Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp

Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp is a Michigan non-profit organization located in the Manistee National Forest that provides summer fine arts camp and international exchange programs in music, art, dance and drama.

The Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp was founded as a non-profit organization in 1966 by the Stansell family, who remain the multi-generational proprietors of the institution. The camp is located on approximately 1200 acres in the Manistee National Forest in Michigan and can host 4500 5th through 12th grade students across several 2 week sessions each summer. Blue Lake operates FM radio stations locally and in Grand Rapids

Grand Rapids, Michigan

Grand Rapids is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan. The city is located on the Grand River about 40 miles east of Lake Michigan. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 188,040. In 2010, the Grand Rapids metropolitan area had a population of 774,160 and a combined statistical area, Grand...

that are National Public Radio affiliates.

Blue Lake also offers adult camp programs. Rather than the rustic cabins of the camp, adult musicians find accommodation at local hotels. Like the youth programs, adult campers take part in daily instruction on their instrument as well as ensemble rehearsals. Access to the camp’s recreational, elective instructional and regular concert programs is available to all ages as well.

International Exchange

Blue Lake hosts international exchange students in the arts as well as organizing several ensembles of American students to travel to Europe and perform each year. These ensembles include, but are not limited to concert band

Concert band

A concert band, also called wind band, symphonic band, symphonic winds, wind orchestra, wind symphony, wind ensemble, or symphonic wind ensemble, is a performing ensemble consisting of several members of the woodwind instrument family, brass instrument family, and percussion instrument family.A...

, jazz band

Jazz band

A jazz band is a musical ensemble that plays jazz music. Jazz bands usually consist of a rhythm section and a horn section, in the early days often trumpet, trombone, and clarinet with rhythm section of piano, banjo, bass or tuba, and drums.-Eras:SwingDuring the swing era in the mid-twentieth...

, orchestra

Orchestra

An orchestra is a sizable instrumental ensemble that contains sections of string, brass, woodwind, and percussion instruments. The term orchestra derives from the Greek ορχήστρα, the name for the area in front of an ancient Greek stage reserved for the Greek chorus...

, and choir

Choir

A choir, chorale or chorus is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform.A body of singers who perform together as a group is called a choir or chorus...

. These exchanges serve to expose students to other cultures and have been cited as “outstanding representatives of the United States”. Blue Lake has also initiated such experiments in multi-cultural cooperation as the ‘’Blue Lake in Bavaria’’ concert band

Concert band

which was formed out of a mixture of American and European junior and senior high school students to rehearse and perform together over the course of a month.

Leonard Falcone

Prior to the founding of Blue Lake, Leonard Falcone

Leonard Falcone

Leonard Falcone was best known as Professor of Baritone and Euphonium at Michigan State University where he also served from 1927 to 1967 as Director of Bands. The school's Spartan Marching Band transitioned from an ROTC auxiliary to a nationally known Big-10 conference marching band during his...

, baritone

Baritone horn

The baritone horn is a member of the brass instrument family. The baritone horn has a predominantly cylindrical bore as do the trumpet and trombone. A baritone horn uses a large mouthpiece much like those of a trombone or euphonium, although it is a bit smaller. Some baritone mouthpieces will sink...

virtuoso and Director of Bands at Michigan State University

Michigan State University

Michigan State University is a public research university in East Lansing, Michigan, USA. Founded in 1855, it was the pioneer land-grant institution and served as a model for future land-grant colleges in the United States under the 1862 Morrill Act.MSU pioneered the studies of packaging,...

had conducted many ‘’Youth Music at Michigan State’’ summer camps in conjunction with, and support of, the Michigan School Band and Orchestra Association. At the urging of Fritz Stansell, Falcone shifted his focus to aiding the program at Blue Lake and became a regular staff member/artist in residence. Falcone would be joined later by other notables of the music education and concert band world as composers John Barnes Chance

John Barnes Chance

John Barnes Chance was a composer, born in Beaumont, Texas. Chance studied composition with Clifton Williams at the University of Texas, Austin, and is best known for his concert band works, which include Variations on a Korean Folk Song, Incantation and Dance, and Blue Lake Overture...

and Václav Nelhýbel

Václav Nelhýbel

Václav Nelhýbel was a Czech-American composer, mainly of works for student performers. He is considered one of the most prolific composers of the 20th century....

.

Following Falcone’s death in 1985, Blue Lake became home to the new Leonard Falcone International Tuba and Euphonium Festival

Leonard Falcone International Tuba and Euphonium Festival

The is an amateur tuba and euphonium festival and competition, held annually the second week in August at the Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp at Twin Lake, Michigan.- Origin and goals of the festival :...

and competition created by his students in his memory and held at Blue Lake every year. This has become a significant annual event in the international tuba

Tuba

The tuba is the largest and lowest-pitched brass instrument. Sound is produced by vibrating or "buzzing" the lips into a large cupped mouthpiece. It is one of the most recent additions to the modern symphony orchestra, first appearing in the mid-19th century, when it largely replaced the...

and euphonium

Euphonium

The euphonium is a conical-bore, tenor-voiced brass instrument. It derives its name from the Greek word euphonos, meaning "well-sounding" or "sweet-voiced"...

community and is the leading American venue for these instruments.