Clinician Bios

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Col. Arnald D. Gabriel retired from the United States Air Force in 1985 following a distinguished 36 year military career, at which time he was awarded his third Legion of Merit for his service to the United States Air Force and to music education throughout the country.

He served as Commander/Conductor of the internationally renowned U.S. Air Force Band, Symphony Orchestra, and Singing Sergeants from 1964 to 1985. In 1990, he was named the first Conductor Emeritus of the USAF Band at a special concert held at DAR Constitution Hall in Washington, DC. Col. Gabriel served on the faculty of George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia,from 1985 to 1995, as Conductor of the GMU Symphony Orchestra and as Chairman, Department of Music for eight of those years. In recognition of his ten years service to the university, he was named Professor Emeritus of Music.

A combat machine gunner with the United States Army’s famed 29th Infantry Division in Europe during WW II, Gabriel received two awards of the Bronze Star Medal, the Combat Infantryman’s Badge and the French Croix de Guerre.

Following his separation from the Army in 1946, Gabriel enrolled in Ithaca College, where he earned both Bachelor and Master of Science degrees in Music Education. In 1989, his alma mater conferred upon him an Honorary Doctor of Music degree and in 1997, he was further honored with its Lifetime Achievement Award.

He is also listed in the International Who ‘s Who in Music, 7th edition. Col. Gabriel’s professional honors include the very first Citation of Excellence awarded by the National Band Association, the Mid-West National Band and Orchestra Clinic’s Gold Medal of Honor and its Distinguished Service to Music Award, Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia’s New Millennium Lifetime Achievement Award and its rarely presented National Citation for “significant contributions to music in America”, Kappa Kappa Psi’s Distinguished Service to Music Award, Phi Beta Mu’s Outstanding Contribution to Bands Award, and the St. Cecilia Award from the University of Notre Dame.

Col. Gabriel was inducted into the National Band Association Hall of Fame of Distinguished Band Conductors, becoming the youngest person ever to have received this honor, and was an inaugural inductee to the Distinguished Alumni Wall of Fame of Cortland High School in Cortland, New York. He is also a Past President of the prestigious American Bandmasters Association. In 2008, the US Air Force Band dedicated the Arnald D. Gabriel Hall in his honor, and Bands of America inducted Col Gabriel into its Hall of Fame. Col. Gabriel has performed in all 50 of the United States and in 50 countries around the world.

In addition to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, among the hundreds of major orchestras and bands he has conducted are the Minneapolis, Pittsburgh, San Antonio, Memphis, Florida, Glendale (California), Green Bay (Wisconsin), York and Williamsport (Pennsylvania), Fairfax (Virginia), Puerto Rico, and Tatui Sao Paulo (Brazil), symphony orchestras, the Carabiniere Band and the Air Force Band (Italy), the Band of the Royal Netherlands Marines, the Royal Hellenic Band (Greece), the Staff Music Corps (Bonn, Germany), the National Band of the Canadian Forces (Ottawa), The Dallas Wind Symphony, the Gamagori Band and the Tokyo Kosei Wind Orchestra (Japan).

Col. Gabriel was named Music Director Emeritus of the McLean (VA) Orchestra for his outstanding leadership from 1986 to 2002. Col. Gabriel continues to appear as clinician at major state, regional, and university music festivals and guest conducts outstanding school, college, municipal, and military bands as well as orchestras around the world.

Frank L. Battisti is Conductor Emeritus of the New England Conservatory Wind Ensemble. Mr. Battisti founded and conducted the ensemble for 30 years from 1969-1999. The NEC Wind Ensemble is recognized as being one of the premiere ensembles of its kind in the United States and throughout the world. It has performed often at music conferences, recorded for Centaur, Albany and Golden Crest records and had many of its performances broadcast over the National Public Radio Network (NPR). He has been responsible for commissioning and premiering over 50 works for wind ensemble by distinguished American and foreign composers including Warren Benson, Leslie Bassett, Robert Ceely, John Harbison, Robin Holloway, Witold Lutoslawski, William Thomas McKinley, Vincent Persichetti, Michael Colgrass, Daniel Pinkham, Gunther Schuller, Robert Selig, Ivan Tcheripnin, Sir Michael Tippett, William Kraft, Robert Ward and Alec Wilder. Critics, composers and colleagues have praised Battisti for his commitment to contemporary music and his outstanding performances.

Battisti often appears as a guest conductor with many university, college, military, professional and high school bands and wind ensembles as well as a guest conductor/clinician and teacher throughout the United States, England, Europe, Middle East, Africa, Scandinavia, Australia, China, Taiwan, Canada, South America, South Korea, Iceland and the former U.S.S.R. Recently he has appeared as a guest conductor with the New World Symphony Orchestra, U. S. Marine Band and the Interlochen Arts Academy Band.

Past President of the U.S. College Band Directors National Association (CBDNA), Battisti is also a member of the American Bandmasters Association (ABA) and founder of the National Wind Ensemble Conference, World Association of Symphonic Bands and Ensembles (WASBE), Massachusetts Youth Wind Ensemble (MYWE) and New England College Band Association (NECBA).

Battisti has served on the Standard Award Panel of American Society for Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) and been a member of the Music Panel for the Arts Recognition and Talent Search (ARTS) for the National Foundation for Advancement of the Arts. For many years he served as editor for various music publishing companies and is currently a consulting editor for The Instrumentalist magazine. Battisti constantly contributes articles on wind ensemble/band literature, conducting and music education to professional journals and magazines and is considered one of the foremost authorities in the world on wind music literature. He is the co-author of Score Study for the Wind Band Conductor (1990) and author of The 20th Centu!y American Wind Band/Ensemble (1995) and The Winds of Change (2002).

In 1986 and again in 1993, Mr. Battisti was a visiting fellow at Clare Hall, Cambridge University, England. He has received many awards and honors including an Honorary Doctor of Music degree from Ithaca College in 1992, the first Louis and Adrienne Krasner Excellence in Teaching Award from the New England Conservatory of Music in 1997, the Lowell Mason Award from the Massachusetts Music Educators Association in 1998, the New England College Band Association's Lifetime Achievement Award in 1999 and the Midwest International Band and Orchestra Clinic's Medal of Honor in 2001.

In 2000, he was appointed the inaugural conductor of the Boston University Tanglewood Institute Young Artist Wind Ensemble. The following year, the institute established the "Frank L. Battisti Tangelwood Institute Conducting Residency," which is awarded each summer to a talented young wind ensemble conductor. Under Battisti's guidance the recipient participates in the Institute's Young Artists Wind Ensemble program as a conducting assistant and chamber coach. Each season the YAWE rehearses on the Tanglewood grounds, summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, performing their concerts in Ozawa Hall.

Thomas C. Duffy (born June 17, 1955) is Professor (adj) of Music in the School of Music and the Director of Bands at Yale University. He received his Bachelor of Science in Music Education (magna cum laude) and the first Master of Musical Arts in Composition from the University of Connecticut, and his Doctor of Musical Arts in Composition from Cornell University, where he studied with Karel Husa and Steven Stucky. He has taught music courses at the Hartford Conservatory, the University of Connecticut, the Auburn Maximum Security Correctional Facility, Cornell University, and Yale University. He was Associate Dean (1996-2000), the first Deputy Dean (2000-2005) and Acting Dean (2005-06) of the Yale School of Music.

Recordings and performances of Mr. Duffy's music include those by college bands, orchestras, and wind ensembles throughout the world. Mr. Duffy has conducted bands and orchestras throughout the United States and Japan, England, France, Ireland, Finland and Italy.

He has served as president of the New England College Band Association, president of the CBDNA (College Band Directors National Association) Eastern Division, president of Connecticut Composers Inc., publicity co-chairman for the World Association of Symphonic Bands and Ensembles, chairman of the Connecticut Music Educators Association Professional Affairs and Government Relations Committees, and a member of American Composers Alliance, BMI, and the American Bandmasters Association. Mr. Duffy is President of the College Band Directors National Association, Music Editor of the American Composers Forum Bandquest Series, and a member of the Board of Directors of the New Haven Symphony Orchestra and Music Haven. He is a member of the Tanglewood II Planning Committee and was a member of the Tanglewood II Symposium in 2008. His music is published by American Composers Alliance, Ludwig Music and Bourne Company Music Publishers. Dr. Duffy was selected as Outstanding Music Educator of the Year by the Connecticut Music Educators Association (1996) and was awarded the Tercentennial Composition Medal (2001) and the Cultural Leadership Citation (2008) by the Yale School of Music. (May 2008)

In addition to composing music for world-class musicians and ensembles, Duffy has had a commitment to writing music for musicians at the beginning and middle stages of musical attainment, and is frequently commissioned by middle, high school and college bands. Recently he has pioneered a new genre of musical composition/ conducting - music that requires a bi-lateral conductor, that is, a conductor who can conduct different meters with each hand simultaneously (sharing downbeats).

David Morrison received his formal training in music at the University of Illinois, where he earned his Music Education Bachelor of Science degree in 1973 and his Masters degree in 1977. From 1973 to 1977, he was Director of Bands at East Richland High School in Olney, Illinois. From 1977 until 2006, he was the Director of Bands at Prospect High School in Mt. Prospect, Illinois, where he developed and maintained a nationally recognized band program for 29 years. He is currently the band director at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Honors that he has received include the Citation of Excellence from the National Band Association, election to the Phi Beta Mu National Band Director’s Honorary Fraternity, winner of Outstanding Contributions to Education Award at Prospect High School on two occasions, Outstanding Chicagoland Music Educator Award in 1992, the Shining Star Award in 1995, and nomination for the Golden Apple Award in 2001. In 2003, Mr. Morrison was honored as the State of Illinois Teacher of the Year. In 2005, he was inducted into the Phi Beta Mu Bandmaster's Hall of Fame at Northwestern University, and in 2006 he received the John Paynter Lifetime Achievement Award. Although recently retired, Mr. Morrison continues to guest conduct, clinic, and adjudicate music groups throughout the U.S. and the world. Mr. Morrison has served as adjunct music faculty for Northern Illinois University, VanderCook College of Music, and DePaul University. Most recently, Mr. Morrison served as guest conductor at the Singapore American School in the Far East, he conducted the Illinois All State Band in January of 2009, and he served as interim conductor of the Illinois Wesleyan University Wind Ensemble the fall semester of 2008. Mr. Morrison traveled to Australia in June 2009 to conduct the Moriah College Music Camp.

Under the direction of David Morrison, the Prospect bands were exceptionally successful. The Symphonic band won numerous honors, including consistent first division awards from the Illinois High School Association State Band Contest, first division awards at the Chicagoland Symphonic Band Festival, and the Honor Band Award at the prestigious Superstate Band Festival. Similarly, the Prospect Marching Band won competitions throughout the state of Illinois and the country, including winning the Grand Champion Governor’s Trophy at the University of Illinois’ Illini Marching Festival 23 consecutive years. Auditioning among outstanding bands throughout the State of Illinois, the Prospect Symphonic Band was consistently selected to the University of Illinois Superstate Band Festival. In 2005, the Band was chosen for the second time to perform as the Superstate Honor Band at Krannert Center’s Foehlinger Great Hall in Champaign, Illinois on May 6, 2006.

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