John P. Morneau

Affiliation: Music
Director of the Bowdoin Concert Band

John P. Morneau is a native of Berlin, New Hampshire and a graduate of the University of New Hampshire.  Mr. Morneau has taught music at all levels including elementary, secondary, college and adult.  He has taught music in Wisconsin and New Hampshire, and since 1979, here in Maine.  Mr. Morneau has served as Director of the Bowdoin College Concert Band since 1988.  He is also the Director of Bands at the Great Salt Bay Community School in Damariscotta.  For thirteen years he served as associate, and then principal conductor of the Casco Bay Concert Band.  He has also served as conductor of the Portland Youth Wind Ensemble (PYWE).

Mr. Morneau has served as a guest conductor, adjudicator, clinician and guest speaker in Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont.  He has also directed summer band camps in Maine, New Hampshire, and Wisconsin. Mr. Morneau currently serves as the conductor for both the University of Southern Maine Youth Band Day Camp and Southern Maine Junior Music Academy Concert Bands.

Mr. Morneau has been involved in the commissioning and premiere performance opportunities of over two-dozen new compositions for wind band. These works have been created by Bowdoin students, faculty and alumni, as well as other Maine and nationally recognized composers. Among the guest performers Mr. Morneau has conducted are Igor Begelman, renowned New York clarinetist; Ron Barron, former principal trombonist for the Boston Symphony; Kenneth Radnofsky, performer, teacher (New England Conservatory) and saxophonist for the Boston Symphony; Maine humorist, Randy Judkins; folk singer and songwriter, Josephine Cameron; and Timothy Johnson, tenor.

Professionally, Mr. Morneau has served as the Band Vice-President for the Maine Music Educators Association, as well as having served as the Maine representative to the New England College Band Association (NECBA).  Besides his membership in the state and national music educators’ organizations (MMEA, NAfME), he is also a member of the College Band Directors National Association (CBDNA).  In 2005, Mr. Morneau was recognized as the Maine District III Music Educator of the Year.  He is also listed in the Who’s Who of America’s Teachers.

Mr. Morneau is active as a free-lance woodwind performer having performed with, among others: The Temptations; Ringling Brothers, Barnum and Bailey Circus Band; Guy Lombardo’s Royal Canadians; Liberace; singer Steve Lippia; the Bangor Symphony Orchestra; jazz greats Dizzy Gillespie, Clark Terry, Wayne Bergeron, Eric Marienthal and Dick Johnson; as well as having served as a regular member of the Don Doane Big Band, and currently as a regular member of the Al Corey and Opus One Big Bands here in Maine.

Education

  • BM, University of New Hampshire