You can find him roaming the halls, his majestic mustache slightly disheveled, but his mouth perfectly positioned into the signature Jim Kovach scowl.

When asked the story behind his famous facial hair, Kovach told The Apple Leaf that it “has always been there.”

“I’ve had it since I was a baby. If I had baby pictures I could show it to you… but I don’t have any baby pictures. Probably because I was too ugly, don’t you think?”

This eccentric, award winning band teacher enjoys bicycling, cooking, and gardening in his free time. He is married and has raised three children, all of which have played in the high school band and had their father as a teacher.

“The hardest part about raising my kids was keeping them from killing each other,” Kovach said. “You know, there are always going to be health issues and motivation issues. But keeping them from killing each other was the biggest challenge.”

He holds a bachelor of music degree in percussion performance, a bachelor of arts degree, and a masters of education. He went to college at the University of Washington for a while before he was kicked out and sent to Green River Community College for a year.

“I think I went into [UW] with about a 3.9 GPA, and within two years I managed to whittle that sucker down to a 0.9,” said Kovach. “You know, I didn’t bother showing up for finals, that kind of thing. So they put me on probation and then they kicked me out. When I went to Green River I got my GPA back up to a 4.0, and they let me back into the U on probation. God, it took me probably about nine years, but I eventually earned all of my degrees.”

When Kovach was growing up, he wanted to be a rock star. And for a while, he was; he took up playing drums in multiple metal bands after college.

“I went to college for teaching, but then I decided I wanted to play. I was in a few different rock bands,” Kovach said. “One of them was named Heir Apparent. I can’t remember the names of all of those [bands] though, that was a long time ago.”

When asked what made Kovach finally turn back to teaching, he said that his wife told him he had to get a real job.

“I’ve worked some pretty weird jobs in the past,” said Kovach. “I worked at A&W for a night. They didn’t like me. I don’t know why, they just never called me back after my first night,” he said. “Oh, I delivered pizzas for Pizza Hut when my wife was expecting our first kid, for extra money. I was good at that, but I didn’t like it. I was teaching also, so every now and then I’d have to deliver a pizza to one of my students. In the stupid little hat and everything.”

“I worked for two hours at Harborview [Medical Center] in the emergency room. It was awful. I had to clean out the machines that sucked the mucus out of people and blood and junk,” said Kovach. “My buddy and I both went in and I think I lasted a little longer than him. I didn’t necessarily quit, they just sorta said ‘This job isn’t for everybody.’ We were both a little green.”

When he finally got a job as a band teacher, he started out in Edmonds Woodway High School in Edmonds. He taught there for 15 years before coming to Wenatchee High School, where he has worked for the last 14 years.

“The most rewarding thing about being a band teacher is … the high pay,” Kovach said, laughing. “No, the best part is seeing how much kids can accomplish when they set their minds to it. To me, that’s huge.”