Students tuning in and tuning up for April music performance

FALLS VILLAGE — Tucked away in a quiet corner of Housatonic Valley Regional High School are music students, learning music theory and composition and playing a wide range of styles.

Music teacher Tom Krupa (no relation to Gene Krupa) is in his third year at the high school. His program involves 83 students in the various instrumental groups, plus around 70 in the chorus.

Krupa has students learning composition and transcription, with the assistance of computer technology that is mind-boggling to someone, like this reporter, who studied music in the late 1970s.

Students often want to work up a particular piece that has caught their attention.

One student, for example, wanted to perform “Don’t Stop Believing,� by 1980s arena-rock superstars Journey.

Alicia Simonetti-Shpur, a teacher from Cornwall Consolidated who works with the high school chorus, told the student, “If you can arrange it, we’ll do it.�

The student and Krupa went to work on it. A few days later, the arrangement was ready.

Krupa describes his students as “highly motivated,� often going beyond what is required of them.

His jazz band is so well-stocked this year that he has enough players in the rhythm section (piano, bass, drums and guitar) to have two bands going.

He said that Housatonic “is a fantastic place to work.

“I love being able to put on concerts for a public that supports it.�

About 70 students are heading to Florida’s Walt Disney World in April. They will perform in Disney Village and check out other high school bands as part of the 25th  anniversary Disney Magic Music Days. Fundraising efforts for the trip are going on throughout this and next month. Students perform as a chorus and as a band. Some schools do dance performances.

Krupa said his music students have eclectic musical tastes — and he welcomes their curiosity about different bands and genres. “This is the iPod generation,� he said.

“They have access to a larger and more diverse collection than students in the past.�

He said students had recently discovered Blood, Sweat and Tears and Tower of Power — groups not exactly in heavy rotation on MTV.

“They get excited about a style, and they download the music. Or their parents still have the records.

“And I challenge them to bring in something like Tower of Power and be excited about it.�