Full Name
Carrie Backman
Job Title
Instrumental Music
Company
Edgewood High School
Speaker Bio
Carrie J. Backman teaches instrumental music at Edgewood High School and is the Director of Bands at Edgewood College in Madison, WI. Prior to Edgewood she taught at Murray County Central School District in Slayton, MN. An advocate of the living composer, Backman has commissioned collaborative student composition projects with Fred Sturm, Lo Marie, Shelley Hanson, Ricky Kirby, Jack Stamp, Michael Colgrass, and Kim Archer. She has also written all-school arts curricula in coordination with artists in residence from Jazz at Lincoln Center, bestselling authors Michael Perry and Jacquelyn Mitchard, and The Amigos Band.
Backman is the WMEA Band Chair, serves on the American Composers Forum BandQuest Curriculum Advisory Committee, is a curriculum writer for BandQuest and ChoralQuest through ACF, is the Academic Program Advisor for the UW-Madison Summer Music Clinic, where she has also served on the faculty, is the music director for the Overture Center's Jerry Awards High School Musical TheatreProgram, is a member of the World Adult Wind Orchestra Project, and free lances as a conductor, trombonist, euphonium player, and pianist in the Madison area.
Backman is the recipient of a College Band Director's National Association "Women in Conducting" Grant, the World Association of Symphonic Bands and Ensembles conducting grant, and a grant to study at Jazz at Lincoln Center. She is a 2015 recipient of the Herb Kohl Foundation Fellowship for excellence in teaching, a 2016 finalist for the Northwestern University Distinguished Teaching Award, and the 2019 Madison Area Music Association Music Teacher of the Year. Backman served as the Assistant Director of the University of Minnesota Marching Band in 2016-2017 in addition to other duties at the University of Minnesota School of Music.
Backman received her B.M. in Music Education with a focus in euphonium performance from the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, her Masters of Music Education from VanderCook College of Music in Chicago, IL, and pursues advanced level studies in wind band conducting at UW-Madison.
Backman is the WMEA Band Chair, serves on the American Composers Forum BandQuest Curriculum Advisory Committee, is a curriculum writer for BandQuest and ChoralQuest through ACF, is the Academic Program Advisor for the UW-Madison Summer Music Clinic, where she has also served on the faculty, is the music director for the Overture Center's Jerry Awards High School Musical TheatreProgram, is a member of the World Adult Wind Orchestra Project, and free lances as a conductor, trombonist, euphonium player, and pianist in the Madison area.
Backman is the recipient of a College Band Director's National Association "Women in Conducting" Grant, the World Association of Symphonic Bands and Ensembles conducting grant, and a grant to study at Jazz at Lincoln Center. She is a 2015 recipient of the Herb Kohl Foundation Fellowship for excellence in teaching, a 2016 finalist for the Northwestern University Distinguished Teaching Award, and the 2019 Madison Area Music Association Music Teacher of the Year. Backman served as the Assistant Director of the University of Minnesota Marching Band in 2016-2017 in addition to other duties at the University of Minnesota School of Music.
Backman received her B.M. in Music Education with a focus in euphonium performance from the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, her Masters of Music Education from VanderCook College of Music in Chicago, IL, and pursues advanced level studies in wind band conducting at UW-Madison.
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