Before the McKnight Center

Donors are great, but our history is everything.

Here at OSU, we have been lucky to see a progressive growth in our school over the last couple years. Admittedly, OSU has been on the up-and-up for a long time now, though most of the students here now haven’t been around long enough to remember a time when all the buildings on campus looked like the Paul Miller building.

With the stunning business building going up alongside a new baseball stadium, soccer stadium, performing arts center, school of music. Along with much needed parking lots (rest in peace Cordell), the completion of north dining and the human sciences extension, OSU has had an explosion of modern and updated facilities.

So with this awesome expansion of facilities that facilitate education, it can be easy to tie education outcomes to a tangible asset like a facility. I find these conversations we have all heard disingenuous. It is natural to have pride in something that is such a massive investment, but I would like to argue that the things OSU students are doing are leaps and bounds more impressive than a shiny new office or a fast new computer.

Now, many people are already saying in their heads “but strong tools make for higher functionality,” and your write, kind of. Here is my proof.

Students are busy. Between study sessions, extracurricular activities and work, it is impossible to keep up all the cool things students are doing at OSU (that’s out job). But while everyone scurries from class to class, there are three students in the OSU Orchestra program that are kicking butt despite the McKnight center not opening until next year.

Here are their stories.

Mehrun Aminkhoee:

Mehrun Aminkhoee is a graduate from Yukon High School and is graduating next year in clarinet performance and music education.

“Neither of my parents where musically inclined, but when I got to the 6th grade I decided I wanted to play the flute. My dad felt otherwise though and I ended up on clarinet,” Aminkoee said.

Aminkhoee didn’t play seriously until the 10th grade, when he picked up lessons. The next two years of his high school career would see a shift though, as he began to grow accustomed life in music.

“My band directors created a culture in our high school that made me want to peruse music for the rest of my life,” he said, “when it came to choose my path I knew it was something I couldn’t live without.

Junior year, Aminkhoee started to get into conducting classes that sparked his interest in orchestral conducting.

“After a couple classes in conducting, I approached Dr. Dickey to see if I could take some lessons in conducting, and he welcomed me with open arms,” he said, “he pointed me to different graduate level classes I could take.”

After a year of learning with Dr. Dickey, he was given the opportunity to study scoring, and was later put in front of the Stillwater Community orchestra.

“I got to work with the community orchestra, and this was an issue for me cause I didn’t really know what strings (instruments) did,” he said. “If you’re a teacher and you tell a performer to play this way but you can’t explain it or demonstrate the way you want it played you’re going to have issues leading an orchestra.”

Within band or orchestra instrumentation tends to vary slight between like instruments. Violin music reads similarly as a viola in the same way a clarinet reads a lot like a saxophone. The difference is close to the different English accents than completely different languages.

The difference between woodwinds and stringed instruments is basically the same as learning a new language. To conduct after a couple years of theory a piece with in a language you are not used to can be tough.

Aminkhoee says that he can hear exactly how he wants the piece to sound, but he has trouble telling the performance how to play it or showing them how to do it. Add to this that he is still learning the ins and outs of conducting, and that he is still doing his regular undergraduate studies, every step is a hard fought victory.

“I love conducting though,” he said. “I started conducting in my car. I would look around and people would be staring at me wondering if I was going crazy. A friend inspired me to get into it, and after conducting in my car for so long, I wanted to take it a step further.

“It does get stressful though. When you have 60 people sitting there waiting for orders, that can be pretty hard.”

This isn’t Aminokhoees first time conducting though. As a drum major for OSU’s Marching band, he found that he had learned the leadership needed to get through it.

“At the end of the day, you just have to remember that with good and bad days you still have this group of awesome performers that want to support you and see you do well,” he said. “I want my piece to be good, but it is more important that everyone is a part of the process. When I’m up there it’s not really about me, but about how we can grow as a group and help each other get better. I’m just there to guide the process.

“It’s not been easy either. When I was in high school music seemed like a natural option because I was good at clarinet, and I had to realize that it’s not something you can just do. You have to love it and you have to work harder at it.”

He says that even if he could go back and tell younger him how hard professional music was, he would still choose the path he has taken.

“My love for music is just so profound that I would have pick this. I enjoy the process of music,” he said.

As his undergraduate career wraps up, he has many options available to him, because he could play his instrument professionally or he could seek a band director position. He is optimistic about his future and is waiting to see what opportunities present themselves, something most undergraduates can relate to.

Rachel Mui:

Rachel Mui is a graduate student coming from OBU. She is a fourth year PHD student that teaches classes as she wraps up her graduate studies. Mui is also a conductor that Dr. Dickey has taken under his wing.

Her story is different from Mehrun or Mathews though, because the class she teaches isn’t in the music department and she isn’t a graduate program for anything music related. Instead, she is an instructor for a strategic management class in the Spears school and he PHD is in business.

Mui has he roots in music though. Both her parents are music professors, so she started playing at a very young age. Going into college, she knew she wanted to go into music and her undergraduate studies are actual in music theory. When looking at her post graduations options, she wanted to go into conducting after, but decided to go into business.

“A lot of music students have this panic moment after they graduate when they start to wonder what they are going to do after,” Mui said. “Most of the choose is if you’re going to attend graduate school or try to make it as a professional, but in my panic I thought a business degree might be helpful so I ended up in the business school.

“I wasn’t sure if I could make it as a professional in the music field, but you can never really get away from music after you have that in your background, and my third year I wanted to see if I could actually do something I had always wanted to do.”

Going from music at OBU to business at OSU was different for her. She says that one of the biggest things she found out was that in the business program you didn’t have to spend every waking hour practicing like you have to in music. She says that most if not all of the work can be done in the classroom. Music gave her the work ethic to complete her studies and also look for opportunities outside the classroom.

She reached out to Dr. Dickey last year and asked if he would be willing to take on a private student that was outside the music school. After a few conversations, she was Dr. Dickey’s pupil and was technically enrolled in the masters of conducting program at OSU.

“This has been amazing, he has been a fantastic instructor,” she said,” He encourages us to develop our own personality and our own style while keeping us grounded in the basics.

“It’s very rare that graduate students get the opportunity to conduct higher level orchestras, so it’s a big deal to have they type of support that he is giving us. He constantly advocates for our ability to get up there and get real experience. People can go their entire masters and only conduct one concert, but we have conducted at least four in just one semester.”

This experience is invaluable for aspiring conductors, since the conductor position is often the most complicated position to fill.

“Ideally, as the conductor you are the one that has to know the music better than anyone else in the orchestra. You have to know what sound you want and how to get that sound out of your performers… most of this has to be done before, because we only got about 20 minutes per session to work with the orchestra on the music we conduct them on.”

Along with becoming an expert with the music she presents, she is also working as a teacher, researcher, and studying for here masters. Still, she finds time to fit in her activities with the orchestra.

“I do this because I want to, I don’t really need another degree,” she said,” I’m doing this purely because it’s been a life goal of mine. Because of that, it’s not hard to find the energy to tackle this even though I have a full time career doing something else. People think I’m crazy for doing this, and their probably right. This semester has been incredibly hectic, but I wouldn’t trade it for anything.”

Mathew Glover:

Mathew Glover is originally from Rochester, New York, which is home to the world famous Eastman School of Music. He went to school for music education, but finished his undergraduate with a degree in trumpet music performance.

After undergrad, he decided to further his education at Washington State after advice from his director at the time. I did a two-year program there for trumpet performance. By the end of that program, he was considering conducting as a possible next step. While at Washington State, he meets a man named Christopher Dickey, who suggested his brother Tomas Dickey at OSU to peruse his new found conducting passion with.

“I put in my application and I remember him saying ‘well I’ve never had a grad student, and to the best of my knowledge we haven’t had one in years’,” Glover said. ”So I was the guinea pig, and Dr. Dickey’s first grad student ever.”

Glover got music in his hands at a very young age.

“My opa (Dutch for grandfather) had an organ in his house that I used to mess around on,” he said. “later my mother bought a piano, and I started taking lessons, and from there it kind of just snowballed.”

He played piano, and in the fourth grade picked up the trumpet. His band instructor inspired him to peruse music education. He excelled in other areas like maths and science, but music was always his driving force.

His roots are in orchestra, though trumpet is typically considered a band instrument. In high school his didn’t have a marching band, so all of his experience took place in a concert hall.

At Washington State, conducting classes where a part of the degree requirements. He liked it so much he started getting private lessons in conducting. One day his professor contacted him saying that he was out of town and that Glover was going to have to conduct the orchestra in rehearsal.

“It really lite a fire in me, and made it clear how I wanted to proceed with my career,” he said,” It continues to grow as I look for the next step in my career.”

Being Dr. Dickey’s first graduate student, Glover has had the most time studying under him.

“You know, they always want the best for you,” he said,” they are always looking for little ways where you can improve. After some time, you can see them looking at you and you learn to anticipate their critiques. They defiantly broadcast when they see something they are fixing in their mind.”

One of the things all three of the conductors say they will remember from Dr. Dickeys lessons is the phrase hit the table, and glover says he these words will ring in his ear for years after he leaves OSU.

Over the last couple years, OSU Orchestra has added more concerts to their performance schedule. Glover says this has really pushed him and the students, but has also showed them that they are capable of more than they thought.

He says that the push over the last couple years is to bring OSU inline of what would be consider a professional workload.

“As a conductor, it is really important to considerer the skill of the musicians you are conducting,” he said,” we try and push the performance and ourselves to do as much as we can and a little bit more, because it is usually that little bit more that makes us grow as professionals.”

Putting the music together can be a bit tricky because of that. Conductors spend hours upon hours studying and preparing a piece to put together with the orchestra.

“Once you get past the analytical side of it and the more technical aspects of conducting, you then have to get in front of the orchestra and evaluate how effective your planning is going to be… I just try to know the piece as well as I can and have it in my head so that I can lead them through the piece in front of us,” he said.

Glover says the worst thing a conductor can do is tell his performers that something is hard or that it won’t be easy, because He believes that the only way to tackle a piece is to attack it and evaluate as you are going.

“As his first grad student, I hope to make that mark,” he said,” I hope to make Dr. Dickey proud in me as a student and find success not just for me but for him.”

So why does these three students and every other perspective matter so much more than a building? What I’ve left out is that for the first time in OSU’s history, something very rare in the music industry happened when these three all conducted in the Holiday Pops concert.

Every student’s perspective and story is rich (and too much to fit into one article). Rachel isn’t even in much anymore, but after perusing a business masters she decided to entertain her long held passion for conducting. Mehran is an undergraduate conducting the upper division orchestra, which is rare enough for graduate students, much less undergraduate. And then there is Mathew, who came from a rich musical background who came all the way from the coast to learn here.

Their history is so important, because it’s what makes OSU what it is so much more than any stagnate structures ever will. Those little things are what make the cowboy family, and they are what shape and mold it well after we are gone. So maybe we can’t stop bragging or complaining about our facilities, but it’s important not to lose sight of what is really important.

Here are some last words from a few of our families most inspiring members.

“It is essential to have music in your life, and to have that culture with you, because America is one of the few cultures that isn’t really an art based culture. I see a problem with that because we have a rich a culture in music and art that is unique but neglected… music is a universal language, and with it is something that is important weither or not you place a heavy emphasis on it. That’s my goal, is to make an impact, however big, on how we as a culture perceive music and the arts, and by doing that in my own way I can help support our culture of music here.” –Mathew Glover

“One thing that really stuck with me was how many young girls would come up to me and express to me surprised to see a girl conductor. It’s not common, though there are defiantly female conductors. It’s unfortunate that there is only one female conductor though in the hundreds of major U.S. symphonies. I celebrate every time a parent comes up to me and says their daughter wants to be a conductor now. It’s rare to get a chance to make an impact like that, and that’s what makes OSU’s program so special.” –Rachel Mui

“A lot of what holds us back, truly is ourselves. But you have the potential within you to go above and beyond what you think you can do. Procrastination is the delusion of instant gratification. The process is everything… If your living in the future, you aren’t experiencing every moment of your life fully, and often struggle harder through those obstacles that keep you from achieving everything you want to do. You also have to internalize this thought process, because it’s less of a plan and more of a philosophy.” - Mehrun Aminkhoee