(Chelsea Update would like to thank Rick Catherman for the information in this story.)
The Chelsea High School Band will be hosting a very special guest this Friday, Sept. 9, at the Chelsea vs. Dexter football game at Jerry Niehaus Field.
Former CHS Director of Bands and Assistant Principal and Athletic Director Bruce Galbraith will be guest conducting the Star Spangled Banner for the first time in 50 years since his last appearance conducting the CHS Band.
Galbraith is a music department graduate of Cass Technical HS in Detroit and the University of Michigan School of Music. He was inducted into the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre and Dance Hall of Fame in 2009. His Master’s degree in Educational Administration is from the Rackham Graduate School – also at The University of Michigan.
After teaching in Grand Rapids for one year, he became band director at Chelsea HS from 1964-1967, then served as assistant principal and athletic director at Chelsea H.S. from 1967-1968.
In his four years at Chelsea, the band received many first division awards, was the featured band at the Detroit Lions Thanksgiving game (national television) and one of four featured at Band Day in Ann Arbor, and grew to nearly 200 members.
He left Chelsea schools to become the Executive Director of MSBOA, the Michigan School Band and Orchestra Association, the group that arranges all music festivals in the state from 1969-1977. Galbraith continued to live in Chelsea and served as Choir Director at St. Paul United Church of Christ and on the Chelsea Village Council.
After eight years with MSBOA, he became director of the Interlochen Arts Academy (MI) and a vice president of Interlochen. While there, he served as chairman of the Michigan Youth Art Festival and was appointed by Governor William Milliken to the Michigan Council for the Arts.
He concluded his education career as Headmaster of Park Tudor School in Indianapolis, Indiana. While at Park Tudor, Galbraith also was Registrar General (COO) of the Cum Laude Society (National high school academic honorary) from 1993 until 2008.
Always involved with music, he has conducted bands, orchestra and choirs on six continents with Musical Youth International on trips to Europe, South and Central America, Australia and the former USSR, as Founding Conductor of the United States Collegiate Choir, making 12 European concert tours, and with the Matan Youth Orchestra of Israel on a tour of that country.
Galbraith is semi-retired and lives in Trinity, Fla., where he sings in a select vocal quartet at St. Dunstan’s Episcopal Church (Largo).
