Large Group Updates

Thank You to those that have registered for the Regional and State Level CO ASTA Large Group Festivals. Please stay tuned for more information!

2021-2022 Large Group In-Person Dates:

Monday, 3/7 - Longmont HS

Tuesday,  3/8 - Cherokee Trail HS

Wednesday, 3/9 - Fort Collins HS

State: April 20/21 at CU Boulder

THANK YOU to the schools, ensembles, and directors who participated in our virtual large group festival for the 2020-2021 school year: 

Castle View High School

Cherokee Trail High School

Frederick High School

Grandview High School

Horizon High School

Kinard Middle School

Lesher Middle School

Thomas MacLaren School

William J. Palmer High School

Congratulations to all of the musicians and directors on their fantastic performances! -

Western States

In lieu of the Festival being cancelled again this year, please be on the lookout for a General Membership Meeting that will take place virtually during the month of November!

CMEA 2022 Updates

CO ASTA is proud to be hosting our CMEA Headliner, Becky Bush. Ms. Bush will be presenting on the topics of tone quality within your orchestra, rehearsal strategies for middle school orchestra, and "Sensational Warm-Ups" for Orchestras. We hope to see many of our chapter members at this year's CMEA conference!

Find out more about Ms. Bush here.

We will also host a General Membership Meeting at 12:00 PM on Saturday, January 29, 2022. We hope to see you all there!

The window is now open to submit your applications and sound files to be considered and selected as a performing group for the 2022 CMEA Conference.  Applications close on November 5, 2021. Click here for the application.

Registration

Early Bird registration opens August 1, 2021.

For updates and more information on the CMEA Conference, please visit the website.

State Awards - A Call For Nominations
We have so many incredible string educators in our chapter, and it is time to honor them! We will be honoring our 2020 winners again, along with our 2021 recipients at this year’s 2022 CMEA Conference.

To see past recipients, please check out our website. 

To nominate someone for these two awards, click here:

CO-ASTA Board Elections

We will be needing to elect a new President-Elect for the next Executive Board cycle. We also have an opening for our Southern Colorado Representative. Please click the following link to get plugged into the Board and/or Executive Board of this great organization!

National ASTA Conference 2022

Save the date for the National Conference! This year, the conference is in Atlanta, Georgia, March 16-19, 2022.

To stay up to date on conference information, check out the website.

National Orchestra Festival - Colorado Represents!

We are pleased to congratulate Kinard Middle School and the Northern Colorado Youth Orchestra on being selected for this year’s ASTA National Orchestra Festival! 

To the directors, Mrs. Leanne Griffey, Mr. Daniel Smith, Mrs. Alison Mayes, and Mr. Josh Greiner, you all make the Colorado Chapter of ASTA proud! Good luck to you and your students this coming school year. We can’t wait to watch your performance in Atlanta!

Private Teacher Retreat

Phil Ficsor and a crew of outstanding private teachers are wanting to meet in-person for the first-ever CO-ASTA Private Teacher Retreat! We are so excited for this event and hope that many of you will be able to attend! 

To register, scan the QR code on the attached flyer below or click HERE.

Facebook Postings
Do you follow us on Facebook? If not, you should! @ColoradoASTA

If you are a music store registered as an ASTA Business/Corporate Member of ASTA, please be on the lookout for a Music Store feature that we will be doing via social media. We want to make sure our members know about your stores and your services! We will be emailing you information on how to get featured in these postings.

If you like teaching strings and like free things, follow us on Facebook for upcoming events and giveaways!!!

Job Openings

As we go through educator hiring season, please check out the website often for new posts. Click here to view current job listings. 

If you know of any current string job openings, or any upcoming anticipated openings (retirements, maternity leave), please let us know. Send us the information and we'll put it on our website.

Check Your Membership

Please make sure your membership is current! Consider inviting colleagues and local organizations to join so that we can continue offering resources and advocacy throughout our state on behalf of string education. 

Looking to Advertise in the CASTA Newsletter?

Just a friendly reminder: if you would like to advertise with Colorado ASTA (on our website and in our newsletter), your business or organization must be an institutional member of ASTA. The membership rate is only $175 per year!

Looking to highlight success in the CASTA Newsletter?

Please send program, area, school highlights, stories, article ideas, etc. to Webmaster leannarutka@gmail.com for our monthly e-newsletter and website. We would love to show-off you and your students!

Additionally, Dr. Joel Schut from CU Boulder is serving as Editor for The American String Teacher Journal. You can send him your ideas at joel.schut@colorado.edu.

Do you have an article, announcement, or other information you'd like to share with the Colorado ASTA membership? If so, we'd love to include it in our monthly newsletter! Please send your newsletter submissions to leannarutka@gmail.com by the 20th of each month, and we will be sure to add them the next newsletter, which is published at the beginning of each month. Contact Leanna Rutka (leannarutka@gmail.com), Colorado ASTA webmaster and newsletter editor, with any questions.