First graders at Happy Valley Elementary School hop, hop to an Easter tune with loved-by-all music teacher Ron Pickett, who retires this year after teaching 29 years at Glorietta and Wagner Ranch.
It’s “bells and boomwhackers week” in Ron Pickett’s music classroom at Wagner Ranch Elementary School.
As each grade level cycles in and out of the classroom for their weekly half-hour of instruction, students get a chance to try out the latest featured instruments. The boomwhackers – lightweight, hollow, color-coded, plastic tubes tuned to a musical pitch by length – are designed to be “whacked” against the player’s upper leg.
Pickett has the smaller kids use chair backs instead. They’re susceptible to suggestion, said Pickett, and they might want to hit one another.
“We don’t want anyone getting hurt,” Pickett said.
He introduces his students to new and different musical modes using posters, videos, and when possible, real instruments. The goal is to show that music can be made from almost anything.
The first graders on this day have completed their lesson and are sitting patiently as their teacher does his “Current Events” run-through, a list of commemorative dates he assembles every day.
Just as the boomwhacker illustrates the infinite variety of ways to make music, this classroom segment illustrates another message – there is a tune for everything.
Today, April 30, is National Honesty Day, so he plays them Billy Joel’s “Honesty.” It’s also National Mahjong Day, and Pickett has found some music traditionally played in the background during tournaments.
“In my class, music is about history, current events and even math and science,” he said.
Spend any amount of time in his vibrant classroom, and it’s easy to understand the dismay of past and present generations of Orinda students and parents at learning that Pickett is retiring after 29 years as the music director at both Glorietta and Wagner Ranch.
A gifted performer with an impressive professional resume, he could have easily chosen another path.
His musical theater professor at Brigham Young University expressed disappointment when Pickett announced he was going to be a teacher – not the Broadway performer everyone envisioned.
After listening to the teacher’s lecture about throwing away his talent, he responded, “And what do you do for a living?” After a long pause, the teacher said, “Touché.”
Pickett is a Walnut Creek native who attended Muirwood Elementary, Parkmead and Las Lomas.
At 19, he became a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, serving two years in Montana. Following that, he entered the advertising program at Brigham Young University (BYU), but soon realized he was only interested in writing the jingles.
Eventually, he ended up in musical theater, and joined the Young Ambassadors, a long-running, celebrated song and dance group at BYU that has performed in more than 68 countries worldwide.
Over the next three years, he traveled throughout the U.S., Europe, India, Sri Lanka and Nepal. In Calcutta, the group serendipitously met Mother Teresa, who insisted on giving them a tour of her work there. That experience left a lifelong impression.
His teaching career began at a private school in Los Altos Hills, where he immediately expanded the small portfolio of oft-repeated musical theater classics.
His first new production was “Little Shop of Horrors.” His lead actors, playing Audrey and Seymour, were a little tentative in their romantic roles, so at one point in rehearsal he jumped up and shouted, “Just kiss her!” The shocked actors complied, and everyone loved it – including the couple, who married a few years later.
After a brief foray away from teaching, he realized his mistake and returned to a teaching job in Walnut Creek. He toggled back and forth between Lafayette’s Happy Valley Elementary School and Walnut Heights Elementary, before the principal at Glorietta recruited him. The principal’s son had been Pickett’s student and he was thrilled at the chance to steal him away.
Performances have always been a big part of his curriculum, and Pickett took an unusual approach to selecting musicals and actors.
“Most schools select the play they will perform, and then have students audition for the parts,” he said. “It often turns out that the kids who audition aren’t the right fit for the play, so the result is disappointing.”
Pickett flipped the process.
Students were asked to choose any song they wanted to sing for him. He then chose a production that would showcase the strengths of those specific performers.
June Lim, an Orinda parent whose daughter was one of Pickett’s students, said everyone was astonished at the exceptional quality of the plays Pickett produced. Her daughter Mina was inspired to pursue a career in musical theater.
“Mr. Pickett is the reason why I’m where I am today – at Otterbein University (Ohio) getting a BFA in musical theater,” Mina said. “He has helped me so much throughout the years – with my singing technique and tone, both of which get compliments from professors, teachers and peers now – and on countless auditions and monologues. I was so lucky to get the opportunity to work with him at a young age.”
Pickett’s influence has been multi-generational.
Kellyn Gagon performed in Pickett’s first Glorietta musical decades ago and her son Bennett was in his class for two years.
“Ron planted the seed for a lifelong appreciation of and joy in music,” she said. “Reflecting back, I genuinely can’t imagine how different my life would have been without Ron’s influence. Music, specifically vocal performance, has been and still is, a huge part of my identity.”
Orinda parent Wendy Bond credits Pickett with helping both her daughters turn singing and musical theater into a lifelong passion.
“He encouraged them and held all of his students to very high standards,” said Bond. Her oldest daughter now teaches music.
Diana Dwyer Sharp’s children graduated from Glorietta 15 years ago, but his influence in her household is felt to this day.
“We still talk about how Ron taught them (and countless other children) the joy of singing, performing and working in a group,” Sharp said. “The fact that he made that kind of impression on fourth and fifth graders is a testament to his commitment to the children and to producing quality performances. If you pass by our house, you might still hear us singing Wild Goose Chase from ‘Honk!’”
Pickett made sure his students brought music out of the classroom and into the community. Among other things, they sang at assisted living facilities where they were encouraged to meet and talk with residents.
“I wanted them to hear those seniors’ stories,” he said. “I wanted them to see how music can bring joy to everyone.”
Getting out in the community, he said, also taught them poise and confidence.
One of his proudest achievements was creating The Ensemble Singers, a group that ranged in size from 30 to 60 students in its heyday. The group performed at the Winter Concert and was even invited to perform at Six Flags Discovery Kingdom in Vallejo.
The pandemic was partially responsible for the group’s eventual decline, but Pickett also attributes it to a gradual change in culture among both students and parents.
“Commitment has lost its value,” he said. “Fewer people want to commit to the work and the time it takes to do something special, whether it’s giving up one recess a week for practice or showing up for an evening performance.”
He was saddened to see that at a recent concert by local schools, only a single performer showed up to represent one of the schools.
In recent years, he decided to relinquish the role of directing school musicals, which now are managed by Town Hall Theatre Company. One reason he cites – fewer parents volunteering.
“Years ago, we had parents helping with every aspect of our productions,” he said. “They found special props for us, ran the concessions, promoted and sold the tickets. Without those volunteers I felt I could no longer do the quality of production we wanted. We couldn’t achieve the special effects that made the kids proud.”
Health problems have also made the job challenging.
“I don’t have any family here anymore, and I need them at this point in my life,” Pickett said. “It was time.”
The music program will continue at both schools, but it’s unlikely anyone can fully replace the joy and creativity Pickett has brought to the classroom, and to the performances he has directed and produced over the years.
Pickett has coached multiple winners of Lamorinda Idols, produced a dizzying array of musicals (never repeating a single one) and whose students have gone on to become music teachers, stage performers and successful musicians in a variety of genres.
Riki Sorensen, an Orinda parent whose child performed in several of Pickett’s productions, said Pickett has the Midas touch with children.
“He could convert shy introverts into master performers,” said Sorensen. “He was patient but direct, creative but methodically prepared. He poured his heart and soul into young people, and they responded with expertly performed concerts and ridiculously high-quality musical productions that were enthralling and entertaining. He is a true hometown hero.”