If the gift of music is one of the greatest you can give a
child, Joe Ostenson is a generous man indeed. Three generations of
band and choir students were present Wednesday night as Ostenson
was surprised with the Central Coast Association for Music
Education’s Lifetime Achievement Award.
If the gift of music is one of the greatest you can give a child, Joe Ostenson is a generous man indeed. Three generations of band and choir students were present Wednesday night as Ostenson was surprised with the Central Coast Association for Music Education’s Lifetime Achievement Award.
“This was all a very pleasant surprise,” said Ostenson. “It means a lot that my colleagues and students are proud of the work I’m doing.”
The Lifetime Achievement Award is bestowed each year to music teachers who have made a career out of going above and beyond the call of duty for their students.
“We want to honor someone who has given a lot of service to the Central Coast,” said Association President Willow Manspeaker. “Joe got his first teaching job in Hollister in 1965 and he never left. To see a program as alive as his after all this time is fantastic.”
When he’s not teaching, Ostenson plays in the Watsonville Community Band, and it was during a concert in the Rancho San Justo gym that he was presented with the award. Ostenson was then asked to conduct “Amparita Roca,” his favorite march.
“It was so neat to watch him,” said former student Bobbie Jo Chapa, whose mother, sister and, as of next year, daughter will have all been Ostenson’s students. “The minute he got up there to conduct he just took charge, and that’s how he is as a teacher. He’s a master.”
Ostenson, 64, was first introduced to music as the age of 11 when he learned how to play the trumpet, which is still his weapon of choice today. The choice to move into music education after college only seemed a natural one, he says.
“Music is my life,” he said. “And I always wanted to work with young people. I was just lucky enough to be able to do what I love. I don’t really know how it happened.”
Ostenson directs the band program for both Rancho San Justo and Marguerite Maze middle schools and Rancho’s choir program. He works with more than 130 sixth, seventh and eighth graders every day.
“When I think of how many kids I’ve worked with in my life, my head spins,” he said. “If I’m walking around town in Gilroy, Salinas or Monterey, someone almost always comes up to me and says ‘Hey Mr. O, remember me? I was in your band 10 years ago.’ I get phone calls at Christmas from former students in Kansas and Colorado who just want to let me know they remember me. It’s truly wonderful.”
Over the years, Ostenson has become something of a Hollister institution, teaching the children and grandchildren of his former students. Tajni Diller began her love affair with music playing clarinet in Ostenson’s band – now she’s the music director of Rolling Hills Church and has put two sons through Ostenson’s program.
“He has all these panoramic pictures up on the walls of his classroom, of each and every band he’s ever taught – I’m in three of them, and my kids look up on the walls and try to find me during practice,” she said. “Music can be so important to a kid, and you use it all your life. When I’m stressed, I play. When I’m bored, I play. And I’m glad my kids can have that.”
It is that sentiment that Ostenson says has kept him teaching in Hollister for 41 years.
“When you make an impression on someone so that they bring back their own children when they’ve grown up, that’s incredible,” he said. “What better compliment could you ask for?”
Despite a impressive career, Ostenson says he has no plans to retire just yet.
“There is nothing else I’d rather do – if I had the chance, I would turn around and do it again for another 41 years,” he said. “And this is what I want to do every day until it isn’t fun anymore, or they don’t let me.”
Danielle Smith covers education for the Free Lance. Reach her at 637-5566, ext. 336 or ds****@fr***********.com
