Members of On the Trail, l-r, Tom Polizzi, Charlie Widmer, Austin Scelzo and Matt Curley. (Photo by Liz Newman, www.liznewmanphotography.com)

Austin Scelzo, Tom Polizzi, Charlie Widmer and Matt Curley are members of the New England-based bluegrass band On the Trail. It’s been an exciting few years for the four Western Connecticut State University music alumni, who won the 2022 Thomas Point Beach Bluegrass Festival Showcase Competition, and they have recently released their first full-length album, “Where Do We Go from Here?” It seems apparent that where they are heading is toward even more success, which is not surprising since they all prepared for their professional musical careers at WestConn.

Curley, who plays upright bass, is from New Milford; Scelzo, on fiddle, is from Wallingford; Widmer, a guitarist, was born in Switzerland and has lived in Danbury and Oxford; and Polizzi, who plays the mandolin, is from Simsbury. All four band members contribute vocals. Despite coming from different places, they all converged at WestConn’s Department of Music.

Austin Scelzo

Scelzo said WestConn was his first college choice from the start. “I knew I wanted to teach music by the time I was a freshman in high school,” he said. “Many of my public school’s music teachers were either from WestConn or highly recommended it. I was sold when I saw the plan for the new music and arts building, which was scheduled to be finished by the end of my freshman year there. I was also so pleased with how friendly and encouraging the students were. As a multi-genre performer, I was excited by my ability to study classical violin and voice while also dabbling in jazz improvisation and accompaniment.”

Widmer auditioned for several music programs, including Berklee College of Music, Hartt School of Music, UConn, and WestConn. “I fell in love with the incredible professors of the music program and the instant community aspect of the music department, both in the teachers and the students,” he said. “The program is insanely hard, with 12+ hour days, and 10+ classes a semester. I wanted and needed a program that was rigorous and demanding, and am thankful daily that WestConn shaped me into the musician I am.”

Despite auditioning at, and being accepted to the Eastman School of Music, New England Conservatory and Berklee College of Music, Polizzi chose WestConn because of “the incredible building, faculty, and student body, as well as the Honors Program and the generous scholarship and other opportunities it afforded me,” he said.

Charlie Widmer

Currently, at anywhere from five to a dozen years since their graduation, the members of On the Trail still have good things to say about their education and how it has contributed to their success — especially when it comes to their professors.

For Curley, who transferred to WestConn after a semester in the Midwest, his decision came down to the university’s faculty. “I was drawn to the strength of the Music Department,” he said. “Especially Professor of Percussion Dave Smith, who I studied with for four years.”

Polizzi said, “I really enjoyed my classes with Ed Dzubak, and my private lessons with the great Chris Morrison,”

Scelzo and Widmer were even more effusive about their experiences.

“Dr. Kevin Isaacs was a mastermind, genius musician,” Scelzo said. “I learned a ton about what true musicianship looks like from him. He has a sublime taste in good music and that rubbed off a lot on all of us. He also came out to a cappella shows and supported our non-classical singing in really fun ways. Dr. Cory Ganschow had an unlimited supply of love and support for her students. She knew everyone in the choir’s name by day two and she took my call four years out of college to encourage me to dream big and follow up on my vision to move on from my first job for bigger and better things.”

Widmer was in complete agreement. “Working with Dr. Kevin Isaacs was, in every imaginable way, life changing,” he said. “The man is about as passionate and honest an educator as you will ever find, and was always one sentence away from changing you forever. Dr. Russell Hirshfield was not only endlessly funny in his uniquely dry way, but made music theory seem almost too easy, no matter how complicated the subject of the day. Jamie Begian was the toughest teacher for sight singing and ear training that we had, so classes and tests with him were unforgiving, but meant you came out far better than you ever came in. I credit my ability to sightread completely to him, so I owe him a lot for the way he ran classes and pushed us. Dr. Margaret Astrup, head of the voice department, was a mama bird to all of us in the vocal program, providing as many opportunities to perform and grow as singers as she could muster, including the internship Austin and I eventually became friends at. My private voice teacher, Dr. Richard Weidlich, became my confidant and personal cheerleader every step of my education, and pushed me to be the most open and connected performer I could be in every lesson and performance. Last, but certainly not least, was Dr. Ganschow, an endlessly kind, inspiring, and electric personality who changed everyone she educated, of that I am sure.”

Matt Curley

Curley graduated in 2013 with a Bachelor of Science in Music Education (Percussion), and went on to obtain a Master of Music from Middle Tennessee University in 2015. Widmer graduated in 2016 with a Bachelor of Music, Classical, with an Emphasis in Vocal Performance. Scelzo was a 2017 graduate with a Bachelor of Science in Music Education (Classical Violin), and Polizzi graduated with a degree in Audio and Music Production in 2020 and subsequently received a master’s degree in Digital Marketing & Data Analytics from Emerson College in 2022.

With such a wide range of years during which they attended WestConn and a diversity in majors as well, it’s interesting how their paths crossed. For several of them, it came about because of their participation in Music Department-related activities. For others, it happened after graduation.

Scelzo said he performed in a local bluegrass/country string band called the Angry O’Haras while he was a student. “Performing opportunities on the violin at WestConn were mostly classical so having a non-classical outlet during my time there helped me expand my musicianship,” he explained. “The on campus, all male acapella group Parallel Fifths helped me develop a stronger stage presence and gave me a really great community of friends outside of my discipline. I also taught privately at a music conservatory called Sharps and Flats in Ridgefield, which was great real-time practice for all the things I learned in my music education courses.”

“Most of my time at WestConn was spent hanging with other inspiring musicians/students, creating bands, gigging locally, recording, and sharing music both in performing and listening,” Widmer said. “I also was a music instructor at Guitar Center in Danbury. I started writing songs with the first band I ever started with fellow students, a hip-hop soul group called Sub-Urban, and we played a lot of Connecticut and New York/New York City shows and cut our first record right after graduating. Austin and I met through an internship we received through WCSU as section leaders at the First Congregational Church of Ridgefield. We were paid section leaders and also part of the bell choir, rehearsing every Thursday and singing or performing every Sunday and major church holidays. We also sang together on campus in the Concert Choir, Chamber Choir and Parallel Fifths. Our friendship grew out of that time together, and we became best friends over that 3+ year period.”

Widmer continued, “During a set break at a Sub-Urban gig, I told Austin I’d recently been listening to a bluegrass band called the Punch Brothers, and, knowing Austin loved bluegrass, said that if he ever got a gig and needed a guitarist, to let me know. He got us our first gig at WestConn’s Community Coffeehouse, with Tom (Polizzi) joining us and WestConn alumnus Niles Spalding playing upright bass. We had no band name, the event was called ‘Bluegrass and Beyond,’ and the rest is history for On the Trail.”

Tom Polizzi

As students, Curley and Polizzi both worked for WestConn’s Music Department running events. Polizzi also worked off campus jobs at a retreat center in Sharon, at a farm in Ridgefield, and taught private lessons in Cheshire as a junior and senior. He met Scelzo while he was still in school and Scelzo had recently graduated — and played with the then-unnamed band at that first campus Coffeehouse. Curley said by assisting WestConn Musical Arts Assistant Laura Piechota with events in Ives Concert Hall, he learned a lot about the inner workings of putting on concerts and events, which has come in handy since. He was the last to join the band, having met Scelzo when they both were Darien Middle School music teachers after graduation. “We bonded over jamming on bluegrass tunes after school,” Curley said.

In addition to their rigorous performing and recording schedule, all four members of On the Trail also have other jobs.

Curley continues to be a middle school band director in Darien and Polizzi works full-time as a Digital Marketing Senior Account Manager for an agency out of Boston. Both Scelzo and Widmer have their hands in several ventures.

Widmer has been a private music teacher for more than a decade since graduating. “I’ve worked in several different great studios, but now run my own and teach completely independently in a variety of music, performing, and songwriting subjects,” he said. “I also spent 10 years as a section leader in several different beautiful church music programs. I have also had some extensive backup singing experience for people like Michael Bublé, Josh Groban, Sarah Brightman and Jared Leto in storied venues such as Radio City Music Hall and Madison Square Garden.”

Scelzo said, “My music business coach taught me how to generate multiple sources of passive income and it’s been such a crucial part of buying the sort of freedom that I have afforded these past few years as a musician. I sell sheet music, video courses, e-books, online school subscriptions, and I developed a web-based app to help people learn to sing harmony. I also have a weekly group zoom class, and host a few of my own music retreats. Occasionally, I’ll host a weekly jamming class teaching people on different instruments how to make music together.”

Collectively, the band was featured in a January 2025 article, “One to Watch: With Connecticut origins, On the Trail find their way in bluegrass” in The Bluegrass Situation.

Individually, Scelzo was named a Connecticut Arts Hero of 2023, the International Bluegrass Music Association’s overall “Industry Involvement” and “Mentor of the Year” nominee, and is a graduate of IBMA’s “Leadership Bluegrass” International class of 2023. Curley is a published composer (Rowloff Publications, C. Alan publications, Eastern Hill Music, and Mattcurley.com). His works have been performed in 17+ countries at concerts, conferences, festivals and seminars.

Widmer was awarded an Artists Respond Grant in 2022 from the Connecticut Department of Economic and Community Development for his project, Music for a Better Tomorrow, a concept to provide free to venue concerts, in order to help them raise funds after the financial impacts of COVID. He is also currently a nominee for the position of Connecticut State Troubadour. Polizzi was one of 15 performers selected internationally for the final Acoustic Music Seminar in 2020 at the Savannah (Georgia) Music Festival, which unfortunately did not take place due to the pandemic.

Despite their different paths, the four performers attribute much of their musical success to WestConn.

Curley said he is grateful for attaining his Music Teacher State Certification and some great “real world” on the job (and on the stage) training. Polizzi recalls the versatility, work ethic, and lifelong passion for music that was cultivated when he was a student.

Scelzo and Widmer also had ample praise for what their degrees have meant to them.

“The music education program was exceptional,” Scelzo said. “I felt well-prepared and confident in my ability to manage a classroom, structure a lesson, and conduct an ensemble. Interestingly, I also found that my basic musicianship (ear training, music theory, dictation) skills were also a cut ahead of many of my peers from conservatory programs.”

Widmer agreed. “Every aspect of music comprehension and the foundation we were expected to have has served me well. The standard that was expected of us, executed in the Sophomore Barrier, was crucial to being able to adapt to any professional music requirements; meaning I was never in over my head when learning roles, sightreading music, writing music, or interpreting music in any way. WestConn shaped me into a professional, so that when I started to work, I always had the skills I needed to be the best that I could be.”

To learn more about On the Trail, visit https://www.onthetrailbluegrass.com/.

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