Thanks to the hard work of his wife and others in the community, a tribute to a beloved Pickerington high school band director has grown, in the four years since his death, into a tribute to high school band directors all across the United States.
Michael Sewell started as band director at Pickerington High School in 1981. He remained there when the school became Pickerington High School Central in 2003 and until his retirement in 2015.
Sewell died in 2017 at age 59. Not long after, his widow, Karen Sewell, established the Michael Sewell Foundation.
Photos courtesy of Saluting America's Band Directors
Sewell led his high school’s band to the Tournament of Roses Parade – commonly known as the Rose Parade – in Pasadena four times (1993, 1996, 2006 and 2010) during his tenure in Pickerington. It only made sense for the foundation to connect with the parade in some way.
After seeing a tremendous outpouring of community support at Sewell’s memorial service, Karen and band parent Jim Kuebler, who had organized those four trips to Pasadena, started brainstorming ways to bring the Pickerington high school bands back to the Rose Parade.
The bands did, in fact, return in 2019. But Karen and the foundation had bigger plans – plans that would eventually become Saluting America’s Band Directors. That’s the name of the animated float that will lead a marching band consisting entirely of marching band directors at the Rose Parade on Jan. 1.
“We wanted a float that captured the fun and excitement and family feeling students, directors and fans get when a marching band takes the field,” Karen says.
The float was designed by Artistic Entertainment Services. It features three 15 ½-foot tall band members – playing the bass drum, piccolo and trombone – and an equally colossal director that may, Karen says, bear some resemblance to Michael. The foundation wanted to take inspiration from everything Michael did for music and music students in Pickerington and to bring attention to the hard work of band directors all across the country.
“There are a lot of Mike Sewells out there who deserve recognition and celebrating,” Karen says. “If we can focus attention on the importance of music education for a few minutes and get them some thank-yous, our efforts have been worth it.”
Saluting America’s Band Directors quickly became an involved process. There were 150 directors already signed up to march in 2021 when COVID-19 struck, pushing plans for the float and procession to 2022. The band now anticipates some 280 directors, ages 19 to 73, coming from all 50 states and Mexico to play “Seventy-Six Trombones” from The Music Man.
“We found out last year how important bands were … when they weren’t there, especially at the college level,” Karen says.
In addition to the band directors, several community figures will be recognized and ride on the float itself, including former Pickerington Local Schools Superintendent Dan Ross, who played a key role in recruiting and raising awareness for the float project, and Janelle Guirreri, a former Pickerington marching band member and current music teacher at Fairfield and Violet elementary schools.
Members of the Pickerington community can be part of the float by buying a rose in honor of a band director, important musical figure or even a parent who diligently drove them to rehearsals. The names will then be part of the float itself, the bottom of which will be covered with live roses. Contributions can be made at www.banddirectorsalute.org.
Though Karen says Michael might think an entire float and marching band in the Rose Parade a bit much, he would have been thrilled about the promotion of music education and the life skills it imparts.
“He loved his students and teaching in Pickerington and loved having his students shine in service projects around the central Ohio area,” she says. “The combined concerts at Labor Day, the annual Memorial Day concert at … Central for Veterans and military, the performances and collecting for Ronald McDonald House – it all started with Mike.”
The foundation has sponsored an award, the Tournament of Roses Michael D. Sewell Service Through Music Award, every year since 2017. It recognizes, with a $500 stipend and a framed trophy and picture, a participating Rose Parade band that practices and values service to others.
“This was the ultimate lesson Mike Sewell always strived to teach to his students,” Karen says.
In addition to its Rose Parade involvements, the foundation supports the arts in Pickerington, including the schools’ music and theater programs as well as Pickerington Community Theatre and Pickerington Community Chorus.
The organization has also worked with the Pickerington High School North band to raise $6,000 to purchase shoes for a Puerto Rico marching band that lost a substantial amount of equipment to Hurricane Maria in 2017. Karen hopes to continue with those initiatives to expand the foundation’s local-level work beyond Pickerington in the future.
Garth Bishop is a contributing writer. Feedback welcome at feedback@cityscenemediagroup.com.
