While every Ambassador’s perspective is unique, these travelers share something powerful: the life-changing impact of what they experience together on this one-of-a-kind performance tour.
We recently chatted with Bill Carson, our Iowa Ambassadors of Music state coordinator, about his many years in the program and the tremendous impact it’s made in students’ lives. He’s seen firsthand how this impact ripples across time, becoming evident not only in the weeks and months after an Ambassador returns home but for years and even decades to come.
Bill joined his first Ambassadors tour in 2000 and his upcoming Iowa Ambassadors trip will mark what he calls “lucky number 13.” He’s had the opportunity to share the experience with his wife, daughter and son as well. In twelve trips, he’s traveled in a variety of roles – team member, state coordinator and city coordinator – so he’s gained a unique perspective on both the experience and how it changes students for life.
Tell us about your first Ambassadors experience and what inspired you to join that first tour?
Well, I’m going to go back a long time to high school, when I took a similar trip with a different group. I grew up in Michigan and went to the Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp there. I went to Europe with their orchestra between my junior and senior years, and that really lit the fire under me for the musical experience, the cultural experience, and the camaraderie of music travel.
I had the greatest time meeting people and traveling with them, interacting with people from the different places we were visiting and just getting a feel for European culture. When I became a teacher, I wanted to try to offer that same kind of experience to my students.
On my first Ambassadors trip – well, I really did not know much about what I was getting myself into! I had very few duties and responsibilities. I was in charge of a group, maybe eight or 10 students, just keeping track of them, keeping an eye on them, and then just observing everyone else. But I was very excited to have been invited just because of all the people I was going to get to meet, and of course, the places I would get to visit and the musical experience.
How does the Ambassadors of Music experience impact participants?
It really opens their eyes. Students with the Iowa Ambassadors of Music come from all different musical backgrounds. There will be students whose high school band is absolutely top-notch, and this is just an expansion of their repertoire.
But for many students from small schools, it’s the biggest band they’ve ever played in. It’s the biggest choir they’ve ever sung in. It’s the best choir they’ve ever sung in, no matter what.
Regardless of the program they come from, they’re meeting incredible people from all over the state that they might not have had a chance to meet had they not participated in this. It’s the social connections, it’s the musical experience. They’re learning about European culture and seeing famous places that they’ve read about in books or seen in movies. And later in their life they’ll say, “I was there. I was at the Louvre. I saw the Eiffel Tower from underneath. I saw the Matterhorn with an unobscured view.”
These are the kinds of things that just really change them. It’s an unbeatable, life-changing, musical, educational, cultural and social experience. The impact unfolds over time – it’s more than a month later, two months later, a year later that you really see it because they’re going to be more cultured. They’re going to have digested the experience.
You really see the differences when you run into them a year later and they can talk intelligently about how it changed them, about things they did, about the people they met, about the connections they made. I just love it when those students come to Coe College, and I imagine how they might be really quite different had they not gone on the trip.
Tell us about your experience as an AOM city coordinator in Paris last summer.
I was thrilled to have the opportunity to facilitate trips for ten different states during the Paris portion of the experience last summer. I was a pretty serious French student in high school and college, and I’ve been to Paris probably nearing twenty times, but never for more than a week.
To go and be there for seven weeks and to use my experience to help others have a great time in Paris – that was my goal. I really enjoyed working very hard to give them the best possible experience while they were in Paris. Now I’m going to be able to help our team have an even better Paris experience. I know Paris even better than I did the year before!
Thank you to Bill for generously sharing his time and looking back with us on his many years in the Ambassadors program. His story, like so many others, inspires new student performers to join us every summer and have experiences that will shape the rest of their lives. To connect with the state coordinator in your area, visit our State page.