Anne McGinty

Anne McGinty is the most prolific woman composer in the field of concert band literature. Her many compositions and arrangements for concert band, string orchestra, flute, and flute ensembles (over 225 titles), all but one of which have been published, extend from the elementary through the professional level. More than 40 of these compositions were commissioned from bands in the United States. Ms. McGinty was also the first woman commissioned to write an original work for the United States Army Band. That composition, entitled "Hall Of Heroes", featured the US Army Band & Chorus and was premiered in March, 2000, with the composer conducting. She was also commissioned to write an original composition for the Bicentennial of the United States Military Academy at West Point. Entitled "To Keep Thine Honor Bright," it was premiered in September, 2001.

She began her higher education at The Ohio State University, where Donald McGinnis was her mentor, band director and flute teacher. She left OSU to pursue a career in flute performance, and played principal flute with the Tucson (Arizona) Symphony Orchestra, Tucson Pops Orchestra, and in the TSO Woodwind Quintet, which toured Arizona under the auspices of a government grant. When she returned to college, she received her Bachelor of Music, summa cum laude, and Master of Music from Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where she concentrated on flute performance, music theory and composition. She studied flute and chamber music with Bernard Goldberg and composition with Joseph Willcox Jenkins.

She is a life member of the National Flute Association and served on its Board of Directors. She taught flute at several colleges in the Mid-West, taught flute and chamber music to underprivileged children and was leader of a Royal American Regiment Fife and Drum Corps. She continued to perform professionally in orchestras, chamber groups and as a flute clinician for a manufacturer.

Although no longer performing as a flutist, Ms. McGinty remains well known as a flute choir specialist and was the first person to convince two major educational music publishers to publish a series for flute choir. As the flute editor at Hansen Publications in Miami Beach, Florida, she arranged and produced the first such flute choir series. She has composed and arranged music for solo flute, flute with piano accompaniment, flute duets, trios and quartets, as well as flute choirs.

She is a member of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) and has received annual composition awards since 1986. She received the Golden Rose Award from the Women Band Directors National Association and the Outstanding Service to Music Award from Tau Beta Sigma, a national honorary band sorority. She is listed in Who's Who of American Women and the International Who's Who in Music.

Ms. McGinty is also active as a guest conductor, clinician and speaker throughout the United States and Canada. She has conducted regional and all-state bands, given clinics at many state conventions and universities on band performance, literature and emotions in music, and has given speeches at state and national conventions, with many diverse topics, all of which are related to the performance and enjoyment of music and the values of music education.

Anne McGinty and Mr. Edmondson formed Queenwood Publications in 1987 and were responsible for the creation, production, promotion, and international sales and distribution of Queenwood's catalog of concert band, jazz band and string orchestra music. They sold their company to the Neil A. Kjos Music Company in March, 2002, and are writing exclusively for them under the Queenwood/Kjos company name.

Her other interests include weight lifting, reading murder mysteries, learning to play the bagpipes and nurturing her two cats, Starz and Stripes.