Percussionist strikes it big

CASEY RESSLER

Frontiersman Valley Life Editor

Teens everywhere go to summer camp. For Wasilla's Katelynn Heasley, however, summer camp is being extended by two years.

After being selected to attend the prestigious six-week Interlochen Center for the Arts camp this summer, Heasley, 16, was invited to audition for the Interlochen Art Academy. Following her tryout, she was accepted, and now will spend the final two years of her high school career in Michigan studying music and preparing for college and a professional career.

"I'm extremely excited," Heasley said. "It is a lot harder than a regular high school, but I'm looking forward to being challenged."

Her father, Butch Heasley, said it will be hard to see his daughter leave, but knows it is only going to further her already impressive talent.

"We are very proud of her, and very happy. They offered her a really good scholarship," he said. "She'll be in residence for two years there, and then college. She's leaving us, and that's a little hard to take, though."

Heasley is a percussionist who has been playing since she was 7. She plays a wide variety of instruments, from drum sets to marimba and timpani.

Interlochen is widely recognized as the country's top school for musicians. Students can specialize in a specific instrument or voice, as well as branch out and study other instruments, music history and compositions. More than 30 faculty members are dedicated to music alone.

"Colleges recognize it as being very prestigious, so that will help me when I start applying," Heasley said.

Interlochen Arts Academy works closely with the prestigious Julliard School of the Arts. In 2002, 20 percent of the incoming freshmen at Julliard were Interlochen graduates. Academically, the academy accepts only the best students - 37 Interlochen graduates have been chosen as Presidential Scholars in the arts/academics category since 1980, more than any other high school in the U.S.

Heasley had to audition just to attend the highly competitive summer camp. She worked on a CD the last half of the school year, and submitted it hoping to just get a chance to study for six weeks. Now, she's got two years to study at the academy.

"They asked me to audition for the academy, and at first I told them no," Heasley said. "But then I called my parents and said I was thinking about auditioning, and they told me I should."

Her audition consisted of three solos - one each with the marimba, snare and timpani - in front of a percussion director. A week after she got home, she got the news she'd been accepted.

"It's a great opportunity," Heasley said.

In other terms, Heasley's situation is akin to a 16-year-old hockey player being asked to play for the best junior program in the country, to groom his skills for two years before heading to the NHL. It's an opportunity Heasley couldn't pass up.

Heasley's long-term goals include joining the U.S. Marine Corps and playing for "The President's Own," which is the top Marine Corps band in the country. The band performs internationally.

She leaves for Interlochen next Tuesday.