Super Badass Maestro Dude

We’ve all done it.  You know, grabbed the imaginary baton and led the imaginary symphony.  With both hands waving in the air, we direct the woodwinds to play with a little more allegro and the brass section with a little less vigoroso.  In our minds, it all looks so easy—anybody can do it, right?

“Anyone who goes to college for six to eight years to get a doctorate in conducting can,” says ARC music major Rob Veline.

Most music majors have teaching in mind as they hone their skills at ARC, but Veline’s ultimate vision of one day conducting the San Fransisco Symphony makes him a rarity.  He says true conductors are born with something special.

If one’s birthplace has any bearing on their future as a conductor, Veline’s seems worthy of mention.  Twenty years ago, the slender blonde explains, he was born on a hippie commune of mid-wifery in Tennessee to “yuppie parents, living a hippie vibe.”

Cutting his musical chops on his parent’s Pink Floyd and Yes vinyl collection, his love of classical music was born of another specialty: Napster.

He laughs as he tells the tale of his parents losing him at a Grateful Dead concert, only to find him, rose in hand, being passed around and kissed by a group of Deadheads.

Inside ARC’s music department, Veline looks anything but lost.  Walking with a purpose, he knows everybody and everybody knows him.  The clarinet is his instrument of choice, but the keys of the nearby piano seem very familiar to his fingers as he sits down and declares, “I wish I was an accomplished jazz guitarist.”

Knowing how to play all of the instruments isn’t a conducting requirement, though saxophone, percussion, and singing are all part of his repertoire.  

“I want to hear with my ears what I hear in my head,” he says.

The aspiring maestro acknowledges Leonard Bernstein as the greatest conductor ever.

“Most people think classical music is pompous but his stuff is raw, as close to metal as you can get,” he says of the legend.

He turns up the volume of his voice slightly and declares, “Classical music isn’t just elevator music.”

The Dry Town resident’s passion for classical music becomes ever more apparent as he sings the praise of the legends of the conducting elite.  “The greats could invoke a riot amongst the crowd.”

Can any modern conductors compare to the legends?  “I can count on one hand anyone who’s passionate about conducting today.”

High-caliber musicianship among the faculty is what attracted the multi-faceted Veline, who currently holds a 3.5 grade point average at ARC.

Director of bands, Susan Hamre, who “breathes new life” into the ARC music department, and the “legendary” Joe Gilman could both be teaching at larger universities, according to Veline, but choose to direct music at ARC.  Gilman also heads the Jazz department at University of Pacific.

According to Hamre, during last fall’s production of “Footloose,” she wrote extra parts for Veline to play due to “problems on stage.”

“He actually played twice as much as the book demanded,” she says of his performance.      

Veline quickly moves about ARC’s Campus Life office, the Associated Student Body representative and vice president of the Inter-Club Council says, “My music life is kind of a double life.”

“Most of my friends don’t think of me as a musician,” he says as he exits the cramped quarters.

Two steps behind, his girlfriend and student-government cohort Miranda Waters says, “It would be sexy to see him conducting the San Fransisco Symphony.”

Jeremy Palmer, another ASB representative says, “Rob is considered by many of us who are involved in campus politics as a Karl Rove of sorts, influencing the whole as an individual, which shares similarities with that of a conductor.”

Palmer, perhaps reflecting on his analysis adds, “For all our sakes, I hope it’s the latter route he chooses.”

As to where he’ll transfer after his curtain falls at ARC?

“I haven’t decided yet…somewhere in the Bay Area,” he says with certainty.

“The ideas of the Bay Area mesh with our ideas,” he adds, speaking of himself and Waters, as well as the group of friends they plan to relocate with.

Hamre believes Veline has what it takes to see his vision fulfilled.

“He is very bright, something you can just pick up by being around him, and he will make a great conductor/teacher/musician,” she said.