While some Gusties were spending their spring breaks binge watching Netflix or soaking up the sun on coastal beaches, the musicians of the Gustavus Wind Orchestra (GWO) were spreading their passion for music.

Gustavus Wind Orchestra has been touring the country and the world annually since 1881 and the tradition is as strong as ever as the orchestra maintains its standards of excellence and reaches new heights.

GWO kicked off their concert tour by performing at Iowa State University for the College Band Directors National Association Conference which they held the honor of being invited to this past summer. They were the only collegiate ensemble from Minnesota invited to perform at the conference titled “And All that Jazz.”

After spending the first two days of their seven-day concert tour in Iowa with a local high school band and at the CBDNA conference, they traveled over 2500 miles through Illinois and Michigan.

“Our concert sites included venues that ranged from the very urban, inner-city Detroit of Ferndale, Michigan to Grace Lutheran Church in River Forest, Illinois and Kaufman Auditorium in the small town of Marquette, Michigan,” Director of Fine Arts and Manager of Concert Tours Al Behrends said.

This was Sophomore Megan Mullaney’s second GWO concert tour and she appreciated the differences in travel from last year’s tour.

“This tour was different from the last tour in that we traveled substantially longer distances. We started in Rochester, made our way to the Chicago suburbs, the Detroit area, and the upper peninsula of Michigan. Everyone grew very close on the tour, and there was a lot more time spent with each other on the bus,” Mullaney said.

Behrends explained that while the students and faculty had a great time during their concert tour, it was not a typical spring break vacation. On top of five concert performances, GWO also spent two days holding clinics for middle and high school musicians.

First-year Emily Woodard reflected on her experience as more than just a spring break trip.

“As cliché as it sounds, it absolutely was one of the most influential and life-changing musical experiences I’ve ever had,” Woodard said.

Director of the Gustavus Wind Orchestra James Patrick Miller echoed this sentiment remembering a particularly moving couple of days during the tour.

“The highlight of the tour, in my opinion, was our day-long workshops and evening shared concert with the bands from Ferndale High School, in Ferndale, MI. Located only 2 blocks from 8-Mile in south Detroit, that community faces many social, financial, political, and cultural challenges every day. Our students built life-long relationships with people in that community, and shared their love of music and service as true ambassadors of Gustavus. In return, the Ferndale community left a lasting imprint of community, passion, and love for music on all of us. Music has saved the lives of many kids in that community – and to interact with and share stories and music together is a memory that will never be forgotten,” Miller said.

Woodard reminisced on the final performance in the Ferndale community and the impact it had on her as well as the community.

“Just knowing that the kids in that audience could have possibly been inspired to stay in music or really just stay out of trouble was such an incredible feeling. The last song we played, David Maslanka’s “Symphony Number 4”, is described by the composer as an “outcry of joy” and it certainly felt like that on that night,” Woodard said.

Mullaney also mentioned Ferndale as the most impactful part of the tour for her.

“Everyone in the city was very welcoming, and it was inspiring to perform a concert in such a rough area. The community was overwhelmingly tight-knit, and it was an experience that I had never had before,” Mullaney said.

The outreach to these communities and their aspiring musicians seemed to be the most important part of the tour for many who went.

“We connected nearly 1000 people to Gustavus in the 5 communities we visited,” Behrends said.

The clinics taught by our own Gustavus musicians to students throughout these communities not only helped those younger musicians grow, but also served as priceless learning experiences for GWO members.

Besides growing in their passion and ability as musicians and personally from their experiences of communities very different than their own, they also built lasting relationships with each other.

“I feel like we got to really be ourselves with each other, not like we hadn’t before, but with all the time we spent together, we really got to know each other on a more personal level and become even more of a family than we already were,” Woodard said.

After their successful and meaningful spring break concert tour, Gustavus Wind Orchestra is now ready to present the music they perfected with the Gustavus Community. Anyone and everyone is welcome to come and hear the music on Saturday, April 9 at 1:30p.m. in Bjorling Recital Hall.