Elaine M. Foley Winchell

Elaine Foley Winchell was a music teacher at Billerica Memorial High School from the early 1990s until she retired at the end of the 2025-2026 school year, and a director of its band. As Elaine M. Foley she had been a member of the high school band herself, playing in the band all four years and in the jazz band, and in 1979 and 1980 she was field director of the Billerica Memorial High School Competition Band and Silver Jade Color Guard under the band director George Lemieux. That season the band and guard were the 1980 Open Southern Nationals field show champions and the U.S. Open Northeastern Nationals field show and parade champions, and at the festival in Florida she received a scholarship award; the band was honored at the 1980 annual town meeting. Her senior yearbook entry gave her hope to go through college as a music major.

She appears on the high school faculty as "Ms. Winchell, Music" in the Warrior yearbook of 1992 and in most of the yearbooks that followed, through 2020. The 1996 yearbook, in a profile of her, described her as "a former BMHS band student and now conductor of the concert band and director of the marching band" who "has lived and breathed band all her life," and told of musicians rehearsing during school, after school and on weekends in the student parking lot "until every note is played perfectly," with Ms. Winchell standing before them as "their nemesis and inspiration." It added that she "demands nothing but perfection from her students," and that the self-confidence, self-motivation and self-discipline she taught were lessons they would use throughout their lives. Later students recalled receiving the band's Summa Award from her, and the seniors of 2011 remembered spraying silly string at her after the band placed first at the marching band championships. During her years on the high school faculty the Billerica Memorial High School Marching Band and the Silver Jade Color Guard won the Division I championship of the Musical Arts Conference in 2004 and 2005 and the Division II championship of the New England Scholastic Band Association in 2009 and 2010.

References

1. Warrior 1980: senior entry of Elaine M. Foley, band 1-4, jazz band 2-4, field director 1979-80
2. Warrior 1980: the 1979 BMHS Competition Band and Silver Jade Color Guard; the Field Director was Elaine Foley
3. Billerica Town Report 1980, annual town meeting: the BMHS band honored; 1980 field show champions, Elaine Foley, Field Director
4. Billerica Town Report 1980, annual town meeting: Florida awards of the BMHS band, Scholarship, Elaine Foley
5. Warrior 1992: faculty, Ms. Winchell, Music
6. Warrior 1996: faculty profile of Ms. Winchell, conductor of the concert band and director of the marching band
7. Warrior 2007: senior tribute recalling the Summa Award presented in marching band by Ms. Winchell
8. Warrior 2011: senior memories of spraying silly string at Ms. Winchell after placing 1st at the marching band championships
9. Billerica Town Report 2005, school department: the High School Marching Band and Silver Jade Colorguard captured the Musical Arts Conference Division I Championship
10. Billerica Town Report 2010, school department: the High School Marching Band and Silver Jade Color Guard first in NESBA Division I
11. Warrior 2020: faculty, Elaine Winchell