Please share a story about your work/experience with ALMA.
In my years with ALMA I have been fortunate enough to be involved with the programing committee which selects what artists perform at Sundays at Six as well as our other programming. In addition to bringing quality musical programing to the community, I also try to create opportunities for our local talent, and one of my favorite examples of this is our Battle of the Bands, an idea I presented to the board shortly after I joined, first ran in 2019, and after a hiatus due to COVID, has become one of ALMA’s signature events thanks to our great team.
During my time in ALMA, I have served as vice president and president, but have since stepped back to being a regular board member.
How long have you been a part of ALMA, how did you get involved, and what is your current role within ALMA?
I first joined the board of ALMA in the late summer of 2018. I had been active for several years as a musician in the valley and was looking for a way to get more involved in the local music community. I was also interested in learning the event production side of the music industry and learning how things worked from the venue side of things. In the summer of 2018, after playing a Sundays at Six concert with the SLV Big Band, I approached the representatives of ALMA and offered to volunteer with putting on Sundays at Six and was invited to join the board shortly after.
Matt Wellman
Board Member | 2018 – Present
Where are you originally from and what brought you to the San Luis Valley?
I grew up in Laconia, New Hampshire, and originally moved to the San Luis Valley to take a teaching position in Sanford after college.
What are you currently excited about regarding ALMA and what project(s) are you a part of?
Over the past few years ALMA has had the opportunity to host some marquis events, such as the Glenn Miller Orchestra, and add new programming opportunities centered on local talent such as Roaming Rhythms. In the future, it’s my hope that Roaming Rhythms continues to be a staple of ALMA programming, perhaps even expanding as time goes on. I hope we also continue to have to regularly bring in Marquis concerts at an accessible price to members of our community. For example, to see an act with the name recognition of the Glenn Miller Orchestra, or Alasdair Fraser and Natalie Haas, people in the valley would normally need to travel out of the valley and pay $50 or more a ticket plus travel costs. We were able to offer these performances to our community for less than half that cost while still paying our performers and sound engineers fair compensation. And of course, Sundays at Six is free to the public.
Speaking of Sundays at Six, there has been a big push on the programming team the last few years to broaden the diversity of genres and performers represented on the series line up the past few years, and I’ve gotten a lot of positive feedback from the community on this. We are fortunate to live in a diverse community. My goal as a member of the programing committee is to try to make sure our lineup has something that appeals to the broadest portion of our community possible. Not every event we program will appeal to everybody, but throughout the year everyone in our community will find at least one event that resonates with them.
Why is music important to you? Why do you think it is important for our community?
I have been singing and playing instruments for as long as I can remember. Even now it’s rare that you don’t catch me humming a tune or drumming on something. As a musician, there’s really no feeling that compares to expressing your ideas in a way that connects you with the audience and your fellow musicians. When the band and the audience find the same groove, there’s no feeling like it in the world.
Music is a powerful vehicle for connection and emotional expression, both for the musician and the listener. It’s my goal as a board member of ALMA to expand opportunities for this sort of connection in an increasingly divided world, perhaps to be an unexpected source of common ground between people who may not believe they have anything in common. My goal as a member of ALMA is to bring more of these opportunities for connection to our community.
