Greater Southwest Music Festival

Greater Southwest Music Festival The Greater Southwest Music Festival is held annually in Amarillo, Texas for regional performers.

Greater Southwest Music Festival encourages the highest performance standards and the greatest educational opportunities for your students. Beautiful facilities and some of the nation's finest educators combine to provide a wholesome, balanced festival experience for directors, students, and parents. The Festival is open to elementary through high school students. Competitions for:
Band
Jazz Band

Choir
Show Choir
Orchestra

Solo and Ensemble Contest
Competitions for Piano, Vocal, Band & Orchestra

Audio Recordings by Audio Refinery
Video Recordings by New Day Productions

Congratulations to all our Best In Class groups!!CHOIRS6th Grade Choir - Fannin Middle School (Director: Jonathan Enriqu...
05/05/2026

Congratulations to all our Best In Class groups!!

CHOIRS
6th Grade Choir - Fannin Middle School (Director: Jonathan Enriquez)

Elementary Choir - Western Plateau Elementary School (Director: Mary Ferguson)

Middle School Non-Varsity Tenor/Bass Choir - Laura Bush Middle School • Lubbock, TX (Director: Jana Zacharias)

Middle School Non-Varsity Treble Choir - Shallowater Middle School • Shallowater, TX (Director: Cindy Starcher)

Middle School Varsity Tenor/Bass Choir - Bonham Middle School (Director: Lizabeth Manfredi)

Middle School Varsity Treble Choir - Bonham Middle School (Director: Lizabeth Manfredi)

High School Non-Varsity Mixed Choir - Shallowater High School • Shallowater, TX (Director: Cindy Starcher)

High School Non-Varsity Treble Choir - Clovis High School • Clovis, NM (Director: Tami Martin)

High School Varsity Mixed Choir - Hereford High School • Hereford, TX (Director: Codi Pesina)

High School Varsity Tenor/Bass Choir - Clovis High School • Clovis, NM (Director: Tami Martin)

High School Varsity Treble Choir - Talkington School for Young Women Leaders • Lubbock, TX (Director: Donna Barbee)

Special Choir - Amarillo Youth Choirs (Director: Brooklyn Johnston)

Best Overall Choir - Amarillo Youth Choirs (Director: Brooklyn Johnston)

SHOW CHOIRS
Elementary Show Choir - Yarbro Elementary School • Lovington, NM (Director: Linda Cauthen)

High School Show Choir - Tascosa High School (Director: Tiffany Russell)

JAZZ BANDS
Middle School Jazz Band - Roosevelt Middle School • Tijeras, NM (Director: Louis Taylor)

High School Jazz Band - Amarillo High School (Director: Robert Hinds)

NON-VARSITY BANDS AND ORCHESTRAS
6th Grade Orchestra - Bowie 6th Grade Campus (Director: Fabian Saldana)

Beginning Orchestra - Sleepy Hollow Elementary (Director: Alejandra Attebury)

Small School Beginning Band - Pinnacle Intermediate School (Director: Wendy Denning)

Large School Beginning Band - Nimitz Middle School • Odessa, TX (Director: Channing Freeman)

Small Middle School Non-Varsity Band - West Plains Junior High School (Director: Alejandra Mulgado)

Large High School Non-Varsity Band - Caprock High School (Director: Alisha Granados)

Large Middle School Non-Varsity Band - Fannin Middle School (Director: Landon Camp)

Middle School Non-Varsity Orchestra - Bonham Middle School (Director: Danielle Kupresanin)

High School Non-Varsity Orchestra - Frenship & Memorial High Schools • Wolfforth, TX (Directors: Darcy Radcliffe & Paige Braly)

VARSITY BANDS AND ORCHESTRAS
Small Middle School Varsity Band - West Plains Junior High School (Director: Braden Lefevre)

Large Middle School Varsity Band - Crockett Middle School (Director: Barry Blackwell)

Middle School Varsity Orchestra - Talkington School for Young Women Leaders (Director: Joshua Allen)

Small High School Varsity Band - Canyon High School (Director: Eric Rath)

Large High School Varsity Band - Amarillo High School (Director: Robert Hinds)

High School Varsity Orchestra - Talkington School for Young Women Leaders • Lubbock, TX (Director: Joshua Allen)

High School Full Orchestra - Palo Duro High School (Directors: Ismael Alfaro, Anthony Newton, Raiden Fore)

Best Overall Orchestra - Talkington School for Young Women Leaders (Director: Joshua Allen)

Best Overall Band - Randall High School (Director: Ginger Denney)

🎵 JUDGE SPOTLIGHT! 🎵Our next judge is our Band Solo & Ensemble judge David Fortenberry.Mr. David Fortenberry has a bache...
04/29/2026

🎵 JUDGE SPOTLIGHT! 🎵

Our next judge is our Band Solo & Ensemble judge David Fortenberry.

Mr. David Fortenberry has a bachelor’s degree in Music Education from Texas Tech University and a Master of Music Degree from Eastern New Mexico University. He taught band for 39 years in UIL class C, CC, 3A, 4A, and 6A. He is an active UIL judge, consultant, and clinician.

David’s bands won numerous festivals and “Best in Class” honors. His bands advanced to the Texas State Honor Band Finals many times, including AAA third runner-up in 2003 and AAA second runner-up in 2005. In 2012, Mr. Fortenberry twice conducted the opening fanfare with the Dallas Winds at the Meyerson Symphony Center, and in 2013, performed as a trumpet soloist with Doc Severinsen and the Allen Philharmonic. He is a member of Kappa Kappa Psi, Phi Mu Alpha, and in 1993 was inducted into the International Band Director Fraternity Phi Beta Mu.

Mr. Fortenberry taught at Andrews HS, Monahans Middle School, Midland Greenwood HS, Plainview HS, Allen HS, and Haggard Middle School (Plano). He served several years as the Region Band Chairman in Region 6 (Midland) and Region 16 (Lubbock). David served many years on the ATSSB State Board.

While in Midland, Mr. Fortenberry was the official bugler for the Midland Police Department and served on the Crime Prevention Commission for the City of Midland. He has been a church choir director for 21 years. In retirement, he enjoys helping local school bands and building houses in Mexico with “Casas por Cristo”, a Christian non-profit organization building homes for needy families in several locations in Central America.

Just a couple of days until the start of our festival! We are excited for our special events and workshops this year. We...
04/28/2026

Just a couple of days until the start of our festival! We are excited for our special events and workshops this year. We hope to see you there!

🎵 JUDGE SPOTLIGHT! 🎵Our next judge is one of our non-varsity Concert Band & Orchestra judges, Mack Bibb.Mr. Mack Bibb re...
04/28/2026

🎵 JUDGE SPOTLIGHT! 🎵

Our next judge is one of our non-varsity Concert Band & Orchestra judges, Mack Bibb.

Mr. Mack Bibb retired from public school education following thirteen years as Director of Bands at Coronado High School in Lubbock. Before coming to Coronado, he was Director of Bands at Seymour High School and was also the assistant director at Monterey High School in Lubbock. Mr. Bibb has thirty-eight years of experience and has taught at every level from beginning band to university band and music education classes. His bands have consistently earned superior ratings in UIL competition, and his students have been successful at both regional and state levels. Many of his students have also gone on to have successful careers in the field of music education.

In addition to his service at Seymour and Coronado, Mr. Bibb has served in an interim capacity as the Director of Bands at Wayland Baptist University and Lubbock Christian University. He also served as the interim Fine Arts Director for the Lubbock Independent School District. Additionally, Mr. Bibb served eleven years as a consultant for Sundown ISD.

Mr. Bibb is in demand as a consultant, clinician and adjudicator throughout Texas and New Mexico. His professional affiliations are the Texas Music Educators Association, the Texas Music Adjudicators Association, the Texas Bandmasters Association and Phi Beta Mu, an international band director’s association. Mr. Bibb was privileged to be one of the directors for the All-Lubbock Marching Band as they participated in the 2012 Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena, California. Additionally, the Coronado Band was honored to have been chosen as one of five high school bands in the nation to participate in the St. Patrick’s Day Parade in Dublin, Ireland in March 2014. Mr. Bibb has been selected for induction into the Texas Bandmasters Hall of Fame this coming July.

Mr. Bibb and his wife, Janey, have been married 50 years and have three grown children and nine grandchildren.

🎵 JUDGE SPOTLIGHT! 🎵Our next judge spotlight is our Jazz Bands judge, Nick Scales.Nick Scales has served as Associate Pr...
04/24/2026

🎵 JUDGE SPOTLIGHT! 🎵

Our next judge spotlight is our Jazz Bands judge, Nick Scales.

Nick Scales has served as Associate Professor of Double Bass in the School of Music at West Texas A&M University and Principal Bassist of the Amarillo Symphony since 2005. He is also Principal Bassist of the Utah Festival Opera Orchestra and Musical Theater Company as well as bassist for Polk Street Jazz and The Martinis in Amarillo. Scales is an accomplished, versatile performer who is comfortable in solo, orchestral, jazz and chamber music explorations. Performance credits include eleven years as core section bass in the Dallas Opera orchestra as well as numerous regional orchestral positions such as substitute performing with the San Antonio, Fort Worth, Tulsa and Shreveport Symphonies. He has also performed numerous solo, chamber recitals and guest performances and presented many pedagogical clinics throughout his career. In 2012, Scales was invited to perform as a faculty bassist at the Orfeo Music Festival in Vipiteno, Italy.

Scales serves at WTAMU as professor of double bass and is coordinator of the Music Business degree program. His teaching duties include jazz bass, electric bass, jazz ensembles, music theory, music business courses and music appreciation. He has also served as interim coordinator of the music with elective studies in business degree and instructor of string techniques. Administratively, Scales serves as director for the WTAMU Chamber Music Strings Camp and string area coordinator within the School of Music. He is active in the Texas music education community and has given numerous clinics and presentations for various educational programs. He’s a member of the International Society of Bassists and has served as an adjudicator in the ISB international young bassists competition as well as editor of the Roll Call column in Bass World magazine.

Scales lives in Amarillo with his wife Lori, who is the A*O assistant principal double bassist. They love to perform together as well as travel and be outdoors.

🎵 JUDGE SPOTLIGHT! 🎵Our next judge spotlight is our Vocal Solo & Ensemble judge, Johnny Miller.Johnny Miller is a retire...
04/24/2026

🎵 JUDGE SPOTLIGHT! 🎵

Our next judge spotlight is our Vocal Solo & Ensemble judge, Johnny Miller.

Johnny Miller is a retired Borger ISD Director of Choral Arts who expected excellence from his middle and high school choirs. Miller has taught for 36 years, beginning his career in his hometown of Pecos, where he taught for 2 years. A stint of three years followed in Spearman before he joined the Borger schools. By his 29th and final year at Borger, Miller had over 67 students make the All-State Choir, 2 of whom have been four-year All-State Choir members. His program had also received state and national recognition, being honored as one of the top 100 communities in the nation for music education in 2001. He was honored by Texas Governor Rick Perry with this award.

Miller has had consecutive sweepstakes awards for the Varsity Honors Choir for over 20 years, along with numerous superior ratings in concert/sight-reading and solo and ensemble contests. His students have also received outstanding, superior, and excellent ratings at State Solo and Ensemble contests. The choir room at Borger High School was renamed the Johnny L. Miller Choir Room in his honor in 2006 as a gift from the senior class.

Miller is not one who could just walk away and retire from his passion after only 35 years. He formed the Texas Panhandle Youth Choirs in partnership with Frank Phillips College in September 2016. Miller started this to meet the needs of talented student singers who do not have a choir offered in their community schools, who are home-schooled, or who just want to sing more and want to share in his passion for the choral arts. Enrollment for this program went from 0 to 52 singers in just the first 2 months of its establishment.

🎵 JUDGE SPOTLIGHT! 🎵Our next judge spotlight is our final Concert Choir judge, Sean Pullen.Dr. Sean Pullen has earned di...
04/23/2026

🎵 JUDGE SPOTLIGHT! 🎵

Our next judge spotlight is our final Concert Choir judge, Sean Pullen.

Dr. Sean Pullen has earned distinguished recognition as a choral conductor, clinician, choral arranger and singer. Since 2012, he has been privileged to be the Director of Choral Activities at the West Texas A&M University School of Music. The WT choirs under his direction have appeared on stage at the Texas Music Educators Association conventions in 2016 and 2024, and for the Southwest American Choral Directors Association Graduate Conductors competition in 2022.

As a choral pedagogue, he has been awarded twice by the Harrington College of Fine Arts and Humanities for his instructional contributions. He is frequently called upon as a clinician and adjudicator for festivals and contests throughout Texas. His writing is published in two volumes of Teaching Music Through Performance in Choir, by GIA publications.

Pullen began in 1998 at Clear Creek High School in League City, Texas, where the Symphonic Chorale earned invitations to perform for the Texas Music Educators Association in 2004 and 2007 and the American Choral Directors Association in 2005 and 2009. In the fall of 2009, he began collegiate work at Abilene Christian University, where his choirs were privilege to be invited to sing for the Ascending Voice Symposium in Malibu, California.

Since 2017, in collaboration with the West Texas A&M University Symphony Orchestra, the WT choirs have annually produced PBS and CBS broadcasted performances of “The Sounds of the Season.” Several of Pullen’s choral arrangements have been performed for these concerts and for conferences in Texas and Oklahoma.

Pullen lives in Canyon, Texas with his wife Amanda. They are the proud parents of Megan, who is a student at Harvard College and Jenna, who is a student at Canyon High School.

🎵 JUDGE SPOTLIGHT! 🎵Our next judge spotlight is one of our Piano Solo & Ensemble judges, Richard Fountain.Richard Founta...
04/22/2026

🎵 JUDGE SPOTLIGHT! 🎵

Our next judge spotlight is one of our Piano Solo & Ensemble judges, Richard Fountain.

Richard Fountain serves as Dean and Professor of Piano in the School of Creative Arts at Wayland Baptist University in Plainview, TX, where he provides academic and strategic leadership in the areas of music, art, graphic design, media arts, and communications. Fountain teaches entrepreneurship, applied and collaborative piano, and piano pedagogy in both traditional and online formats, and also serves as Wayland’s official institutional representative to the National Association of Schools of Music. As a performer he has enjoyed a varied career as soloist, orchestral pianist, collaborator, and chamber musician.

Fountain is one of very few pianists to perform the complete cycle of Franz Liszt’s monumental transcriptions of Beethoven’s nine symphonies. His solo and concerto repertoire highlights American music from all eras, and he is also devoted to the poetic and religious music of Liszt.

Fountain holds the positions of Principal Keyboard with Lincoln’s Symphony Orchestra and the Lubbock Symphony Orchestra. His major teachers and mentors include David Gerard, Leon Harshenin, Paul Barnes, Malcolm Bilson, and Luiz de Moura Castro. He holds a BM from Taylor University, MM and DMA from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and an MBA from Wayland Baptist University.
Fountain served as President of the Texas Music Teachers Association from 2022-2024 and was inducted into the Steinway & Sons Teacher Hall of Fame in 2021. He has received numerous awards for professional activities, teaching, and service from the Lubbock Music Teachers Association, the Nebraska Alumni Association, and from his colleagues at Wayland. He has been named as the 2024 MTNA Fellow for the state of Texas.

Fountain is an enthusiastic traveler, having traveled to forty-six of the fifty United States and fifteen other countries. He particularly loves long road trips on the open highways of America, and possesses a strangely comprehensive knowledge of the U.S. Interstate Highway system.

🎵 JUDGE SPOTLIGHT! 🎵Our next judge spotlight is another one of our Concert Choir judges, Kyle Pullen.Dr. Kyle Pullen was...
04/21/2026

🎵 JUDGE SPOTLIGHT! 🎵

Our next judge spotlight is another one of our Concert Choir judges, Kyle Pullen.

Dr. Kyle Pullen was named the Director of Choral Activities at Harding University in the fall of 2023, where he directs the University Chorus and Chamber Singers. He also teaches private voice, conducting, and choral methods. Prior to his appointment at Harding, he spent eleven years serving as the Director of Choral Activities at Oklahoma Christian University. He also spent fourteen years as a choral director at Clear Creek High School in League City, Texas. Dr. Pullen’s choirs have performed eight times as honor choirs on state, regional, and national level stages, including the ACDA National conventions in 2005 and 2009. Dr. Pullen is an active member of the American Choral Directors Association, the Arkansas Choral Directors Association, the Texas Choral Directors Association, and the National Association of Teachers of Singing.

This week we are representing the Greater Southwest Music Festival at the Oklahoma Music Educators Association winter co...
01/22/2026

This week we are representing the Greater Southwest Music Festival at the Oklahoma Music Educators Association winter conference in Tulsa, OK! Glad to meet so many Oklahoma educators!

(And don’t worry, we plan to get home before the snow storm ❄️)

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Amarillo, TX
79101

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Monday 9am - 5pm
Tuesday 9am - 5pm
Wednesday 9am - 5pm
Thursday 9am - 5pm
Friday 9am - 5pm

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