Music
The Music Program at St. Mark’s School serves a wide range of student interests and includes co-curricular vocal and instrumental performing groups; curricular classroom courses for beginning, intermediate, and advanced students; and a comprehensive curricular and co-curricular private lesson program.
Performance Venues and Events
This year alone we will sponsor thirty concerts on our campus. We’ve also hosted several of our own festivals. Look in the events calendar for who’s coming and who’s been here.
The Class of 1945 Hall has become a popular recording venue for major artists and groups in the Boston area.
Since the hall’s opening, the Boston Symphony Chamber Players, the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, and the public radio show From the Top have booked our Hall for recording.
Performing Groups
All performing groups are scheduled during the class day.
The sixty mixed voices of the St. Mark’s School Choir rehearse twice each week and perform for major Chapel services and concerts during the year. Highlights this year include our annual Service of Lessons and Carols, Gospel Night, a Spring Sing with three other schools, a Choral Evensong in April, featuring Mozart’s Vesperae de Dominica with orchestra, and our End of Year Concert in May, featuring Beethoven’s Choral Fantasy. The Choir sings a wide range of music from traditional to harmonic singing to even Sting. In recent years, the Choir has traveled to Japan (2000), England (2002), Italy (2005) and we are currently planning a trip to Spain in 2007. Auditions for new members are held in the fall.
The Cat’s Meow and the Octet are female and male a cappella pop groups whose members are auditioned from the Choir each fall. The Cat’s and Octet perform concerts for the school and community and join with other schools for the annual Wick Festival.
Selected members of the Choir are invited to form the St. Mark’s Singers, a mixed voice group specializing in a wide range of a cappella music.
Our active Chamber Music program at St. Mark’s includes the 30-piece Chamber Players and numbers of duos, trios, and quartets of strings, winds, and keyboard. Highlights this past year included a Fall Orchestra Meet with Groton School and Concord Academy, Lessons and Carols, a February chamber music concert in collaboration with Firebird Ensemble, and our End of the Year Concert in May. Members of the Chamber Players have recently traveled with the Choir to Japan (2000), England (2002) and Italy (2005). A trip to Spain is planned for Spring 2007.
The St. Mark’s Jazz Band rehearses twice each week and includes wind, brass, and rhythm players. Performances this year include the annual Cutler Festival and workshop, which featured coaching sessions and performance with Berklee School of Music trumpeter Greg Hopkins and Made in the Shade; a February after dinner concert; and the End of the Year Concert in May. Auditions for the Jazz Band are held in the fall.
Twenty professional musicians teach and coach in the SM Music program. Fifteen adjunct teachers — active teachers and performers in the Boston area — instructed 80 St. Mark’s students in weekly lessons last year. Lessons are offered on a credit or non-credit basis. Students may also take lessons as an independent study project or in lieu of sports.
Instruction is offered in these areas:
- Keyboard — pipe organ, jazz, blues, classical piano
- Voice
- Strings — violin, viola, cello, bass
- Guitar — acoustic, electric, bass
- Winds — flute, oboe, clarinet, saxophone, bassoon
- Brass — trumpet, trombone, French horn
- Percussion — timpani, drum set, ethnic drumming
Music Department Profiles
See teachers and their related biographies for the teachers in our Private Lesson Program.