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Ep. 51 - Sibling Choral Conductors: A Literal Choir Fam - John Parezo & Stephanie Schumacher
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"I had already taught about a third of the students that we had at the opening of the school. We were able to hit the ground running. We spent a lot of time getting to know each other and team building. We built our own culture and have decided what we want to be." - John Parezo
"It's been a really cool experience for me to teach elementary students for the first time. What's still blowing my mind every week is how musical and tuneful and brilliant these little people really are and how quickly they soak things up like sponges. They just learn so fast." - Stephanie Schumacher
Stephanie Schumacher is wrapping up her first season with Honors Choirs of Southeast Minnesota as the conductor of both Children's Chorus and Treble Choir and the Director of Education and Enrichment. Honors Choirs is a nonprofit organization that serves about 300 students in grades 1-12 from all over southeast Minnesota. Stephanie holds a bachelor of arts in music education from Concordia College, where she studied with Dr. Rene Clausen. She has spent the last twelve years in the public schools, teaching everything from middle school band to high school chamber choir and directing musicals. Under her direction, many of her singers have participated in the MN All-State Choirs and ACDA Honor Choirs. At the height of the pandemic, her high school concert choir was selected to perform at the Minnesota Music Education Association Conference and was able to perform via videorecording, socially distanced and masked. This summer Stephanie will begin a three-year term as the Southeast District Chair for ACDA of Minnesota. She frequently serves as an adjudicator for MMEA, ACDA, and various local contests. Stephanie has sung with the Choral Arts Ensemble in Rochester, Minnesota, for past 15 seasons and serves as Alto I section leader. Stephanie lives in Zumbrota, Minnesota, with her husband, Aaron, who is also a choir director, and their children, Kate and Will.
John Parezo currently serves as the choir and show choir director at Jefferson High School in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. In just two years as a new school, the choir department has already grown in size and has started to be recognized for musical excellence in competitive show choirs and vocal jazz ensembles. Prior to the opening of Jefferson in 2021, John worked at Roosevelt High School as the assistant choir director for six years. He was the director of Roosevelt High School’s Chorale, RiderChor and Capitol Harmony show choir. He also co-conducted Mixed and Freshman Choruses. Under his direction, the Roosevelt RiderChor was invited to participate in and served as a featured performance choir for several festivals and conferences. Capitol Harmony show choir earned several grand champion placements in unisex division competition along with numerous evening finals placements. John is currently the All-State Show Choir Chair for the South Dakota High School Activities Association and President-Elect for South Dakota Region II Music. John was named Roosevelt High School Assistant Director of the Year for both the 2018-19 and the 2016-17 school years. He was also the 2017 SD-ACDA Overture Award recipient - an award given to outstanding choral directors in their first five years of teaching.
To get in touch with Steph, you can find her on Instagram (@honorschoirs) or visit honorschoirs.org. To get in touch with John, find him on Instagram (@sfjeffersonchoirs) or visit
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