SANFORD — Clarinetist, composer and saxophonist Mike McGinnis was a 13 year-old at Sanford Junior High School when his band teacher, Angela Hendricks, suggested he get hold of a recording of jazz great Charlie Parker. His parents got him one, and he listened ”“ and then he listened, again and again.

It made an impression ”“ a big one.

“It was a lightning bolt,” McGinnis recalled in a telephone interview Wednesday. “I’d never heard anything like it before. It brought me to this other world.”

He remembered being at school the next day and anxiously waiting to get home, so he could listen to the cassette tape again. 

It was a while ago that McGinnis was in eighth grade at Sanford Junior High School. He graduated from the University of Southern Maine School of Music in 1995, went on to the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York, and then moved to Brooklyn, where he’s been composing and playing the clarinet and sax ever since, focused on jazz and contemporary classical music.

And he’s headed home for a Saturday night concert at Sanford Springvale Historical Museum, set for 7:30 p.m.

He’ll be playing a concert called Full Circle. He said his music “tends to be all over the place, a lullaby or a nightmare,” and he promises to challenge the audience and find a balance that fits.

“I want to present something I really like and care about,” he said.

McGinnis said that many facets of his compositions draw from his childhood here, and that there will be some other connections to Sanford too. McGinnis said he’ll perform some of his own works, along with some by others, and a couple of songs associated with the late trumpet player and Sanford native Randy Brooks, who played with Les Brown, among others, in the big band era.

McGinnis was a teenager when he started playing the saxophone and then picked up the clarinet at the suggestion of a teacher, but said he didn’t get serious about playing the latter instrument until he was in New York and was introduced to Eastern European music.

Back in the day, when he was in Sanford he was into heavy metal ”“ a direct contrast to what he was playing in the school band.

When he was 13 years old, he said, his music teacher suggested he try band camp at USM, but at first, he didn’t want to go, he recalled Wednesday ”“ he wanted to stay home and skateboard instead. But he went, even though band camp “sounded so dorky,” he said. And he was glad he did. McGinnis found he was surrounded by other kids his age who were as excited about music as he was.

He’ll be accompanied at Saturday’s concert by Brooklyn jazz pianist Erik Deutsch. USM professor and saxophonist Barry Saunders will guest perform on a few pieces as well.

Tickets, at $15 for adults and seniors and free to those under 21, are available by reservation by calling 324-2797 or in advance at Bradford Block Bistro, 459 Main St.

The Sanford Springvale Historical Museum is at 505 Main St.

— Senior Staff Writer Tammy Wells can be contacted at 324-4444 (local call in Sanford) or 282-1535, ext. 327 or twells@journaltribune.com.