The Madison Community Orchestra (MCO) was founded in 1965 by former MSO director, Maestro Roland Johnson. Since its inception, the MCO has operated under the auspices of the Madison Area Technical College, first as an extension of the Vocational School and now as a program of the Communication and Performing Arts Department. To this day, the MCO Orchestra has remained committed to the growth and continuing education of amateur musicians in the Madison area by providing the opportunity to play in a full orchestra and continue to improve their abilities.
The group’s first conductor was Robert Gutter, a trombonist from the UW Music School. In subsequent years, the MCO was directed by a number of distinguished conductors including Ernest Stanke, Tom Buchhauser, John Holzaepfel, Leyla Sanyer, Cindy Whip (nee Narr), Morris Brand, and since 1994, Dr. Blake Walter from the Edgewood College Music Department. In its early days, the MCO often performed with a guest soloist and occasionally traveled outside the Madison area. One summer, the group provided orchestral accompaniment for Mendelssohn’s Elijah as part of a Summer Sing with the Madison Symphony Chorus. In 2005, the MCO was featured in a television commercial for a local utility company as part of their “The Power of Working Together” campaign.
Today, the orchestra performs 3 free concerts per season in Mitby Theater on the Truax campus of MATC and also presents a Holiday Concert in the Wisconsin State Capitol rotunda.
The Madison Community Orchestra has always been an ensemble of great variety. Members have ranged in age from 17 to 84 years old and have driven from as far away as Poynette and Milwaukee to participate. MCO musicians have represented a cross section of the community – from lawyers, doctors and business people, to university faculty, stay at home parents and students.
Over the years, the group’s repertoire has also been full of variety - from Dvorak’s “New World Symphony” to Hovahness’s “And God Created Great Whales” to LeRoy Anderson’s “Fiddle Faddle.”