Joshua Gilbert

Joshua Gilbert

Education

• B.M Jazz Studies | University of North Texas

Why did you choose to work at WCM?

I am a transplant to Milwaukee and wanted to be a part of sharing the gift of music to the community, and the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music proves to be one of the foundational pillars for doing so in the Milwaukee area. The opportunity to come alongside students and explore all types of musical expression is invaluable, and equips them with one of the few universal languages able to connect people together across age, culture, and background.

Describe a musical experience or teacher that had a positive impact on you.

All of my mentors had profound impacts on my musical growth in their own ways- Ed Soph, Quincy Davis, and Jose Aponte all helped shape and challenge what the others had started in me. However, the teacher who laid the foundation for the rest to build off of was Jerry Steinhilber, who always echoed two quotes (among many) that rang true together. The first saying, "No one does what you do better than you do." and the second from Bashō which he quoted as, "Do not seek to be like the masters, but seek what the masters sought." Both of these he used in bridging beyond the building blocks of techniques, musical language, and other important aspects of the craft, and instead pointed towards using those tools in a pursuit of a personal relationship with music that doesn’t stop at just sounding good. To speak about music as a language, Jerry instilled in me the hunger to not just be able to speak well, but to start talking about good ideas.