Thomas Lee Dvorak: a career as music educator and conductor

Thomas Lee Dvorak (b. 1941) uniquely blended his experience as a music educator with his long career as a collegiate conductor. In his ten-year career as a public school instrumental music educator, Dvorak taught bands at the elementary, middle school or junior high, and high school levels. During this time, he encountered beginning instrumental music instructional methods that allowed his beginning band students to advance at a rapid pace. Dvorak parlayed his school band teaching experience with his growing reputation in band music education into an appointment to the music education faculty at the University of Michigan. At Michigan, Dvorak combined his experience and duties in music education with a conducting position when he was assigned to conduct the University of Michigan Youth Band/Wind Ensemble in 1975. After being named its Director of Bands in 1979, Dvorak created a similar symbiotic role for himself at the University of Wisconsin--Milwaukee (UWM) when he founded the Greater Milwaukee Youth Wind Ensemble in 1982. Throughout his twenty-seven year tenure as Director of Bands at UWM, Dvorak also combined education and conducting through the mentorship of graduate conducting students, his sponsorship of new and original music for young/developing bands, and his outreach work with Milwaukee-area school band programs. Dvorak also enjoyed a reputation as an insightful interpreter of wind band music, a leader of national professional organizations, authority on wind band repertoire, and as a frequently invited guest conductor of school, collegiate, and professional ensembles Thomas Dvorak retired from UWM in May 2007 and was named Professor Emeritus of Music.