'Pillars of Gold' - Music Inspired by Core Values with Mr. Brian Croach and Mr. Rob Traugh

On this episode of Voices, Seneca Valley spotlights a one-of-a-kind music experience, bringing a living composer into the classroom to create an original work for students. Band Director Mr. Brian Croach and composer Rob Traugh share the story behind "Pillars of Gold," a commissioned piece written specifically for the Ryan Gloyer Middle School eighth grade band. Inspired by the school’s positive behavior program, the work brings to life the core values of respect, responsibility and resilience, transforming them into a powerful and meaningful concert performance. 

IN THIS EPISODE, WE WILL REVIEW

• The Seneca Valley Band Commissioning Project
• What is "Pillars of Gold"
• The value of students working with a living composer
• The inspiration behind the piece, "Pillars of Gold"
• Where and when the concert will take place
  • Free concert - Thursday, May 7 at the Intermediate High School auditorium at 7 p.m.

SPECIAL GUESTS

Mr. Brian Croach, Instrumental Music Teacher for grades 7-12 and Mr. Rob Traugh, American composer, conductor, collaborator, educator and performer.

Mr. Brian Croach is in his ninth year of teaching and third year at Seneca Valley. He is a band director that works with students in grades 7-12 through various curricular instrumental ensembles such as the 7th grade band, 8th grade band, Symphonic Band, and Concert Winds. He is also the director of the Ryan Gloyer Middle School (RGMS) Jazz Ensemble and is one of the directors for the Roaring Raider Marching Band. Mr. Croach received he undergraduate degree in Music Education from Slippery Rock University and has continued his education through the Instructional Leadership program at Robert Morris University. 

Mr. Rob Traugh is an Assistant Professor of Composition (Music Technology) and Program Director of the Composition for Media Degree at the Mary Pappert School of Music and conducts the Wind Symphony at the Three Rivers Young Peoples Orchestra. Rob attended West Virginia University as a Provost Fellow, earning a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in 2026. He holds a Master of Music degree in Electronic Composition from Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, PA, and a Bachelor of Music degree in Music Education from The Dana School of Music in Youngstown, OH.

Transcript

FULL TRANSCRIPT (with timecode)

00:00:02:29 - 00:00:10:17
Jeff Krakoff: Welcome to Voices, a national award-winning podcast brought to you by the Seneca Valley School District. 

00:00:10:29 - 00:00:37:05
Jeff Krakoff: This is Jeff Krakoff. Today, I'm joined two by experts. We're gonna talk about music and composing. We have Brian Croach, who is the band director for Seneca Valley in grades 7-12. And we've got Rob Traugh who is a composer, and he's been a guest composer at Seneca Valley and other school districts and is also a professor at Duquesne University. Thanks for joining us today. 

00:00:38:04 - 00:00:39:00
Rob Traugh: Absolutely. 

00:00:39:03 - 00:00:56:19
Jeff Krakoff: So we're here to talk about something a little different. It it's a band commissioning project. Right, Brian? And I believe this is the second project of this type. Can you walk us through a little bit of the history of what's been done in the past and what this particular project is all about? 

00:00:57:10 - 00:02:01:06
Brian Croach: Yeah. I'd love to. The first thing I'd like to mention actually with this project is I'm not even the only band director associated with it. At the middle school level here, Mrs. Sarah Snyder has also been on the front lines of what this project is, and we've been working in collaboration with Mr. Traugh to bring this piece in into life. But it all started actually back with an idea from Mr. Armstrong, other one of our other band directors and our performing arts coordinator with the idea to, establish this commissioning project through our Seneca Valley Band Foundation. So funds have been raised through that foundation and creating opportunities for students in grades 4-12 to play brand new music written specifically for them. So we were able to actually kick off that process this past fall with our sixth grade bands premiering a brand new piece of music, by our sixth grade bands, and the title of that piece was Seneca in Sunrise Mhmm. By Mark Sarovczyk. 

00:02:01:29 - 00:02:11:13
Jeff Krakoff: Okay. And then that kinda brings us to what's happening now with Rob as a composer. Give us the the quick story there. 

00:02:12:02 - 00:02:41:27
Brian Croach: Yeah. So, Rob is a really amazing composer, a band clinician from our local area. But even more importantly, he has a very strong connection to ourselves here at Seneca Valley. He has children within the district. He actually has a daughter in Ryan Gloyer Middle School right now as well as a son in our Intermediate High School. So he has a connection to us in the district, and it also even works as one of our clinicians for our marching band. So we we've had a strong connection for quite some time. 

00:02:42:17 - 00:02:47:14
Jeff Krakoff: Rob, am I making a correct assumption that your children are involved in music? 

00:02:47:26 - 00:02:52:20
Rob Traugh: Yes. They are involved in music here at Ryan Gloyer and in the Intermediate School currently. Yes. 

00:02:52:22 - 00:03:17:21
Jeff Krakoff: That that's awesome. So you have this commissioning project. This is the second piece. Why do you do this? What is the value to students? You know, I think when we think of composers, they lived a long time ago. It's Tchaikovsky, Beethoven, some of those names. But, you know, what do the students get out of working with a real life composer like Rob? 

00:03:18:03 - 00:03:52:21
Brian Croach: Yeah. Well, honestly, you're really touching on it there. It's the fact that it's  new music that they are gonna be bringing to life themselves. It's amazing that the first time that this piece is premiered will be truly a world premiere by our eighth graders, and they're gonna be the first ones to ever bring it to life that then can spread to other bands, you know, throughout the world. And that's a really unique and cool experience that not every student has the opportunity to be part of, and just through the learning process of what that is. Okay. The students grow so much. 

00:03:53:03 - 00:03:59:25
Jeff Krakoff: So, Brian, what is this piece? Specifically, what can you tell us about this piece of music? 

00:04:00:07 - 00:04:59:00
Brian Croach: Yeah. I'd love to. It's entitled Pillars of Gold. And just through brainstorming with Mrs. Snyder, again, sort of at the beginning of this process, we really wanted it to be connected to what we do in Ryan Gloyer Middle School. And so we started by thinking of the Profile of the Learner dispositions that are integrated throughout our district. And then through the year, the district here and the administration started a PBIS program, a positive behavior intervention system that focus down to three particular words, and those are respect, responsible, and resilient. And so we wanted a piece that would connect to that and almost view those words potentially even through the way that Ryan Gloyer himself has modeled those words, you know, whether be in his time here in the building of Ryan Gloyer or during his time as an active military man. 

00:04:59:02 - 00:05:03:07
Jeff Krakoff: Okay. And this piece, is it a a classical piece of music? 

00:05:03:26 - 00:05:43:15
Brian Croach: It would be we would probably consider it to be more of a concert piece. With those three words, it's really amazing that we're able to get a variety of styles within the piece. You know, we have moments where it's almost a fanfare of an opening type of thing, very exciting, fast rhythmical elements. And then there's more lyrical slower sections, that can maybe help us to think about those times we need to be responsible. And then then ultimately, you know, bringing back up that tempo and maybe even energy in in a sense of resilience, to close out the piece. So there's kinda, like, three main elements of the music all formed into one piece of music. 

00:05:43:17 - 00:05:51:20
Jeff Krakoff: That's great. And were those themes, were they derived from students, or was it coming from you as a band director? How was that decided? 

00:05:52:04 - 00:06:13:01
Brian Croach: Yeah. Well, I might even let Rob talk about a little bit, but we sort of landed on those words respectful, responsible, resilient because of the Ryan's Way initiative. But then Rob was actually able to come in and talk to the students themselves and get some more insight of to the way that they, perceive those words and integrate them into their lives. 

00:06:13:06 - 00:06:24:12
Jeff Krakoff: Alright. That that's it's a good switch. Rob, tell us a little bit about the process of composing. You know, what did you do? What did the students do? What did you do together? 

00:06:25:08 - 00:08:31:03
Rob Traugh: Yeah. Sure. So, you know, I think one of the benefits to working with a a living composer and bringing something like this to life is that the students actually get to feel connected to the creative process of music.  A lot of times, they're connected to through the performance and interpretive process. But here, the this starts even before that in the creative process. So I've visited the school, I think, for this purpose four times total over the course of months. I think the first time was about a year ago. Right? Sounds good. And that's when they asked me if I would be maybe even over a year ago. They asked me if I would be interested in in creating a piece of music for this particular eighth grade band. And, so I sat down with, directors, Brian and Sarah, and, we talked through, okay. This is what the band looks like, and here are their strengths, and, here's here this is about how long we would like the piece to be and, a lot of, like, the very, specific, like, boundaries. So when you're creating a piece of art like this, it's really about, like, drawing the boundaries. And similar to, like, somebody who might be, literally drawing a piece of art, they might draw or trace something first, and then they would take it to the canvas and paint it. And so it's a very similar process. So that that's the first meeting. The second meeting was sometime in the fall. I can't was early fall. I came in, and, I just wanted to hear the band play before I started committing, notes to paper. And, so I had the opportunity, Mr. Crouch and Mrs. Snyder, invited me in to hear them a play little bit, and I got to talk to them. And so I just surveyed them. You know? What do these words mean to you? Because this is a new, initiative at Ryan Gloyer Right? Yes. And so, asking the students, like, what does it mean to you through music? Like, how can we be respectful through music? How can we be responsible? And how can we demonstrate resilience, like, in something like your music class? 

00:08:32:26 - 00:11:43:23
Rob Traugh: And so I got some great answers from the students, and that allowed me to take that back to my drawing board, so to speak, and brainstorm a little bit more about, like, okay. Now that I I understand, like, how they're thinking, how can I connect that thinking to this piece of music we're gonna develop? And it just so happened that back in our first meeting that Mr. Crouch and Mrs. Snyder wanted this to be a three part kind of piece. Mhmm. So it's like a fast, slow, fast kind of, like, ensemble piece. So we would consider this like a concert, like, adjudication selection kind of material. Yeah. And so the piece, once I started composing it, you know, I wanted to I knew I wanted it to be about these three ideas, respectful, responsible, resilient. How could I demonstrate that? Or how could I create, I guess, the container for the teachers who are just fantastic teachers to teach to those principals through this piece of music? So I created this piece with that in mind, specifically the teacher's perspective and prompting students to give them, like, how do we demonstrate respectfulness in this part of the music? Well, everybody has their own individual lines, and they come together, and you have to make your own space and play in time and in tune so that everything can be heard the way that it's intended to be heard for the audience. How do you demonstrate responsibility in in looking up at the conductor to shape this phrase and stay together in this particular portion? And then the end of the piece has some time signature changes, and you have to be resilient to work through time signature changes as an eighth grade band. And so, you know, I'm I those are just three small examples, but spent a lot of time thinking about the teacher and how the teacher could, engage with these ideas with their ensemble. And the last thing I did was come up with a title, and that's usually the case. You know, I have a general idea of what this is about, but the title is usually something that is, like, at the end, the piece of music tells me what this is. And I knew I had these three terms, respectful, responsible, resilient. And, you know, my son went through Ryan Gloyer Middle School, and my daughter's currently in Ryan Gloyer Middle School. And they do such a great job of introducing these concepts that they'll need through their lives and citizenship and just being a great human being and community member begins with this idea of respectful, responsible, resilient. And they are the pillars of, like, the Ryan Gloyer gold. So, like, I ended up coming up with the title of pillars of gold, and I remember the one of the time I had them actually over to my house because I actually live in Cranberry Township, obviously. My son and daughter go to school here, and we're just so happy with the music program. But when this piece was done, we I invited Mr. Crouch and Mrs. Snyder over to my studio, and we look listened and looked through the piece. And, I think probably, like, a week or two later, it was in its final form, and, they've been working on it since. 

00:11:43:25 - 00:12:09:02
Jeff Krakoff: Yeah. I love that. So how important is it for the students? You know, you've got these three values that they live every day at Gloyer, but how important is it for them to have these values reflected in a work a piece that they are working on are gonna perform. And it's so expressive, right, the form of your art and music. What does this mean to the students? 

00:12:09:21 - 00:13:21:11
Brian Croach: Well, I think in so many ways, especially with the arts and with music, we could build those life skills just through the daily activities that we do. You know, we really do feel like we're building respect within the program. Mhmm. And to be able to connect that to the words of Ryan's way in the PBIS program, that's really important to us as well as obviously responsible. I mean, there's so many elements within a daily rehearsal that individual students need to be responsible for various elements of themselves to have success in any type of music program and certainly in the band program. And then there are always challenges within any activity that you do. I mean, I think we all grow and learn through our hardships and failures, and that's certainly the case in a band program as well. There's times when music's very challenging, and we have to overcome things. And talking about the words resilience and just being able to really clearly identify each of those three core values for our students through the music, I think just has such a strong connection and builds up the entire program and the entire person, even that much more. 

00:13:21:21 - 00:13:47:26
Jeff Krakoff: Yep. Rob, I have to you. ask For any creative process in music, I would guess there are times the ideas just come to you and flow, and sometimes it's a little bit more hard work. Right? You hear about famous rock songs that came to somebody and they wrote it in 15 minutes. Right? And others take weeks and months. What was this process like? Was it did it come to you pretty quickly, or was it a struggle? 

00:13:47:28 - 00:15:24:08
Rob Traugh: Yeah. I think, you know, the one of the important things in artist studies is, like, they have to get to know themselves and their process. So for me, I describe my process as putting everything on the table. So it's a lot of, like, gathering of research. I'll call it research, but it's, like, interviews with the directors, interviews with the students. And the more that I can gather and put on the table, then I can look at the table and I can start to see these connections kind of come through. It's almost like a bit of, like, forensics where I'm looking at this this and thinking I have this idea that I want to initiate, but I'm looking for how these pieces, like, fit together. You dump you know, one of our favorite activities as a family with my parents and is to, like, dump out a puzzle. And we're working on it over, like, you know, a week or two depending on how large the puzzle is. But you dump that on the table, you turn them all upside, and you start to see, like, some patterns. Alright? And so you can organize them in some way. And I think creating art is very similar. Like, if you're doing the research, it should be you your goal is to get to that flow state. Sometimes that takes a while. Sometimes it doesn't. In this case, it actually did not because I gave myself the luxury of time. We started this over a year ago, and I gathered all that onto the table so that when I got to the content development, the actual putting, you know, ink to paper, that, started to, flow pretty easily at that point. But, yeah, it ended up you know, once I started that, it was about month and a half Okay. Of like, content development. Yep. 

00:15:24:10 - 00:15:39:10
Jeff Krakoff: That's great background. So we talked about you and your process. We talked about the students. But how about the people that are about to hear this, experience this, the audience? Rob, what are you hoping they visualize, and what is their experience.

00:15:39:22 - 00:16:38:03
Rob Traugh: Yeah. Well, like any art in any art form, I I love that, art is ambiguous. So we all bring something to the table when we experience art, and music is the same. So everybody's gonna bring, like, and hear something different in this piece. But what I would like the audience to understand is, like, these three pillars, respect, responsible, resilient, they are actually written into the music. So, like, it actually says with little notes in their parts, like, you know, there's a section that says resilience or be resilient or be respectful responsibly. And that kind of engagement with those ideas has been a part of the process of bringing this music to life. And if somebody comes to the to the table, with that in mind, I think they'll start to hear some of those things and interpret that, in their own way whenever they come to a concert and listen. 

00:16:39:08 - 00:16:50:26
Jeff Krakoff: Alright, Brian. So you mentioned this is there will be a concert. It will not only be a Seneca Valley premier, but a world premier of this piece. That's great. When and where will it take place? 

00:16:51:15 - 00:17:14:26
Brian Croach: Yeah. We'd love to have everybody come out to the IHS, the Intermediate High School auditorium on Thursday, May 7 at 7 PM. That's when the concert will kick off, and we'll actually be showcasing our two bands in the middle school, and that's our seventh grade band to start off the concert followed by the eighth grade band, and they will be closing out the concert with the premier piece of "Pillars of Gold." 

00:17:15:00 - 00:17:21:16
Jeff Krakoff: Great. And how's it work? Can people just show up? They have to buy a ticket? They have to RSVP in any way? 

00:17:22:02 - 00:17:52:18
Brian Croach: Yeah. Thanks for asking. Actually, there's no cost to our concerts here at Seneca Valley, so we'd love to have you guys come out and check it out if you are so inclined to, you know, further the SV Foundation and our band commissioning project, we will have the ability to donate at the concert for that as well as just a general donation to the band program if you would be so inclined to do. But absolutely no reservation needed. No tickets needed. We'd love to see you there. 

00:17:52:23 - 00:17:56:01
Jeff Krakoff: Alright. Can you re repeat the when and where one more time? 

00:17:56:03 - 00:18:06:15
Brian Croach: Certainly. Yes. It's at the intermediate high school in in the auditorium there at 7 PM on May 7, Thursday, May 7. 

00:18:06:22 - 00:18:16:07
Jeff Krakoff: Alright. Well, before I let you both go, is there anything else you'd like to share about pillars of gold? I we've think covered a lot, but is there anything we did not cover? 

00:18:16:26 - 00:19:22:00
Brian Croach: We really, I think, done a great job of covering it. I actually just want to mention one thing that I neglected to mention with our first commissioning project, and that was premiered by our two elementary band directors, Mrs. Tracy Glass and Mrs. Kelly Levere. They led up those sixth grade band ensembles, so certainly wanted to mention them. And I I might have even misspoke on the title of the piece. It's titled Sunrise in Seneca, and that was, again, the first premier piece. And then here at the secondary campus, 7-12 grade, I already mentioned mister Armstrong, his work as a band director and performing arts coordinator, but we also have Mr. Robert Babic as a director up here been that's supporting these students. And then, obviously, Sarah Snyder and I, with the, direct, influence with our eighth grade band. We're just so excited for this this premiere in connection mister with Traugh, our local, community composer that, works across, honestly, the state of Pennsylvania in so many different regards with band programs and various things. So very excited for the piece. 

00:19:22:08 - 00:19:40:16
Jeff Krakoff: Alright. Thanks, guys. So we're looking forward. Thursday, May 7 will be the premier at the concert, and this was Brian Croach, band director, grade 7-12, and Rob Traugh, composer and guest conductor sometimes at Seneca Valley. Thanks so much for your time. 

00:19:41:02 - 00:19:43:14
Brian Croach: Yeah. Thank you so much. We appreciate it. 

00:19:43:16 - 00:19:44:06
Rob Traugh: Thank you. 

00:19:44:08 - 00:19:44:22
Jeff Krakoff: Take care.