Profile Paula Powell
Paula Powell was born in Maine and grew up in Pennsylvania. She loved singing and playing piano from a young age. Throughout high school, she participated in choir, band, and orchestra, and took piano and voice lessons.
She majored in vocal performance at Gordon College in Massachusetts and later went back to school to get a teaching license in music education. For many years, she taught choir and general music in Pennsylvania before moving to Ohio. After moving to the area, she taught at Troy Christian High School for six years and then went back to school to get a master’s degree in vocal pedagogy from the Ohio State University. Her career then took her to Wilberforce University, where she had a thriving voice studio. In 2010, she accepted a position as the choir magnet director at Stivers School for the Arts.
In addition to teaching, she sings with the Dayton Opera Chorus and the Dayton Philharmonic Chorus.
Q. Can you share more about your day-to-day responsibilities as the choir magnet director at Stivers?
A. In my current role, I have bell-to-bell choir rehearsals! I teach two middle school choirs, two intermediate/advanced choirs, and two honors choirs. In addition to the daily teaching schedule, I make connections with the community. My groups have performed at the Schuster, Victoria Theater, CultureWorks events, and local churches and community groups. We have also collaborated with local university music programs and of course, have our regular concert and contest schedule. This time of year, I am also involved in musical rehearsals after school.
Q. What is the most rewarding part about being a DPS teacher?
A. Besides the amazing talent of the students, I have incredible colleagues who are quick to celebrate one another’s accomplishments.
As a choir director, I also get to be both a teacher and an artist. I love teaching, but it is incredibly thrilling when your student musicians take what you’ve taught them to a new level of artistry and we just fall in sync and make beautiful music together.
Q. What do you consider to be your greatest career achievement?
A. I’d like to think there’s more to come and I haven’t achieved the “greatest” yet. In 2020, I submitted a Chamber Choir recording to the selection committee for acceptance to the Ohio Choral Director’s Association’s (OCDA) summer conference. They were selected, and I was elated! We were going to perform at the 2020 conference, but the pandemic canceled that event.
Last year, I submitted the Chorale’s recording and we were accepted again. We performed before an audience of highly esteemed choral conductors from around the state. It was really an amazing experience. The students had to give up some of their summer vacation to rehearse and perform, but they made me very proud!
Q. Some of your students have the opportunity to perform at Carnegie Hall in March. Can you share more about how this opportunity came about?
A. After the Chorale’s success at OCDA, I wanted to do something for the Chamber Choir because they didn’t get the opportunity to perform in 2020. I started looking for meaningful opportunities for them to perform and discovered a program through Manhattan Concert Productions that offers select high school and college choirs the chance to do a festival residency with a renowned choral conductor, culminating in a concert at Carnegie Hall. I submitted recordings and we were accepted.
Since then, we’ve been raising money and learning repertoire in preparation for our trip. Our students will be working with Dr. Derrick Fox from the University of Nebraska-Omaha. His choir will also be participating.
Q. What will students gain from this experience?
A. Whenever people get to travel outside their community, it is an important experience. New York is the epicenter of arts and culture in our country, and Carnegie Hall is the most perfectly acoustically designed theater. Our students will have an opportunity to hear themselves sing in that magnificent venue!