Music, Theatre, Dance Faculty & Staff
Last Name
Schut
First Name
Joel
Email
schutjo@gvsu.edu
Title
Director of Symphony Orchestra, Associate Professor of Music Education
Website
Office Address
1217 Haas Center for Performing Arts
About
Joel Schut is Director of Orchestras at Grand Valley State University where he teaches courses in conducting, orchestral performance, and music education. He previously served on faculty at the University of Colorado Boulder, the Crane School of Music SUNY-Potsdam, and in the Michigan public schools. He is an active conductor clinician for all-state, regional, and honor orchestras, and a passionate advocate for school music programs throughout the country. He serves as Music Director of the Grand Rapids Youth Symphony & Classical Orchestra.
As a conductor, he has appeared with the Grand Rapids Symphony, Crane Symphony Orchestra, Michigan State Opera Theatre, Michigan State Symphony Orchestra, the University of Colorado Boulder Symphony, Philharmonia, and Chamber Orchestras, and All State and Regional Honors Orchestras of Michigan, Utah, Idaho, Kentucky, Maryland, Ohio, Virginia, and Colorado. He served as Music Director of the Livingston Symphony Orchestra, founding director of the Detroit Medical Orchestra, conductor of the Denver Young Artists Conservatory Orchestra, and organizer of the Michigan Teachers Orchestra. He has collaborated with a range of professional artists including Andrés Cárdenas and Ralph Votapek and commissioned works for string and full orchestra.
A dedicated educator, his research and service include work as a conductor-teacher trainer and advocate for cross-cultural music making. He has conducted and performed with students in the US, China, Germany, Honduras, Tunisia, Mexico, Myanmar, and Afghanistan, and mentored young teachers nationally and internationally. A graduate of the YOA Orchestra of the Americas Global Leaders Program, he served as a program mentor connecting innovators in youth orchestra education throughout the Americas.
He has presented clinics and workshops at the Midwest International Band and Orchestra Clinic, the American String Teachers Association National Conference, and several state and digital conferences. His publications have been featured in Teaching Music Through Performance in Orchestra (GIA), Teaching Instrumental Music(Oxford), the American String Teacher Journal, and Southwestern Musician Magazine. He received his Doctorate in Orchestral Conducting from Michigan State University, Masters in Orchestral Conducting from the University of Colorado-Boulder and Bachelors in Violin Performance and Music Education from the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre and Dance where he was awarded the Albert A. Stanley Medal, the school's highest honor.