We were lucky to catch up with Jennifer Sengin recently and have shared our conversation below.
Jennifer , appreciate you joining us today. Have you been able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen? Was it like that from day one? If not, what were some of the major steps and milestones and do you think you could have sped up the process somehow knowing what you know now?
I have been able to make a full-time living with my creative work. I am so fortunate in this area – that I love both conducting and teaching! This has been a great way to carve out a path to turn my passion into a career.
When I was a senior in high school, our school district offered an incredible program called, “Senior Society,” where seniors with strong GPAs were allowed to find a location to volunteer for the last 3 weeks of the school year. Having participated actively in the school district’s music program my entire time in school, I knew I wanted to spend some working with my middle school choir director, Lisa Lepore. She had been a huge inspiration to me during my most formative years and I thought it would be an enjoyable experience to volunteer to help her with the middle school choir. I loved music but I really requested this volunteer location because I thought it would be an enjoyable experience. I did not realize that this 3-week experience would change my life and career path so drastically. During this time, Lisa gave me an opportunity to conduct one of the middle school choirs. It was incredible!! I knew in that first minute that this was the career path that I was meant to do and could not see any other field being such a great fit! She gave me my first start conducting choral ensembles in concert – one of the most formative experiences of my musical life. After these three weeks, I immediately sought to change my undergraduate degree.
I originally started out in nursing school during my first year of undergrad. I knew I wanted to be in a service field where I would have an opportunity to work with the general public to make their lives better. I immediately discovered, however, that nursing was not right path for me! I had participated in musical activities throughout my time in public school and felt the loss of this participation as soon as I started in another career path. During my first year of undergrad, I then started auditioning for collegiate music programs in order to pursue my dreams of being a conductor-teacher. I graduated with my undergrad in music education and had the great privilege of enrolling in the Choral Conducting program at Ithaca College. The experience in my masters program with Dr. Janet Galván was transformative! I went from being a strong musician who wanted to teach choral ensembles to being a formidable teacher. Throughout my degree program, Dr. Galván was one of my biggest mentors and champions – a role she still plays in my life.
After completing my masters degree, I taught high school choir in New Jersey for five years. I LOVED that experience and the way I was able to work with high school students every day. Each day was a new experience and provided lots of opportunities to facilitate music-making experiences with wonderful people. After five years of lots of great experiences, I decided to pursue a doctorate in choral conducting. After consultation with my mentor from my masters degree, I decided that Michigan State University was the right choice for my continued studies. There, I had the opportunity to learn from Drs. David Rayl, Jonathan Reed, and Sandra Snow. It was another largely transformative experience. During this time, I learned so much from these incredible teachers not only about content and teaching strategies but also how to navigate the field of collegiate choral music teaching. Immediately after graduating from MSU (Go Green!), I started as the Associate Director of Choral Activities at Georgia State University. One year later, I began as the choir director at Central Presbyterian Church as well. In both of these institutions, I have the great fortune of collaborating with incredible students and colleagues. I continue to learn every day and learn to find the joy in all of the stages of the music-making process.
I feel so fortunate for these opportunities and am excited about future!
Jennifer , before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
I provided my story in the previous question but I’m happy to provide information for the second question here.
I love conducting choirs in all capacities! I usually work as a choral conductor where I conduct choral and choral-orchestral music with various choirs throughout the country. In all of my work, I view my role as a facilitator where I encourage the musicians to collaborative engage in the music-making process. I definitely prefer to operate in a collaborative environment where the singers engage in their own learning and making musical decisions. My goal is to engage and inspire the ensembles so that they bring this confidence, energy, and collaborative experience to all of their musical endeavors in the future. I feel so grateful to work in the arts where we have the opportunity to lift other’s spirits and provide an artistic outlet. As long as I get to continue to do this, I know this field will bring me great joy!
In my work at GSU, I am lucky to be able to conduct two choirs, teach choral conducting to graduate and undergraduate students, and to teach several music education courses. It has been a great experience to be able to influence and empower future music educators and conductor-teachers so that they are prepared to work in the same field. I love empowering young conductor-teachers. It is one of the things that I enjoy the most about this position. I feel as though I have had amazing mentors and I hope that I can provide my students with the same type of support that I received.
At Central Presbyterian Church, I now serve as the Director of Musical Arts. In this capacity, I work to collaborate with my amazing colleagues to provide music that supports the worship services. I also work to create opportunities for community engagement through the arts.
Both at GSU and at Central Pres, some of the most exciting aspects of my work involve bringing together outside organizations in order to provide musical experiences to the larger Atlanta area. This is truly a joyful aspect of my work at both institutions! For example, Central Presbyterian Church will be hosting a recital with famed singer, Callie Day. As part of this recital, we will have several area choirs join this recital to perform several pieces as the culmination of this recital with Callie Day as the soloist. We will also be donating some of the proceeds of this event to a service organization that we will be determined in consultation with the participating choirs. I love these experiences to provide the community with collaborative arts experiences and I look forward to doing more of these collaborative experiences!
I think I am most proud of the collaborations. I love people and collaborating with folks is one of the most exciting parts of my day!
What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?
The most rewarding aspect of working in the creative field is the way in which we can help to positively influence another person’s day. In a time when life is so full of stresses and work abounds, I love that I can provide an experience for the musicians and the audience/congregation to be transported to a different mental space – even if it is only for a few minutes. Singing is such a great artistic outlet because nearly every has the capability to sing in a choir with others. The way in which we get to interact and engage in a bigger picture is such a special part of being in a choir. I also love to build and spend time in a positive and growth-minded community. As a conductor-teacher, I have such a privilege of creating and maintaining this space. Though I am not in nursing, I do find that this creative outlet has the opportunity to make a positive impact on the lives of others.
What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?
This is a great question! I think collaboration is key! Sharing resources, working together on projects, creating concert experiences that speak to various social justice initiatives and ways that we can improve society all provide opportunities to support artists and encourage our creative ecosystem.
In our current time, it is important for creatives and artists to find ways to build their own careers through a variety of means. One of the organizations that I think has done this so brilliantly is the “Challenge the Stats” organization as well as the “Atlanta Music Project”. I would highly recommend exploring these two organizations that so brilliantly bring together creative arts and social justice work. They are incredible. Finding ways to work at the intersection of these two things are key for creatives and artists to thrive in society, in my opinion.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://cpcatlanta.org/
- Other: https://news.gsu.edu/2022/02/21/dr-sengin-awarded-the-gsu-instructional-effectiveness-award/ https://thearts.gsu.edu/2021/11/04/artistic-voices-jennifer-sengin-and-the-american-prize/
Image Credits
I provided links that I found on google images. I am not sure if they are copyrighted. They exist on the internet and they were taken at GSU. For the black and white headshot and the headshot with the red shirt, those were taken by photographer, Kara Beth Nichols – https://www.instagram.com/knicholsonphotography/?hl=en