Lisa Fournier-Donley retired from a 37-year career dedicated to bringing the joy of music to young people as a music educator in Bourne and Barnstable Public Schools. Now teaching at Cape Symphony, she says “I still get to do the fun stuff!”
After decades mentoring young people and directing concert, jazz, and marching bands, choruses, festivals, holiday programs, and more, the one horn Lisa doesn’t love to “toot” is her own. Her focus is always on the students. “You just do everything you can for the kids,” she said of the multiple roles she’s held over the years. “It was all about creating musical opportunities for them.”
One of those kids grew up and nominated Lisa for the prestigious 2026 GRAMMY Music Educator Award, for which she was a nationwide quarterfinalist. As part of advancing through that process, Lisa was asked what tips she’d give future music educators. “We all start with the same pedagogy… we can all transpose, and all that. Which is good,” she told them, “but the single most important thing is that kids feel safe with you. Your class has to be a safe place to take risks, to make mistakes, and to fix them. Once they feel that, then the learning happens.”
A teacher inspired Lisa to become one herself. As a Barnstable High School senior, she’d been accepted to college but hadn’t decided exactly what to study. “My band director announced at our last concert that I had won the J.P. Sousa award. He said, ‘Lisa’s going to be a music teacher, and she’s going to be great!’ He saw something in me that I didn’t know I had.” Lisa has since experienced that many times with her own students. “They don’t see themselves the way we see them,” she says. “Students are so hard on themselves… they get upset to miss one note, not seeing the hundreds they got right. I can give them that perspective.”
Beyond skill at their instruments, what would Lisa like her students to take away from their learning experience? “Being part of something bigger than just yourself,” she says without hesitation. “That’s what being part of an ensemble is to me… that’s what music does. You’ve each worked hard individually, you give of yourselves, and it’s magic when it all comes together. Being a musician is just special. You can’t replicate it, you can’t buy it. It’s second to none.”
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Lisa Fournier-Donley is accepting new students at our West Barnstable campus. For more information or to arrange a trial lesson, email
