My name is Brad Maki.  I am a husband, a father, a musician, a handbell choir director, a student, and a university employee.  Wearing each of those hats, sometimes concurrently, takes nearly all of my time.  But I cannot imagine my life without any of it.

I am working toward a Bachelor of Arts in music.  This will be my third university degree, but my first degree that doesn’t have specific employment in mind.  I’m pursuing it for mostly personal reasons, but it may allow me further opportunities for supplemental work (or retirement work in the distant future!) and income.  I have been studying voice for the past two years while also taking music theory, aural harmony, and music history.  I have sung in the University Chorale the past two years.  I am studying music to fulfill a lifelong dream of being a good musician.  I started my music journey in kindergarden playing the classroom piano by ear; my parents started me in private lessons as a first grader.  I stayed in lessons off-and-on through most of high school, during which time I also learned to play saxophone, baritone, trombone, and tuba for the school bands.  Church music became an interest of mine as well as a junior high and high school student, and I became involved in playing the organ (albeit without the pedals!) in my church.  In my first college career at Central Michigan University, I was in a symphonic band as well as the Marching Chippewas.  Following college, I became employed part-time as a church musician (keyboards) and handbell choir director.  I had to stop that employment after the arrival of my first child, but recently took on the role again on an interim basis.  Following the completion of my MA degree in higher education, I had an internal pull to start a degree in music, and here I am.

Most people in this class would not know that I used to work in local television.  My first job out of college was as a TV news promotion writer-producer.  I wrote, edited, and produced local news promotions at WNEM-TV (channel 5) in Saginaw for three years before moving to higher education.  I even won two Michigan Emmy awards.

Presently, my full-time employment is as the Director of Graduate Admissions at the University of Michigan-Flint.  My family includes my wife, Susan, and two kids, Aidan and Emma.