This year Corry High School has gotten a new band teacher, Tristan McCray. Mr. McCray was born April 19, 1986, and grew up going to Corry. His music journey began in fourth grade where he started studying music. He found out playing and teaching the art was his passion in high school and decided that’s what he wanted to do for his career. Hobbies that Mr. McCray has are gardening (where he grows vegetables), cooking, and playing music. His favorite thing to cook is soup and his favorite instrument to play is the trumpet. Fun Fact: He said if he were to get a tattoo, he would go with the iconic trumpet on Lady Gaga’s arm. 

Moving on to favorites of his, Mr. McCray’s favorite song is “Down Home Girl” by Old Crow Medicine Show released in 2006. His favorite movie is “O Brother Where Art Thou,” a comedy/crime about a trio trying to pursue freedom from hard labor. And lastly, his favorite color is blue. A music artist that Mr. McCray likes to listen to is Pete Seeger, a 1940s folk singer. Seeger’s most famous song being “The Hammer Song (If I Had A Hammer)” released in 1949 to support the progressive movement. Mr. McCray’s favorite genre of music fits into the category of bluegrass. Bluegrass is a genre of music that is more like old country originating in the 1940s. 

After a long while of thinking about where he would like to go for his dream vacation, Mr. McCray decided that he would take a trip to 48 out of 50 states because he said, “Alaska is too far of a drive and you can’t drive to Hawaii.” Colorado and Greece were the next closest options. Maybe on this trip his dad could drive him to all the states considering he was a bus driver. In fact, his whole family has school-related jobs. His mother and sister are also teachers, so it’s cool to see that school education runs in the family. 

If Mr. McCray was to give any advice it would be to keep your word and have integrity, which means to do the right thing even when no one is around. His pet peeve would even be people who lack integrity. Mr. McCray would encourage everyone to not be two-faced and to be kind to others, so I would take his advice and do an act of kindness today.