JoAnn Wieszczyk serves as the Director of Instrumental Music at Moravian University, where she conducts the Wind Ensemble and teaches courses in music history and theory. She also directs the Moravian Greyhound Marching Band.
Wieszczyk earned her Bachelor of Music in Music Education with a flute concentration from Temple University. Following her undergraduate studies, she taught in public and charter schools in Philadelphia, where she established a successful 5th through 12th grade band program at the Philadelphia Performing Arts Charter: A String Theory School. She also helped develop the Music Pathways Program through the Settlement Music School at the Mary Louise Curtis Branch and was a founding faculty member of the Saint Francis University Marching Band.
She later earned her Master of Music in Wind Band Conducting from the University of Minnesota and her Doctor of Musical Arts in Conducting: Band and Wind Ensemble from the University of Michigan. Throughout her career, Wieszczyk has worked with a variety of chamber groups, including the University of Minnesota Saxophone Ensemble, and continues to serve as a guest conductor and clinician throughout the region. She joined the Moravian faculty in 2022.
What inspired you to go into your field of study?
I knew in high school that I wanted to be an educator for the rest of my life because so many teachers had invested in me. I wanted to invest in students in the same way. For me, being an educator isn’t just a career but a vocation, and I’ve appreciated working with student musicians at every age.
In undergrad, I discovered that of all the musical ensembles I was performing with, the band had such a capacity for timbral variance. Many young composers were and still are eager to write for the medium and the ensemble welcomes them with open arms. I loved the opportunity to collaborate with so many composers and soloists, and this is why I ultimately decided to pursue wind conducting for my graduate degrees.
What research are you currently working on?
The internal monologue of conductors on the podium and how the internal monologue impacts the rehearsal process. In 2022, I began with poster presentations at the Society for Music Perception and Cognition, as well as the Instrumental Music Teacher Educators conferences. This was prior to my curiosity about how internal monologue can impact the way conductors navigate rehearsals, so it is my hope to do a more formalized case study in the coming year.
What do you think is the most recent important development in your field of study?
I think representation of diverse composers at every level of ensemble is important. Seeing those composers programmed more frequently is becoming more normalized, which is important, but I don’t think this is yet considered a standard expectation.
What job would you have if you couldn’t be a professor, regardless of salary and job outcome?
I’ve always been interested in mortuary science. It first began with the cosmetology component, but as I’ve gotten older, I just appreciate being with people as they navigate their grief.
What do you know now that you wished you knew when you were in college?
You will never have more time than you have right now, and you will never have more energy than you have right now. Particularly as a marching band director, this is something I am constantly thinking about because of the physical demand.
The best advice I ever received while in college: if you take all of the courses required of you during your four years at an institution, you graduate with the bare minimum. If you can successfully take more, do it.
What is your biggest student pet peeve?
I had a mentor say, “The eagle soars and the chicken pecks.” Students who use eagle vision will be most successful because they look at the semester ahead of them and plan and communicate accordingly. Emergencies happen, but it is the communicative measures you take in those situations that matter.
Students who use chicken vision are only focused on issues that arise moment by moment. Circumstances created by chicken vision are my biggest pet peeve.
What should students expect from your classes? What is the secret to succeeding in your classes?
In any of my classes – academic or performance-based – get ready to collaborate. That can look like a discussion, a music theory competition, or an act of performance.
I think the secret to succeeding in my classes is communicating. I love to hear what the course material means to you personally, but I also want to hear about where you’re struggling.
What was the last streaming show that you binge-watched or the last good book that you read?
I’m currently working my way through a crime drama called “Blindspot”. More recent binge-watches were “Wednesday” and “The Sandman”. “Seinfeld” and “Criminal Minds” have been watched countless times, but they are always in the rotation.
Regarding books, you can catch me reading pretty much two genres: leadership or poetry. “Road Back to You” by Ian Morgan Cron and Suzanne Stabile is my favorite leadership tool as it applies to the enneagram. The poetry book I’m currently loving is “I Hope You Remember” by Josie Balka.
What is something interesting about you that most people don’t know?
I grew up in a very rural and isolated part of North East, Pennsylvania. My father was a NY State archery champion, so of course, he taught me how to shoot a bow. In middle school, I also went to a day event for hunters where we shot clays with a shotgun, ran an agility course through the woods (complete with a rope swing across a river), archery deer target, and loaded our own shotgun shells. I fell in the river and came home with a bruised shoulder. I’m the furthest thing from a hunter, but I appreciate every story about “the one that got away.”
Is there any advice you have for aspiring musicians or anyone studying music?
Ira Glass has a fabulous quote about those of us who do creative work and how we get into it because we have good taste, but sometimes our artistic output doesn’t match our taste. To narrow that gap, it is imperative that we do a lot of work. Put yourselves on a daily deadline and then take time to reflect on your growth. Be honest with yourself about the quality of that work.
Additionally, carve out time to take in and appreciate all kinds of art – go to an art museum, hear live music of all genres, read poetry, go salsa dancing, etc. I find myself to be a more inspired and better musician when I make time for the other arts.
