S2 Ep29: The Alpharetta Symphony with Kelly Meholic

Discover the inspiring journey of Kelly Meholic, who transitioned from a shy child to the vibrant Executive Director and Principal Flutist of the Alpharetta Symphony. As Kelly takes us through the symphony's incredible growth over its ten seasons, she shares her personal evolution from a musician dreaming of playing in an orchestra to an unexpected leader driving a community's musical heartbeat. Kelly’s story is a testament to the power of passion and dedication, fueled by the support of both her community and her husband.

Join us as Kelly recounts her adventures from Florida State University to a conservatory in Switzerland, and how these experiences shaped her musical and leadership skills. She opens up about the challenges and rewards of her role, including her transition from a flute teacher and freelance musician to the first executive director of the symphony in 2020. With eight concerts a year, a thriving youth symphony, and engaging chamber music performances, Kelly's leadership has been pivotal in making the Alpharetta Symphony a cornerstone of the community's cultural life. Tune in to learn more about Kelly's remarkable journey and the symphony's transformative impact.

Transcript

Speaker 1 0:02

This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Stacey Poehler.

Speaker 2 0:15

Hey everybody, I'm excited to be chatting with Kelly Mahalik. She is the Executive Director and Principal Flutist with the Alpharetta Symphony. Welcome, Kelly.

Speaker 3 0:25

Hi Stacey, Thanks so much for having me and for your listeners for listening.

Speaker 2 0:29

So why don't you start off by telling us all about the Alpharetta Symphony?

Speaker 3 0:33

Yeah, this year is exciting. This is our 10th season, believe it or not. We started super small. I joined the second year, so I've seen a lot of our journey through the last decade. When I started in this, I never thought that I would be on the management end of things. I always, you know, growing up, envisioned oh, I'm going to play in an orchestra, and so it's been such a journey seeing all of this happening and learning and making it come to the community and bringing it to what it is today.

Speaker 3 1:02

We have about eight concerts a year, a youth symphony, and we also do some chamber music. So there's always something happening. Why don't you?

Speaker 2 1:10

talk about your journey and how you got into music and what led you to this position.

Speaker 3 1:17

Yeah, I started playing the flute when I was 12 years old. I was a pretty shy kid. I'm a twin, so no one knew who I was. I was fine with that.

Speaker 1 1:24

I was just like don't call on me to answer any math questions Super shy.

Speaker 3 1:29

Then I started playing the flute and I had some natural talent and lessons and I worked really hard. I started to stand out for playing the flute, which gave me a lot of confidence and also gave me a way to express myself too, because that wasn't really a thing that I was used to. So it's been a great tool for me for just going through life and learning through it. I'm really grateful for that and for my parents for supporting me in music. After that I went to FSU. I got my undergrad in music performance and then I went to a small conservatory in Lugano, switzerland, for my master's, which was a whole nother experience. I feel like I traveled so much in my youth and I had so many great experiences. I feel like I'm 80. I'm like, let me garden and read books and sing with my cats and stuff. So then, how I got with the Alpharetta Symphony was like I mentioned. I always thought I'm going to be, I'm a player, I'm a musician. That was my identity. I had never in college thought of being on the admin side of things.

Speaker 3 2:34

When I joined the symphony, I was playing in it and you know we were really small about 15, 12, 15 people or so and me and some of the leadership saw a lot of potential with the group and the area. Alfred is such a great community and North Fulton and just all of Fulton loves the arts. It's really awesome. We saw a lot of potential. We started placing people where they needed to be to build this. It's pretty much built by musicians in the symphony. Now we have outsiders that are filling some of the roles. Our board is growing and we're getting more business leaders in the community.

Speaker 3 3:12

I started out as personnel manager. I thought, oh great, I'll just take attendance and that's all I have to do. Then I realized it's a little bit more if you want it to sound good. I learned a lot on the job training, which is one of the best ways to learn, and so shortly after that, I became the president of the board. Which leadership it was. There are challenges, you know it's not easy, but it is so rewarding that made me want to continue. They appointed me the first executive director in summer 2020. Really, we've been growing since then.

Speaker 2 3:47

Did you have another career before you started as executive director? Were you just doing professional music? What were you doing?

Speaker 3 3:54

Yeah, great question. A lot of this has been a lot of volunteer hours from a lot of people, including myself. Luckily, my husband supported me through a lot of this. But yes, I was a flute teacher. I taught online lessons before it was a thing I've taught kids all over the world, which is really cool. I did some freelance playing in different orchestras, just substituting. I'm from Florida, so I played down there and then moved up here. I had to start over, but even before that, when I first moved to Georgia, I was not in music. For a little while. I worked at a veterinary clinic and I was a nanny, but I always held on to music.

Speaker 2 4:32

Yeah, Music, kids, pets they kind of go together Good deal. Do you think there are any misconceptions that people have about the Alpharetta Symphony or about symphonies in general that you'd like to set the story straight on?

Speaker 3 5:07

One thing that I think about often is accessibility. A lot of times that can mean to certain people it could mean that have great outreach programs, really try to get into the community, not just music, to the arts in general. Like I don't think people realize how hard we work to bring our communities together, which is the super rewarding part of it all. One story that I always think about is one of our violinists. She had a friend or neighbor who was going to our concerts for years just to support her and he's kind of a football guy, likes frisbee golf, that kind of thing, not really the typical symphony goer. One day after a performance he was so excited and told her I'm really starting to enjoy these things.

Speaker 3 5:51

Even for us when we're introduced to new music it can be a little harder. I'm like, oh, I don't know if I like that, but once you play it and you get to know it and understand music in general, it's so cool. It's like when you are first introduced to a new group or artist and you're like, oh, wow, I really like this one cheesy song. And then you look at the rest of the CD and you're like, oh, wow, I really like this one cheesy song. And then you look at the rest of the CD and you're like, oh wait, this one's better, that one's better, and it just kind of sucks you in, which is really cool also.

Speaker 2 6:18

I can attest to that because I've never been a classical music person, but I do have a daughter who's a serious cellist, so now I have a much greater appreciation. After dozens of high school concerts, all-state concerts and orchestra concerts, I am a fan, so it can grow on you like that, which is nice.

Speaker 3 6:40

Yeah exactly.

Speaker 2 6:41

Why don't you talk a little bit about your youth orchestra and how that program works and how people might be able to get their kids involved with that?

Speaker 3 6:48

Yeah, so we are so proud of our youth symphony and we have about 75, 80 kids now, so it is just growing, growing, growing. They rehearse once a week on Sundays at 5.30 PM at Preston Ridge Community Center. Really, you do an audition, you sign up. We try to find a place for everyone if we can. They rehearse. They do about four concerts a year. We also just introduced a beginning group for string players so you don't have to know anything, or if you're just not very advanced, then you can join it also. They just did their first performance and it was really sweet to see that, because I know a lot of times it is hard to get people started and to reinforce that. Being a private lesson instructor for years like and a musician, I know how hard it is to dedicate yourself to practicing daily or weekly. It can be hard to find the time, especially kids have so many other things on their plate these days. But just to give them that experience and that reiteration of what they might receive at school or in their lesson is really cool.

Speaker 2 7:53

Awesome, you had mentioned earlier chamber music. Can you talk about the differences between a symphony, a string orchestra, chamber music and when you guys perform those?

Speaker 3 8:03

different types of things? Good question. The symphony orchestra is like what you hear in the movies a lot of time like John Williams, where you have the brass, woodwinds, strings and percussion and it's just this big, giant show. So the Alpharetta Symphony is that we're bringing the big guns to you. Then you have a string orchestra which is just going to be the string instruments your violins, violas, cellos, basses and it just is more intensive on that. So it's a lot easier for kids when they're playing the same thing, generally they'll start out in like a string orchestra, like in school. You know, they kind of separate it into strings and winds. That is what makes our Youth Symphony and our symphony so special is that it combines both of those groups to play this wonderful, fantastic music. You know Beethoven, mozart, all those guys, john Williams, and so it's really great music.

Speaker 3 9:01

A chamber ensemble could be a number of different things in sizes. We have a woodwind quintet that I play in which is five of our woodwinds flute, clarinet, oboe, bassoon and front horn, who's not technically a woodwind. We've done different concerts. We did one at the library. We did a little Harry Potter concert at the library, which was a lot of fun, and we did a collaboration with the concert truck with one of our sponsors, north Point Mall. These two pianists travel across the country and show up wherever and open up the truck. There's a stage and piano and we did a concert, so that was really cool too.

Speaker 2 9:39

What are some of the challenges that you guys have that you're kind of working through and trying to take care of as you grow?

Speaker 3 9:46

Yeah, the time old question is funding. Back in the day it was for the king only, it was for the rich patrons. Now the model's different. We have corporations that give us money and fund us, like North Point Mall and Jackson Healthcare and all these great businesses, local businesses. We have great support from our community. Writing grants is a big part of it too. Funding is always going to be a challenge because you're trying to put together an 80-piece orchestra putting on a production of a concert which involves venues, personnel, equipment and all sorts of things you wouldn't think of that go into it. It's a big production and things cost money. That is a big challenge that we're always focused on growing.

Speaker 2 10:34

Where do you guys have your concerts?

Speaker 3 10:37

Alpharetta actually does not have a performing arts center. It has so many other great things, but it does not have a performing arts center or a music center. We hope that in the near future that changes, because we are getting too big for our stage. Currently we are being hosted by Alpharetta Methodist Church in downtown Alpharetta and we do the majority of our concerts there and they've been really great and helpful in giving us a place to play. Otherwise, we do some at Innovation Academy. Our next one is going to be at Innovation Academy. Those two places and some parks when the weather's nice can you talk about?

Speaker 2 11:14

do you have different memberships where people can get tickets, or how do people get tickets for the shows?

Speaker 3 11:27

Yeah, so you can find out about us and all of our concerts at alpharetasymphonyorg. It lists all of them there. The way the symphony season works is it starts in about August, september and goes to about May or June, and so our next season technically will start, you know, august September, and so for that you can get a discount, which we call a season subscription. You get a discount on all the concerts and you join us for all season long, or you can buy individual tickets and come to whatever concerts you're interested in. We have Pops concerts, we have Park concerts, we have more Masterworks concerts. Our next one is an Alpharetta holiday. That one's at Innovation Academy on Sunday December 1st at 3 pm in downtown Alpharetta. We're looking forward to that one.

Speaker 2 12:09

Anything else you want folks to know about the symphony?

Speaker 3 12:13

We really appreciate the Alpharetta community. It is so rewarding when we have a full house and you feel that energy. We really want you to come check us out and connect with you, and we try to give you great experiences. For example, in September we did well, this kind of led to the Harry Potter concert. We did a symphony Harry Potter concert, so we did the small chamber group one and then we did a symphony one where we played music across all the movies. We did this at Union Hill Park and we had some different activities for children. We really like to collaborate with other groups and to bring in like kind of what's the word mix the arts, and so we had some art projects for them, them, and it was just a great festival experience. We really tried to do that and make our concerts really special for you.

Speaker 3 13:05

We're working really hard and we hope to see you.

Speaker 2 13:07

Can you give us that website and maybe your social media too, so folks can find you?

Speaker 3 13:12

Yeah again, the website is alpharetasymphonyorg. Don't go to com org O-R-G. And you can find us on Facebook and Instagram at Alpharetta Symphony Great.

Speaker 2 13:25

Thanks so much for joining us today. Kelly, Thank you so much.

Speaker 3 13:28

Have a great day, you too.

Speaker 1 13:30

Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast Milton More. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to GNPMiltoncom. That's GNPMiltoncom, or call 470-664-4930.