Summer Music Programs

Ensembles and Classes
Ensembles are key to the SMI experience, whether instrumental or vocal. Small chamber groups allow students to develop music in relation to one another and each student shares a leadership role. Classes in theory, solfège, harmony and other fundamentals help students grow in their understanding of music. Each student is placed in the ensembles and classes that are best suited to his or her level of playing. All students participate in the Institute Singers choral group.

Masterworks Performance Opportunity
Every Institute participant has the opportunity to perform in a masterwork as part of the final Institute concert. The combined forces of an all-student orchestra, chorus and soloists join together to perform a major work by one of the great composers. In past years, students have performed Vivaldi's Gloria, Mozart's Regina Coeli and Fauré's Requiem.

Concerts and Recitals
On the final Saturday afternoon, parents and guests are welcome to attend the closing Institute concerts which feature the Institute Singers and Orchestra as well as chamber music ensembles.

Conductors

Laura L. Joss, M.M., Loyola University, B.M., Baldwin Wallace University. Mrs. Joss is currently an Assistant Professor at Baldwin Wallace Conservatory of Music in Berea, Ohio where she serves as the Chair of the Music Education Department and teaches middle school and high school music education method classes, brass, woodwind and string methods and conducts the BW Concert Wind Ensemble.  She is also a doctoral candidate at Case Western Reserve University. This past fall, Mrs. Joss traveled a second time to South America as part of an Artists in Residency program sponsored through the Ohio Arts Council and the Santiago Chilean Northamerican Cultural Institute. She conducted both bands and orchestras at the Liceo Experimental de Musica Copiapo in Copiapo, Chile and facilitated teacher work sessions to begin to write the National Chilean Artistic School Music Education Curriculum. Mrs. Joss then traveled to the La Serena, Chile to present a week long band clinic for all of the band directors in the north of Chile at the Universidad de La Serena Escuela Experimental de Music “Jorge Pena Hen’ and facilitated the formation of the first Chilean Music Education Association. Mrs. Joss is active both nationally and internationally as an adjudicator, music education consultant and clinician. In 1997, while directing both bands and orchestras in Strongsville City Schools, Mrs. Joss was selected as “Master Teacher of the Year” by the Martha Holden Jennings Foundation. She is a member of the Ohio String Teachers Association, American String Teachers Association, Ohio Music Education Association, and the Music Educators National Conference.

Frank Bianchi, M.M. Cleveland Institute of Music, B.A., Cleveland State University.  Mr. Bianchi is part of the Adjunct Faculty in the Music Education Department at Baldwin Wallace University Conservatory of Music, teaching Choral Conducting.  He serves as the Director of the BW Men's Chorus in the Conservatory Outreach Department.  A choral music teacher in the public schools for more than twenty years, Mr. Bianchi has been choral director at Medina High School for nineteen years, and during the 2005-2006 season he served as Assistant Director of the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Chorus.  Choirs under his direction have performed at Riverside Church in New York, NY, Cathedral of St. John in Cleveland, and with the Cleveland Pops Orchestra, and have appeared with choirs from Ohio State University, Bowling Green State University and Ashland University.  Mr. Bianchi has conducted County, Regional and All-State honors choirs in Ohio and has taught student and teacher workshops throughout Ohio, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts.  He has taught voice privately, and conducted the Women's Chorus at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music.  Mr. Bianchi also serves as choral director at Holy Martyrs Church in Medina. 

Curriculum Placement

Theory Placement All SMI students will take a brief music theory placement exam on Registration Day, the first Sunday of the Institute. Results are used to place students at the instructional level best suited to their current abilities and backgrounds.

Chamber Ensemble Placement All students will have a scheduled audition on Registration Day. Chamber music coaches and private lesson teachers hear all auditions and place students in large and small ensembles according to playing ability. All students should bring a prepared piece for auditions, including vocalists.