- May 2, 2024
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Oliver Esquival-Novek is the first Indian Trails Middle School student to be make the audition All-State Middle School Band. Esquival-Novak, who plays alto saxophone, performed at the Florida Music Education Association Conference last month along with High School Honor Band members Erica Rimstidt (clarinet) and Tyler Grady (trombone) from Matanzas High and Glynnis Gong (flute) from Flagler Palm Coast.
Over 10,000 teachers and students from across the state attend the FMEA Conference and All-State Concerts each year.
Esquival-Novek is one of three students that have represented Indian Trails at the All-State Conference over the years. Indian Trails has had two students selected to the Middle School Honor Band and Esquival-Novek is the first to be selected to the Middle School All-State Band.
Indian Trails Band Director David Morden said Esquival-Novek is the first Flagler County band student to make the audition band in quite a few years.
“The audition bands have a lot of students who take private lessons on a regular basis and/or attend arts schools in larger school districts and cities. Oliver was able to take three or four private lessons before his audition last September,” Morden said.
The All-County bands performed at the Pirate Theater at Matanzas High on Feb. 3. The middle school band was made up of 64 student-musicians from Indian Trails and Buddy Taylor. The high school band had 70 student-musicians from Matanzas and FPC.
“All-County Bands, Honor Bands and All-State Bands have been a long-standing tradition throughout the state of Florida and are considered to be a high honor for the students who have been selected,” Morden said.
This year's All-County conductors were Joseph Powell, from Silver Sands Middle School in Port Orange, and John Dupuis, the K-12 Performing Arts Specialist in Volusia County.
“All-County is not only a great opportunity for the students to perform more and meet other students from other schools, but it serves as professional development for the teachers,” Morden said. “We get to watch as high quality music teachers work to put together the concert in a very short amount of time, and then take some of what they did back to our own classrooms.”
