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Since her earliest years, Austin’s MacPhail Center for Music Site Director Cheryl Berglund has been a passionate advocate for music and music education.

She received her first drumsticks at the age of 10 and at age of 14 she was given to perform rehearsals that maybe didn’t have the immediate impact she was hoping for at the time, but that laid the foundations for what was to come all the same.

“From age 14 I started holding rehearsals during lunch hours for my friends,” Berglund said. “That wasn’t very popular, but it was just because I loved it that much. One of my biggest obsessions is music and honestly it’s not about getting the performance right. It’s just about appreciating it and exposing everyone to music in different ways.”

That drive to bring music to the community through education will now be honored on Feb. 13 during the Minnesota Music Educator Association’s Midwinter Convention when Berglund will be presented with the MMEA’s Community Music Educator of the Year Award.

The MMEA, which caters to music education in every state with K-12 music programs, is honoring Berglund for her work not only with MacPhail, where she is also a percussion instructor, but also within the general music community of Austin.

The Austin High School Orchestra will also be performing at the convention.

The MMEA honors music teachers across a number of areas including high school, middle school, elementary and collegiate levels along with the community award.

Berglund found out in December that she would be honored after being nominated in November.

“When you’re a community educator, you don’t have a lot of opportunities to be recognized in a larger way,” Berglund said. “For me it was just really important because I’ve been doing this work since I was 14 and you do it on a smaller scale.”

“It means a lot because aside from my family, it’s what I put all of my effort into — community music education,” she added.

MacPhail’s Austin site started 11 years ago, but not with the intention of opening a site in Austin. The idea that the community might be able to support this kind of programming started with musicians coming down from the Twin Cities to provide those opportunities.

However, very quickly the response generated was an indication that something more could be established in Austin.

“Within a few months, we realized we were going to have to have a physical presence because we needed to have a place for people to have lessons,” Berglund said. “That wasn’t originally going to be a piece of it. It just escalated.”

Escalated in such a way that MacPhail now serves 1,500 people a week through its on-site services as well as through community partnerships. Berglund was involved in this effort very early, witnessing the growth first-hand and including the opening of its current building in 2020, a collaborative space with Austin Public Schools at the Austin High School Annex.

To Berglund, this growth over the years represents the power of music education for a community.

“For me, in community education it’s not just about the performance,” Berglund said. “I would say it’s about giving the public all of the experiences that they need to enhance their lives.”

While Berglund had always eyed a career as a professional percussionist, she has come to realize that her true gift has been a desire to give back through this very education.

“It was more about just being able to help people with the music and show them that their lives were worth it and giving them music as a tool,” she said.

Prior to MacPhail, that work included an at home studio where she taught lessons. But since coming to work for MacPhail after a push by Jennifer Lawhead to try for the site director position, Berglund has been able to really expand that passion for music education.

That principal is largely built on the idea that everybody has something in them they can excel at.

“I do believe everyone is given a gift and I do know that my gift is to show people music and what it can do for them,” Berglund said. “To be able to fill that gift, I don’t even know how to describe it.”

Berglund, to be sure, is honored to be recognized by the MMEA’s award, but she feels more so that it is a community honor in a way.

That feeling is based on just how many opportunities there are to reach people in Austin and the area through music. In her view, it’s a way to enhance the lives of citizens all the way through life.

“It’s absolutely a reflection on this community,” Berglund said. “We’re not an overly large community and I would say the best thing we do is once we introduce music starting at any time, we have a pathway that extends far into adulthood and that is special.”

Following the convention, a reception will be held to honor Berglund at 2 p.m. on Feb. 23 at MacPhail.