Austin Testerman

Bio

Austin Testerman is an avid researcher, performer, Florida-certified music educator, worship leader, and SEU Alumni whose musical experience ranges from classical percussion to contemporary worship music and various Brazilian regional music. Austin has been teaching strings and percussion for the past 6 years. He has worked as a clinician for various schools within Polk County to help local orchestra and band directors prepare their ensembles for concerts and music performance assessments. Currently, he works as an Itinerant Orchestra Director for Polk County Public Schools. In this role, he directs the orchestras at Lake Gibson Middle School, Lake Gibson High School, and Kathleen High School. He coordinates these three orchestra programs to perform at annual music performance assessments, school events, and seasonal concerts.

As a musicologist, Austin’s primary research pertains to worship histories in Florida and world music pedagogy. He has presented his research at various scholarly conferences including the American Musicological Society Collegiate Southeastern Chapter annual meeting, the Florida State University Society for Musicology colloquium, and the Society for Christian Scholarship in Music annual conference.

During his time here at SEU, Austin participated in the Fireline, Percussion Ensemble, Chamber Orchestra, Wind Ensemble, and Chamber Choir. While pursuing his graduate studies at Florida State University, Austin performed in the Old Time Ensemble, Modern Popular Music Ensemble, and helped lead the Brazilian Ensemble “Grupo Jaragua.”