LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD
DEADLINE | May 31, 2014 |
APPLICATION | 2014 Award Nomination Form |
PRESENTED | October 22, 2014 |
EVENT | Annual Awards Banquet |
The lifetime achievement award is intended to honor professionals in the field of music education and/or performance who have distinguished him/herself in his/her career by giving meritorious service in the musical development of the community.
2013 Lifetime Achievement Award Winner
Dr. Nicholas J. Contorno
For more than 50 years, Dr. Nicholas J. Contorno has nurtured music throughout the state as an award-winning educator, conductor, musician and composer. Contorno, who holds Bachelor and Master’s degrees from UWM along with a Doctor of Musical Arts in Composition from UW-Madison, began his teaching career in 1961 as an Instrumental Music teacher with Glendale Public Schools and Director of Bands at Dominican High School in Whitefish Bay. Several years later he became the Music Curriculum Supervisor and Director of Bands at Kettle Moraine High School in Wales, Wisconsin where he founded the KMHS Orchestra in 1978. In 1983 he was appointed to Marquette University, where he founded and directed the MU Orchestra and retired after 24 years as their Director of Music Programs, bands and orchestra.
An active professional musician, Contorno has performed with numerous bands and orchestras, including the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, and with many national shows and artists like Linda Ronstadt, Natalie Cole, Manhattan Transfer, Vic Damone, Johnny Mathis, Dinah Shore, Mel Torme and Sonny & Cher. Every year in Milwaukee he conducted his own bands in The Great Circus Parade, and he has been the musical coordinator of Festa Italiana and the Musical Director/Conductor of the First Brigade Civil War Band of Wisconsin. From 1996 to 2002, he directed the Milwaukee Concert Band, which was formerly Civic Music Association’s Civic Symphonic Band.
An A.S.C.A.P. award winning composer and arranger, Contorno currently has over 50 published pieces as well as a number of commissioned pieces. He has received many honors from local, national and international organizations, and in 2001, he was inducted into the Jesuit Honor Society Alpha Sigma Nu. In addition to holding memberships in numerous professional organizations, he has served on the board of directors of the Goldman Memorial Band of New York City, the Festival City Symphony and the Waukesha Symphony Orchestra. In July of 2012, Instrumentalist Magazine selected him to serve on its Board of Advisors.
Now in retirement, Contorno continues to dedicate his life to music. In 2008, he co-founded the St. Paul School Band in Genesee Depot, Wisconsin where he continues to volunteer as an instrumental music instructor at the school. In 2010 Musical Haiti, a small charity founded after the devastating earthquake by one of his former Kettle Moraine band students, opened the Nick Contorno School of Music in Gonaives, Haiti. Contorno now uses the national connections he made as a teacher and performer to secure donations for the school, including musical instruments and sheet music translated into French.
An active professional musician, Contorno has performed with numerous bands and orchestras, including the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, and with many national shows and artists like Linda Ronstadt, Natalie Cole, Manhattan Transfer, Vic Damone, Johnny Mathis, Dinah Shore, Mel Torme and Sonny & Cher. Every year in Milwaukee he conducted his own bands in The Great Circus Parade, and he has been the musical coordinator of Festa Italiana and the Musical Director/Conductor of the First Brigade Civil War Band of Wisconsin. From 1996 to 2002, he directed the Milwaukee Concert Band, which was formerly Civic Music Association’s Civic Symphonic Band.
An A.S.C.A.P. award winning composer and arranger, Contorno currently has over 50 published pieces as well as a number of commissioned pieces. He has received many honors from local, national and international organizations, and in 2001, he was inducted into the Jesuit Honor Society Alpha Sigma Nu. In addition to holding memberships in numerous professional organizations, he has served on the board of directors of the Goldman Memorial Band of New York City, the Festival City Symphony and the Waukesha Symphony Orchestra. In July of 2012, Instrumentalist Magazine selected him to serve on its Board of Advisors.
Now in retirement, Contorno continues to dedicate his life to music. In 2008, he co-founded the St. Paul School Band in Genesee Depot, Wisconsin where he continues to volunteer as an instrumental music instructor at the school. In 2010 Musical Haiti, a small charity founded after the devastating earthquake by one of his former Kettle Moraine band students, opened the Nick Contorno School of Music in Gonaives, Haiti. Contorno now uses the national connections he made as a teacher and performer to secure donations for the school, including musical instruments and sheet music translated into French.