Throughout his career, Richard Kravchak has held a variety of roles from K-12 music teacher through leadership positions in comprehensive higher education institutions.
the students and their community, he taught them from “a musicianship point of view” by “always learning to sing and perform their music in solfeggio before playing it.” His Canoga Park High School bands only played classical music arrangements on the field. Kravchak would then take his students to Los Angeles Philharmonic performances of the full version of the pieces those students played at halftime. Not only did his students benefit from hearing world class performances of the music that they were studying, but Kravchak would train his students in proper concert etiquette such as how to dress and behave in a professional manner. “This remarkable group of students won the Los Angeles Unified Band and Drill Team Championship in their division five out of seven years that I was fortunate enough to teach them,” Kravchak said. On the University level, Kravchak’s experience brought him to: Luther College in Decorah, Iowa (double reeds, saxophone and music appreciation); California State University, Dominguez Hills (chair of the Department of Music, leader of the music education program, studio woodwinds); Marshall University (professor of oboe and founding director of the School of Music and Theatre); University of Southern Mississippi (director of the School of
“ One never goes wrong following one’s passion so long as we are practical about how to monetize that passion.”
— Richard Kravchak
Music); and the College of Southern Nevada, our nation’s fifth largest community college.
Finding His Instrument Kravchak’s choice to learn the oboe “had little to do with the oboe or its sound!” He wanted to attend summer school with his friends and his only option was to learn an instrument. He picked the oboe because it was not a brass instrument and was available to a rising fourth grade student, unlike the saxophone or bassoon. “I didn’t select the clarinet, because I worried that the name sounded too much like ‘cornet’ and that it might somehow be a stealth brass instrument,” Kravchak said. “I was the only oboe player, which as an only child, I really liked.” WINTER 2022
I the triangle
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