DAVID SMARELLI - MUSIC DIRECTOR AND CONDUCTOR  

David Smarelli is in his nineteenth year as Director of Orchestras for the Sycamore Community Schools.  In addition to conducting the orchestras at Sycamore High School and Sycamore Junior High, he teaches fifth and sixth grade strings at Edwin H. Greene Intermediate School.  Before coming to Sycamore, Smarelli taught orchestra at all levels for seven years in the Lima (Ohio) City Schools.  While in Lima, he maintained a private violin studio and served as a lecturer in music at Ohio Northern University where he taught applied music, string methods and conducted the Ohio Northern University String Ensemble.

Smarelli attended Ohio University and Bowling Green State University where he graduated Magna Cum Laude in 1982 with a Bachelor of Music in Performance and Education.  He received a Master of Music in Education from Miami University in 1996.

Smarelli began his musical studies on the violin at the age of nine with his father, John Smarelli, a professional violinist and respected music educator in the state of Ohio.  His other violin teachers have included Marcia Ferritto, Howard Beebe, Paul Makara and Eric Pritchard.  He has been a member of the Lima Symphony Orchestra and the Lima Symphony Chamber Players where he served as co-concertmaster and violin soloist.  He also performed with the Jerry Kaye Orchestra in Columbus Ohio where he collaborated with notable performers such as Bob Hope, Red Skelton, Andy Williams, Danny Thomas, and Bernadette Peters.  He is presently a first violinist with the Springfield Symphony Orchestra where he has played for twenty-nine seasons. 

Under his direction, Smarelli's junior high and high school orchestras have received local and statewide recognition during his tenure at Sycamore.  Being selected to perform at numerous Ohio Music Education Association professional conferences has honored both orchestras.  His high school orchestra has also performed in recent years at Disney World, Chicago and Washington D.C. including a performance on the Millennium Stage at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. In 2003, Smarelli formed SEE 1 (Sycamore Electric Ensemble), Cincinnati’s first high school rock orchestra, composed of electric and amplified acoustic string instruments along with traditional “garage band” instruments. SEE 1 has collaborated with Mark Wood, internationally known electric violinist and Emmy-winning composer and performed for a “sold-out” audience this past year at Sycamore High School.

Smarelli resides in Anderson Township in Cincinnati with his wife Brenda and their three daughters, Laura, Marissa, and Julia.  In his time away from music, he enjoys genealogy, computers, flower gardening and coin collecting.