Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp is a Michigan nonprofit organization located in the Manistee National Forest that provides summer fine arts camp and international exchange programs in music, art, dance, and drama. The Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp was founded as a non-profit organization in 1966 by the Stansell family, who remain the multi-generational proprietors of the institution.Journal of the Senate of the State of Michigan, 1991 p.1414, Senate Resolution 253 of 1990 The camp is located on approximately 1200 acres in the Manistee National Forest in Michigan. It can host 4500 Internationalidssmf Association for Jazz Education, Jazz Education Journal, 2001, NPN 5th through 12th grade students across several 12-day sessions each summer. It operates FM radio stationsBidgoli, Hossein, The Internet Encyclopedia, Volume 2, John Wiley & Sons, Hoboken NJ, 2004, P.677 locally and in

Grand Rapids Grand Rapids is a city and county seat of Kent County in the U.S. state of Michigan. At the 2020 census, the city had a population of 198,917 which ranks it as the second most-populated city in the state after Detroit. Grand Rapids is the ...

that are

National Public Radio National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from other n ...

affiliates. For Central campers, several options for fine arts are offered, including theater, band, choir, art, dance, and many others. Campers may also choose from many options for minors, such as conducting or team sports. In addition to the Central camp, there is the more relaxed Bernstein camp for younger students in grades 5th through 8th. Bernstein campers may choose between orchestra and band for their concentration. Blue Lake also offers adult camp programs. Like the youth programs, adult campers take part in daily instruction on their instrument as well as ensemble rehearsals. Access to the camp's recreational, elective instructional, and regular concert programs is available to all ages as well. Adult musicians may either stay on Blue Lake property in campers or tents in the Niblock camp ground, or find accommodation at local hotels.

International exchange

Blue Lake hosts international exchange students in the arts as well as organizing several ensembles of American students to travel to Europe and perform each year. These ensembles include, but are not limited to,

concert band A concert band, also called a wind band, wind ensemble, wind symphony, wind orchestra, symphonic band, the symphonic winds, or symphonic wind ensemble, is a performing ensemble consisting of members of the woodwind, brass, and percussion fami ...

jazz band A jazz band (jazz ensemble or jazz combo) is a musical ensemble that plays jazz music. Jazz bands vary in the quantity of its members and the style of jazz that they play but it is common to find a jazz band made up of a rhythm section and a h ...

orchestra An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families. There are typically four main sections of instruments: * bowed string instruments, such as the violin, viola, c ...

, and

choir A choir ( ; also known as a chorale or chorus) is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform. Choirs may perform music from the classical music repertoire, which sp ...

. These exchanges serve to expose students to other cultures and have been cited as “outstanding representatives of the United States”. The camp has also initiated such experiments in multi-cultural cooperation as the ''Blue Lake in Bavaria''

which was formed out of a mixture of American and European junior and senior high school students to rehearse and perform together over the course of a month.

Leonard Falcone

Prior to the founding of Blue Lake, Leonard Falcone,

baritone A baritone is a type of classical male singing voice whose vocal range lies between the bass and the tenor voice-types. The term originates from the Greek (), meaning "heavy sounding". Composers typically write music for this voice in the ...

virtuoso and Director of Bands at

Michigan State University Michigan State University (Michigan State, MSU) is a public land-grant research university in East Lansing, Michigan. It was founded in 1855 as the Agricultural College of the State of Michigan, the first of its kind in the United States. It ...

, had conducted many ''Youth Music at Michigan State'' summer camps in conjunction with, and support of, the Michigan School Band and Orchestra Association. At the urging of Fritz Stansell, Falcone shifted his focus to aiding the program at Blue Lake and became a regular staff member/artist in residence.Stansell, Fritz, Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp, the Early Years, RDR Books, Muskegon, MI, 2007, p. 211 Falcone would be joined later by other notables of the music education and concert band world, such as composers

John Barnes Chance John Barnes Chance (November 20, 1932 – August 16, 1972) was an American composer. Chance studied composition with Clifton Williams at the University of Texas, Austin, and is best known for his concert band works, which include '' Variatio ...

and Václav Nelhýbel. Following Falcone's death in 1985, Blue Lake became home to the new Leonard Falcone International Tuba and Euphonium Festival and competition created by his students in his memory and held at Blue Lake every year. This has become a significant annual event in the international

tuba The tuba (; ) is the lowest-pitched musical instrument in the brass family. As with all brass instruments, the sound is produced by lip vibrationa buzzinto a mouthpiece. It first appeared in the mid-19th century, making it one of the ne ...

and

euphonium The euphonium is a medium-sized, 3 or 4-valve, often compensating, conical-bore, tenor-voiced brass instrument that derives its name from the Ancient Greek word ''euphōnos'', meaning "well-sounding" or "sweet-voiced" ( ''eu'' means "well" o ...

community and is the leading American venue for these instruments.Wikipedia page and associated sources, Leonard Falcone International Tuba and Euphonium Festival

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp Summer schools Summer camps in Michigan Art schools in Michigan Music education organizations Education in Muskegon County, Michigan Buildings and structures in Muskegon County, Michigan 1966 establishments in Michigan Music festivals established in 1966

International exchange

Leonard Falcone

See also

References