The music faculty at West Liberty University are excited to announce a new competition and festival – the Creative Musical Arts Competition (CMAC)! We welcome project submissions from West Virginia, Ohio, and Pennsylvania high school students. The projects may be in any scope chosen by the student including performance, composition, theory, history, or pedagogy, among others. We also welcome a variety of formats that the student projects may take – the competition will include (at least) the following categories:

1. Recorded performances
2. Original compositions
3. Research papers
4. Poster presentations

Requirement: Each entry must have a teacher-sponsor to be accepted into the competition – high school band and choir directors, general music teachers and/or other appropriate teachers to coach, direct, conduct and/or generally serve in an advisory role for students and their projects.

Teachers: the current pandemic situation and various health and safety guidelines may make “typical” classroom practices and procedures very difficult or impossible, and we hope that the West Liberty University CMAC offers an incentive for music students and teachers to engage in all kinds of creative performance, academic and/or collaborative opportunities. The submission deadline may correlate well with students’ final projects for the semester.

Directors: please submit recorded performances of your ensembles. There will be one (1) category for all solo performances, regardless of instrument or voice type, and one (1) category for all ensemble performances (instrumental, vocal and mixed). We are doing this in hopes of encouraging creativity and collaboration between vocal and instrumental students – as well as those students that are both!

Creativity: Furthermore, we hope you consider collaborating with students and teachers from other disciplines (art, dance etc.) as well. An example of a creative collaborative project might be:

• An art student makes visual art (drawing, painting etc.),
• Another student takes the art as the basis for writing an original composition,
• A third student (or ensemble) plays the original composition around the art display.

Inquiries and guidance: The West Liberty University faculty are here to help guide your ideas, hone your topic, suggest resources and provide feedback from students and teacher-sponsors. Please contact the director of the CMAC, Dr. Mitch Greco, so that he can connect you with the appropriate faculty member.

Dr. Mitch Greco, Director of CMAC (mitchell.greco@westliberty.edu)
Dr. Anna Stephan-Robinson: Head of Musicology and Theory
Dr. Gretchen Pohlman: Head of Ensemble Performance
Dr. Caryn Crozier: Head of Solo Performance
Dr. Ryan Keeling: Head of Composition