full time band director position, filled by George Beratis.  

As a performer, Mr. Mac founded Relative Souls in 2009, an original Bridgeport based funk-rock fusion band that plays all over New England on the club and festival circuit.  Through his performance network, he has been able to bring in several musicians and conductors for master classes for the instrumental students at RHS.  Relative Souls disbanded in 2017, and since then Mr. Mac has frequented local Ridgefield establishments playing funk music with other acclaimed music teachers and performers in the area, usually under the name Shere Khan.

In his spare time when not performing or practicing, Mr. Mac is an avid reader and student of human nature, psychology, leadership, history, economics, political science, and astronomy. He also enjoys gardening and has taken over the RHS Garden along with Mr. Anderson. Lately he has been a student of Leo Kottke’s guitar music, taking lessons from John Stropes (Kottke’s official transcriptionist) from the University of Wisconsin.

Mr. Mac lives in Ridgefield, CT with his wife Jessica, who is the founder of Ridgefield Suzuki School and conductor of Philharmonia Strings at Norwalk Youth Symphony.  They have two kids, who of course are also musicians: Julie  (age 10, violin) and James (age 7, cello).  

about
the 50 state
string orchestra project

2022-2024

The 50 State String Orchestra Project is a large-scale consortium commission that is bringing new music to classrooms and concert halls all over the US in the 2022/2023 and 2023/2024 seasons, with educational and community orchestras in all 50 states commissioning a new piece for string orchestra, similar in difficulty level and scope to Stephanie’s 2011 work for string orchestra Beyond the Gate. Her consortium commissions for chamber music have already brought new string-centered music all across the world, from her 50 State Sonata Project for violin + piano, inspired by the work of her teacher John Kendall, and her World Sonata Project, which was commissioned by violinists from 35 countries in 2016.