LIVING THEIR POPS LIFE TO THE FULLEST, 

DRS. KEVIN AND LESLIE MCDONOUGH 

KEVIN MCDONOUGH

CURRENT POSITION: Senior Research Engineer at Bihrle Applied Research Inc.

LOCATION: Wilmington, NC

UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN DEGREE: B.S.E Aerospace, M.S.E Aerospace, Ph.D. Aerospace

GRADUATION YEAR: 2010/2012/2015

ACTIVITIES AT MICHIGAN: I had a lot of odd jobs on campus ranging from working at the Law School's cafeteria to being a tour guide for prospective students.  Beyond that, it was just Pops and school.

MICHIGAN POPS ORCHESTRA INSTRUMENT: French Horn

LESLIE (KORSON) MCDONOUGH

CURRENT POSITION: General Medical Officer in the U.S. Navy, soon to be General Surgery Resident at Henry Ford Hospital

LOCATION: Wilmington, NC

UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN DEGREE: BA in Spanish, Minor in Medical Anthropology

GRADUATION YEAR: 2010 

ACTIVITIES AT MICHIGAN: I did Campus Symphony for a bit before Pops. I was an undergraduate student instructor for chemistry and did study abroad in Sevilla, Spain for 6 months. Other than that, lots of running and nerding out to get into med school :)

MICHIGAN POPS ORCHESTRA INSTRUMENT: Violin

Listen to some McDonough Pops favorites while you read about their Pops Life!

A CONVERSATION WITH THE MCDONOUGHS

KELLY COMPTON, our Pops Life correspondent, engages Kevin and Leslie in a free for all conversation on everything in their lives!

KC: Tell me about your musical background before coming to Michigan!

KM: When we were in high school, we did the Kalamazoo Symphony Orchestra. Sorry, I’m talking in “we”s now, which is something I do when talking about my past, because Kris (my twin) and myself are a “we.” When I got to Michigan, I joined Pops mostly because Tom had done Pops. I saw how much fun he had and heard about the friendships that he had in the orchestra. That’s what I was looking for, so I got very heavily involved in Pops. Freshman year I dressed as a mime to advertise on the Diag for one of our concerts, “Pops in Paris.” Then I did Pops for 7 years while I was at Michigan. For six of those years, I was on the Board. I held a whole lot of different positions on the board, and I don’t remember what they all were. Then I did DMO (the Detroit Medical Orchestra) with Leslie after we finished with Pops and moved to Detroit.

LM: And sadly neither of us have done much the past few years. 2015 was pretty hectic because I was a surgical intern, so I didn’t really have time to stay involved with music. Kevin played once or twice with the NIH Orchestra I think?

KM: Another Pops contact actually got me playing in the National Institute of Health (NIH) Orchestra!

LM: I’ve tried to find orchestras here in Wilmington that are smaller community orchestras, but I have not had any luck with that, so that’s sad. But when we move wherever we end up going, hopefully music will resume, because we’ll probably be in a more urban area. I began playing violin when I asked my mom to get lessons for me after being at a friend’s house while she practiced. I took private lessons for probably 10 years while doing travel groups, youth orchestras, etc. I started as a music major at Wayne State before transferring to U of M, where I got involved in Campus Symphony and Pops. In med school, I played in the Detroit Medical Orchestra.

KC: How did you two meet??

LM: I found out about Pops because I had a friend in Organic Chemistry who knew Nate Friedman and Zack Rosenthal. I think Nate was in Campus Symphony with me, so he and Zack got me to audition. I was section leader for the second violins when I started. That’s actually how I met Kevin, because he was in charge of attendance, so he would come to me and take the attendance sheet from me every week.

Kevin and I started hanging out as friends before I left to study abroad, and then I came back and we started hanging out again. Then there was one Halloween when we went to whirlyball, and I invited Kevin to come out with my friends and me. Kevin came out - it was basically me with a bunch of my girlfriends at the Jug, and we all wanted to go to Ricks, so I basically forced Kevin to come to Ricks with us. I paid for his cover. And that’s where the romance began.

KM: Yes, we found love where love goes to die: in the basement of Rick’s American Café.

KC: Tell me about some of your favorite Pops memories!

KM: Basically my life in college revolved around Pops, whether it was actual rehearsals or Board meetings or just hanging out with people from the orchestra. My entire friend base was from the orchestra. My senior year, 5 of us from the orchestra lived in the “Pops House.” We always hosted the after-parties. I found my wife in Pops, all of my best friends were in Pops, and all of the people I still talk to from college were in Pops, with the exception of some people I worked with in grad school.

LM: I loved playing the music, but honestly there were some really good parties and spin-off parties. I had a robust social life in college so that’s obviously what I’m going to say was my favorite thing – all of the partying and everything.

KM: The parties were great, but the music was always fun. My favorite musical moment in the orchestra was the encore for “Pops in Love,” when we played “Nessun Dorma” with an opera singer. It was incredible, and there was a standing ovation even before he was finished. As far as other times…  I met literally all of my best friends in that orchestra. I could write a book of memories and send it to you.

KC: How did Pops influence your career decisions? Where are you now, and what wonderful things are you doing these days?

LM: I don’t know if Pops has really influenced my career other than the fact that it was a great resume builder for someone who wants a diverse resume. Applying to medical school is incredibly competitive, so if people see that you’re well-rounded then that’s great. That’s, of course, not the primary reason I joined but it was good bonus. In terms of my career right now, I’m working as a General Medical Officer for the Navy, and this summer I’ll go back to resume residency in general surgery.

KM: I don’t think Pops really influenced what I wanted to do…I always wanted to build spaceships. I’m not building spaceships now, so I’m already a failure at life. What Pops gave me, especially being on the Board, were a bunch of different skills that I wouldn’t have gotten anywhere else, from learning to manage a rather large budget, to coordinating lots of people in different ways, to organization – just essential life skills that you don’t really get until you start doing things where you need to use them. Pops has made me better at doing all of the things I have done in my life. My official title now is “Senior Research Engineer” at Bihrle Applied Research. I do drone research for infrastructure inspection. They now allow me to work from home,so I spend my days with our beagle/Jack Russell mix, Larry.

KC: Kevin – your whole family has been involved with the Pops. Could you tell me a bit about the McDonough legacy?

KM: Yes! My brothers Tom and Kris (Kris is my twin) were also in the orchestra. Between the three of us, there was an unbroken chain of 13 or 14 years with “McDonough” in the orchestra. I have friends who were my brother’s friends, and I call them “Pops 1.0” (all people who were older than me). And then I have friends who were in the orchestra with me, so there are three different generations of Pops people whom I know.

The orchestra itself meant a lot to my family – my parents came to almost every concert, and when my father passed away in 2009, there were a couple dozen people from the orchestra who came to the funeral. That was incredibly touching. The orchestra in general was my extended family at the university, and I think it was the same way for my brothers Kris and Tom. The orchestra was our home in Ann Arbor. We can’t get together and not talk about Pops – at some point there’s always some conversation about Pops.

KC: What does the Pops mean to you personally?

LM: Obviously, number one is that I met my husband in Pops. That’s pretty significant ..... *clapping noise* ..... that was a high five that Kevin just gave me. That has obviously forever changed my life, hopefully still for the better, we’ll find out I guess. Aside from that, I started out as a music major, which is very geared towards being classically trained, and it’s a lot of pressure. I found out quickly that I didn’t want my experience of music to be just that. Pops pretty much provided what I love about music; it’s all about having fun and making friends and enjoying the music, but at the same time being challenged. Pops did all of that for me. I wish I had known about it sooner before I transferred to Michigan.

KM: My older brother, Tom, was in the orchestra, and he is 6 years older than me. So the first time I went to a Pops concert, I think I was in 6th grade. It was either Pops in Space or 613 Miles off Broadway. I had just started band and was learning how to play the horn, and I remember watching this concert and realizing how incredible it was to me. It was fun, it was different - people were openly laughing at the concert, which I thought was blasphemous - and it showed me that music is fun, and fun in a way that I hadn’t ever seen before. Pops influenced me musically from the beginning of my musical life.

Once I got to Michigan and joined the orchestra and basically found a family there, there was this term that we would throw around: “Pops Love.” I guess to some extent it was romantic love, at least between some people, but in a real sense it was a very familial and welcoming love. It was “come as you are and play some music with us, get to know people of different backgrounds and different walks of life, and just have fun.” I think most of the people who embraced that part of the orchestra found something much greater than the orchestra; they found Pops Love. They found people who changed their lives.

It’s difficult for me to say how different my life would be if I’d never been in the orchestra. I probably wouldn’t have met Leslie, which is a pretty big thing. I like her quite a bit. The core essence of who I am was shaped by Pops; it genuinely changed me or at least turned me into the person I am today, which I guess is a cynical asshole? I’m not sure.

LM: I don’t know if you’ve noticed this, but Kevin is like 30-40% bullshit with what comes out of his mouth.

MCDONOUGH FAVORITES

KEVIN...

• MOVIE: Oh I don't know, Contact, Star Wars, Star Trek, Star something...something with super heroes. This is a bad and vague answer and I feel bad for giving it to you.
• TV SHOWS: West Wing, Battlestar Galactica, Scrubs
• SNACK: Cookies, I love cookies. 
• RESTAURANT IN A2 AND WILMINGTON: Ann Arbor - all of them...I miss the land of good food. uhhhh, ok, real answer--Jolly Pumpkin or Tomukun.  Wilmington - Indochine...it's this fantastic pan Asian restaurant.
• POPS PIECE: For the encore of Pops in Love (Spring 2010), we played "Nessun Dorma" with a very talented opera singer whose name I am forgetting. It was incredible. I think I probably cried.
• GUILTY PLEASURE: I would say video games. Blah blah, something about escaping my reality to some other place, crippling depression, etc. 

LESLIE...

• MOVIE: 10 Things I Hate About You and The Martian
• TV SHOW: Scrubs
• SNACK: popcorn with an absurd amount of butter...or, perhaps more accurately, butter. 
• RESTAURANT IN A2 AND WILMINGTON: Ann Arbor - Jolly Pumpkin.  Wilmington - Indochine.
• TRIP YOU'VE TAKEN TOGETHER: Well, frankly one of the only ones, but our recent trip to Ireland and England.
• POPS PIECE: Toccata and Fugue (Bach) - reminds me of Fantasia!!
• GUILTY PLEASURE: very very long naps                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             5/25/18

AND NOW THE MOST WONDERFUL ADDENDUM...

On May 19th, 2018, Kevin and Leslie welcomed FINNEGAN ROBERT MCDONOUGH into their family. The Pops Family congratulates the happy couple and celebrates the birth of the world's first Pops baby!