Barbara Retzko

Recently retired, Barbara Retzko served as Choral Director in Bernards Township from 1980-2020. As Director of Choral Activities at Ridge High School in Basking Ridge, NJ she led the award-winning Ridge Chorale, Concert Choir, Voices of Ridge, Ridgemen and A Cappella Choir Honors. From 2000-2002, she served as Choral Director at the International School of Düsseldorf, Germany where her singers performed in Honor Choirs in Den Hague, Netherlands, Stavanger, Norway and Berlin, Germany. In May 2002, May 2006, and May 2019, she served as Guest Conductor for International Honor Choirs in Zurich and Basel, Switzerland. From 2006-2013, Barbara served as Associate Professor at Rutgers University (Douglass College campus), directing the Voorhees Choir.

Stateside, Barbara has served as Guest Conductor for the 1991 New Jersey All-State Mixed

Chorus, the 2002 Independent School Choral Festival in Charlotte, North Carolina, the 1998

New Jersey Region II Mixed Chorus, the 2008 Sussex County Chorus, the 2009 Region II

Women’s Choir, the 2011 New Jersey All-State Women’s Chorus and the 2017 All-Eastern

Treble Honors Choir. At present, she is the only NJ Choral Director to have conducted the two

Region II and two NJ All-State Choruses. She received the Governor's Teacher Award for

Teacher of the Year at Ridge High School in 1998 and the first Excellence in Arts Education

Award from the Somerset County Cultural & Heritage Commission in 2005. She was named

Master Music Teacher 2008 by NJMEA and received a Distinguished Leadership and Service

Award in 2015. She has traveled with the American Music Abroad RED tour to Europe during

the summers of 1998, 1999, 2006 and 2011. In 2018, she received the Mayor’s Arts Award for

excellence and commitment to the Arts in Bernards Township.

Barbara Retzko possesses a strong commitment and dedication to the Choral education of all

singers. She received her Bachelor of Arts in Music Education from Trenton State College and

her Master of Arts, Summa cum laude, in Choral Conducting from the same. She has served as

an adjudicator for the Hunterdon, Sussex and Bergen County Teen Arts program, the Roxbury

High School Invitational and Performing Arts Consultants.

She was a member of the National Association for Music Educators (NAfME) and has served on

the state board of the New Jersey Chapter of the American Choral Directors Association (NJ-

ACDA) representing Repertoire & Standards – Senior High School and Women’s Choirs. She is

currently serving the NJ All-State Choral Procedures Committee as Audition Registration

Manager and Historian.