2007-2008 is the 3 and a half year mark of Pat’s tenure as the Music Director of the Milwaukee Festival Brass.  A native of Wisconsin, Pat was born in Milwaukee and grew up in the City of Brookfield.  From there she moved with her family to Waukesha where she graduated from Waukesha South High School.  She attended Carroll College in Waukesha where she earned her BA in Trumpet Performance. While studying for her Master of Music degree at the University of Minnesota – Twin Cities, she learned the true meaning of the term hypothermia.  She was also privileged to be a part of the exceptional musical scene in the Twin Cities performing with the St. Paul Civic Orchestra as their Principal Trumpet and the Bloomington Symphony.  She played in 5 different brass quintets, and the Pleasant Street Brass Trio.  Having survived the first two winters, she continued on with her Doctor of Musical Arts degree at the U of M.

Pat is a performing artist for the Wisconsin-based Getzen Company.  She plays both the Getzen Eterna cornet and the brass band model cornet.  Pat helped in the design of the brass band model B-flat and E-flat cornets.  She is also an artist for Denis Wick using their mouthpieces and mutes.

Her most notable trumpet/cornet teachers have been Dr. David Baldwin, the late Dr. Edgar Turrentine both of the University of Minnesota and Byron Autrey, solo cornetist of the Detroit Concert Band under Leonard B. Smith.  One of the bonuses of working with outstanding bands like the Milwaukee Festival Brass has been Pat’s discovery of how much she loves to conduct.  She will first and foremost always be a performer, but she has had some wonderful instruction in the art of conducting from her hih school orchestra conductor, Terry Bjorklund and the late Elizabeth A.H. Green.  Miss Green literally wrote the book on conducting and her words to Pat were very encouraging.  This past summer Pat took up the baton to direct the Shorewood Concert Band.  She has learned to program based on wind shifts off the lake.  Yet another thing they don’t teach you in music school.

An internationally known band music scholar, Pat has presented papers at many conferences across the United States and in England and Austria.  Her two primary fields of interest are cornet soloist and their compositions as well as women’s bands.  Pat has done extensive primary source research on the women’s service bands from 1942 through 1973.  While attending the first reunion of the US WAF Band (United States Women in the Air Force) she enjoyed seeing the band members being reunited after nearly 50 years.  As the woman came into the reunion hotel band, friendships were immediately rekindled and all were excited about playing together again.

After a brief organizational meeting in the evening, one of the former Master Sergeants came to Pat to ask if she knew anything about tuba.   It seems that the only tuba player had learned to play e-flat tuba, not the more modern and traditional b-flat instrument used in a concert band.  Inquiring as to instrumentation, Pat realized that they had no other bass voices.  No bass clarinet, no bassoon, no bari sax.  Essentially, they did not have a band without that bass part.

Youth and enthusiasm told Pat that she could surely keep up with these women, some of whom had not played in 50 years.  Reality set in at the first rehearsal where she found out that most of them could really play.  By the end of the week Pat was voted an honorary member of the band – surely from bravery at playing the tuba.

Along with keyboardist Valerie Floeter, Pat has produced 4 CD’s of outstanding hymntune based literature.  Her compositions are published by IHS Publications, Inc, Pelican Music Publications, Sound Ideas Publications, Wimbleton Music and Alliance Publications, a Wisconsin-based publisher.  Pat and Valerie have toured to Germany three times.  Pat was the guest conductor of the brass choir for the Evangelical Free Church – Kirchenmusiktag held in Zwickau in 2003 and in Chemnitzin 2005.  In 2006, she was a conductor, soloist and arranger at the WELS International Brass Festival held in Appleton, Wisconsin.

2007 looks to be a busy year for the maestra.  In January she was the guest conductor of the Packerland Honor Band held in Door County.  She has been a consultant to the Veteran’s Administration for the Wheel Chair Games.  Athletes come from all over the United States and Great Britain to compete.  Pat has helped create the music for the procession of the athletes.  In July she will be in Dallas as the music director for a national youth rally and August will see her headed back to Germany for a third appearance as guest conductor of Kirchenmusiktag.