Class Notes
Eastman School of Music
Reunion News
Eastman School classes celebrating reunions
October 20–22, 2006
70th Reunion: 1935 and 1936
65th Reunion: 1940 and 1941
60th Reunion: 1945 and 1946
55th Reunion: 1950 and 1951
50th Reunion: 1955 and 1956
45th Reunion: 1960 and 1961
40th Reunion: 1965 and 1966
35th Reunion: 1970 and 1971
30th Reunion: 1975 and 1976
25th Reunion: 1980 and 1981
20th Reunion: 1985 and 1986
15th Reunion: 1990 and 1991
10th Reunion: 1995 and 1996
For more about Alumni Weekend, visit the Eastman School’s office of Alumni Relations
1932
Mitch Miller was the honorary chairman of Rochester’s
East High School’s centennial last July. Last September, he presided over
the Eastman School ceremony that named Eastman Place, the building at 25 Gibbs
Street that houses the Sibley Library, “Miller Center” in honor
of his parents, Abram Calmen and Hinda Rosenblum Miller.
1937
Frederick Fennell ’39 (MS), ’88 (HNR)
was the guest conductor of the Blossom Festival Band at the Blossom Music Center
in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, last July (also see ’58).
1947
Ella Vosburg Cripps, organist and choirmaster
at the First United Methodist Church in Geneva, N.Y., was honored last summer
for her 60 years with the church. Ella has been an organist at the church since
she graduated from the Eastman School.
1949
Shirley Graf Durling and her husband, Robert,
celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary last May. Shirley was a charter member
of the Syracuse (N.Y.) Symphony and retired after 35 years as a violinist. She
also was a string teacher in the West Genesee (N.Y.) School District.
1950
Former music industry executive Jim Foglesong
was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame on November 9. Jim now teaches
at Vanderbilt University’s Blair School of Music.
1951
Donald Knaub ’61 (MM), former professor
of tuba and trombone at the Eastman School, plays bass trombone and piano with
Barry Snyder ’66, ’68 (MM), Eastman
professor of piano and cochair of the piano department, on the CD Retread.
The CD is a digitally remastered copy of two albums Donald recorded in the late
1960s and early 1970s. Donald is professor emeritus of trombone at the University
of Texas–Austin.
1955
Paul (MM) and Helen Bilhorn
Baumgartner (MM) presented a classical piano concert at Cross United
Church of Christ in Berne, Ga., last August.
1958
Carol Moyer Winkelman ’59 (MM) sang Bernard
Rogers’s Three Japanese Dances with the North Carolina School
of the Arts wind ensemble, directed by James Kalyn
’92 (DMA), last May. She was the soprano in the original recording of
the work with the Eastman Wind Ensemble, directed by Frederick
Fennell ’37, ’39 (MS), ’88 (HNR).
1961
Donald Knaub (MM) (see ’51).
1966
Barry Snyder ’68 (MM) (see ’51).
1969
Fred Halgedahl hosted the first annual five-hour
Reinbeck (Iowa) Sonata Marathon open house at his home last June. Fred is assistant
professor of violin and viola at the University of Northern Iowa School of Music
in Cedar Falls.
1970
Geary Larrick (MM) is the author of Theory
and Composition of Percussion Music. He also has references in the RILM
Abstracts of Music Literature, a comprehensive international guide to writings
about music produced by the Répertoire International de Littérature
Musicale. His composition, Dance to Four Drums, was premiered last
August at the Central Wisconsin Children’s Museum. . . . Chris
Vadala, director of jazz studies and professor of saxophone at the University
of Maryland, is listed in John Laughter’s book, The History of the
Top 40 Sax Solos (1955–1998), and Lewis Porter’s Encyclopedia
of Jazz. A frequent performer with the National Symphony and the Baltimore
Symphony, Chris also has conducted 33 all-state jazz ensembles in the past 10
years.
1972
(Stephanie) Eden Vaning-Rosen (MM) is the author
of From Rote to Note, the 19th book in her Step-by-Step Method series
for Violin, Viola, and Cello. She has taught at the University of Wisconsin,
the University of Northern Arizona, and the University of Southern California.
1973
John Beall (PhD) (see ’78). . . . Don
Freund (DMA) (see ’78). . . . Chief Warrant Officer Kenneth
Megan has been appointed director of the United States Coast Guard Band.
He has been a musician, arranger, assistant developer, director of public information,
and producer of the band’s radio series, as well as supervised the band’s
Young People’s Concerts and the Coast Guard Band Recital Series. . . .
Jeff Tyzik ’77 (Mas) (see ’58RC undergraduate).
1974
Heidi Lowy (MM) has recorded Mozart: The Complete
Piano Sonatas and Ravel: Das Klavierwerk (Works for Piano Solo).
1975
John Ward passed the associate examination of
the American Guild of Organists, winning the Associateship Prize for the highest
score on the examination and the S. Lewis Elmer Award for the highest overall
score on any of the upper-level exams given by the organization. John is musical
director for the First Congregational Church of Blue Hill in Maine.
1978
Pianist Steven Smith (DMA), professor of piano
and piano literature at Penn State, recently returned from a concert tour of
Australia and New Zealand. The repertoire included works by Don
Freund ’73 (DMA) and John Beall ’73
(PhD). He also gave recitals and master classes at the University of Melbourne
in Australia and the University of Waikato in Hamilton, New Zealand. Earlier
in the 2003–04 season, he performed Brahms’s Second Piano Concerto
with the Nittany Valley Symphony in State College, Pa., and recitals with
his wife, Theresa, a soprano, at West Virginia University in Morgantown, W.Va.,
and in Interlochen, Mich., as well as several recitals at universities in Illinois
and Ohio with tenor Richard Kennedy.
1979
Jeff and Deborah Plutzik-Briggs
’80 write that Deborah was named one of Maryland’s “top 100
women” by The Daily Record, and Jeff was named the 2003 Ernst
and Young Maryland Entrepreneur of the Year for software. Jeff is founder of
Firaxis Games, and Deborah is community relations manager and recruiter for
the company. . . . Elizabeth Bankhead Buccheri (DMA)
received an honorary doctor of fine arts degree from North Park University in
Chicago last May. She continues her associations with the Lyric Opera in Chicago,
where she is an assistant conductor, and with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra,
where she is an accompanist and soloist coach. Elizabeth also is senior lecturer
and director of the collaborative piano program at Northwestern University School
of Music. . . . Robert Jesselson (MM), professor
of cello at the University of South Carolina, spent two months teaching and
performing in South Korea and Taiwan. Robert taught at the Killington Music
Festival and at the North Carolina School of the Arts last summer. In December
2003, his USC String Project was featured in the New York Times. His organization
is the model for 36 other “string projects” at universities across
the country.
1980
Deborah Plutzik-Briggs (see ’79).
1981
Robin Stamper (see ’83). . . . Barrick
Stees (see ’83).
1983
Bassoonist Diane Groves Bishop and pianist Robin
Stamper ’81 performed an aria from Mozart’s Abduction
from the Seraglio in the Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra’s Sounds
of Summer Series last June. The work was transcribed for bassoon and piano by
Barrick Stees ’81. The executive director
of the Orlando Philharmonic is David Schillhammer ’87.
Diane is principal bassoonist with the Orlando Philharmonic, and Robin is music
supervisor and chorus master of the Orlando Opera.
1984
Clyde Thompson (MM) composed the cantata We
Have Spoken—Voices from Native America and directed performances
of the piece at the High Desert Museum in Oregon last August.
1985
Jonathan Dubay is in his 11th season as a member
of the Oregon Symphony. He released his first CD, Béla Bartók,
The 44 Duos for Two Violins. Jonathan says his two children, 2 and 5, inspired
him to write, produce, and perform The Wooden Boy with the Tears of
Joy Theatre at the Portland (Ore.) Center for the Performing Arts. The show
combines Bartók’s violin duos with Hungarian and Romanian folk
tales and puppets. . . . Sandra Maile Dudley (Mas)
writes that she has been assistant professor of commercial voice at Belmont
University in Nashville, Tenn., since 1995 and recently has produced her first
solo recording, Close to You. She is also the featured vocalist on
the Jazz Orchestra of the Delta’s Big Band Reflections of Cole Porter.
Her Web site is www.sandradudley.com.
. . . Jazz composer Maria Schneider (MM) has
released her first CD in four years, Concert in the Garden. Her Web
site is www.mariaschneider.com.
1986
Ivan Griffin (MM) played the role of Jim in the
Croswell Opera House’s production of Big River in Adrian, Mich.
. . . Cellist Mark Lekas, part of the Northwest
Indiana Symphony Chamber Trio, performed in the concluding program of the 2003–04
Mercantile Bank Family Concert Series in Hammond, Ind.
1987
Monisa Phillips Angell is the founder of the Nashville
Chamber Orchestra’s Historic Franklin Chamber Music Festival in Williamson
County, Tenn. Monisa also played the viola in a concert featuring works by Ralph
Vaughan Williams, Dimitri Shostakovich, Walter Leigh, and Libby Larsen. . .
. David Schillhammer (see ’83).
1988
Lisa Ferrigno is concertmaster of the Brevard
(Fla.) Symphony Orchestra. . . . Pete Mills released
the jazz CD, Art & Architecture, last August.
1989
A composition by Gordon Chin (DMA), Wind,
the Colliding Sound of Time for cello and percussion, was performed in
the Taipei Cultural Center’s annual Taiwan Connection show at Alice Tulley
Hall in New York City.
1991
Jazz pianist Jonathan Katz (MM) is a cofounder
of the quartet Candela, which combines jazz-based music with Japanese melodies.
1992
James Kalyn (DMA) (see ’58).
1993
Brant Taylor, a cellist with the Chicago Symphony
Orchestra and with the lounge jazz group Pink Martini, performed and taught
at the Mimir Chamber Music Festival at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth
last July.
1994
Cheryl Terwilliger (MM) and Cathy Harris affirmed
their partnership in a commitment ceremony in New York City last June. Cheryl
is the director of instrumental music and chair of the visual and performing
arts department at the Bullis School in Potomac, Md. Cathy is a senior associate
with the Washington, D.C.– based law firm Kator, Parks & Weiser and
an adjunct professor of law at George Washington University.
1995
Arisa Kusumi and Sean Sullivan were married on
August 26 in Asheville, N.C. Arisa is an opera singer based in New York and
Orlando, Fla. Sean is a manager at Siemens in Orlando. . . . Singer Jesse
Lowry competed in an American Idol–type talent show, Gimme
the Mike, in Pittsburgh.
1996
David Holben has formed the brass quintet Long
Beach Brassworks. He plays the tuba.
1997
Saxophonist Pat Donaher is the founder of the group No Sale Value. Band members
include “DJ Industrial Average,” also known as Joshua
Valleau ’00, drummer Chris Vatalaro
’00, and trombonist Tim Albright ’98.
Their debut recording is Nu Currency. Their Web site is www.nosalevalue.com.
. . . David Hamilton (MM) is the interim principal
at Churchville-Chili (N.Y.) Junior High School.
1998
Tim Albright (see ’97). . . . Shizuo
(Z) Kuwahara writes, “I have been promoted to associate conductor
of the Virginia Symphony Orchestra in Norfolk, Va. I was at American University
in Washington, D.C., as an assistant professor and music director of the university’s
symphony orchestra. I am also an assistant professor and the music director
of the symphony orchestra at the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg,
Va. I conducted the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra last summer on a tour of the
United States and returned to conduct the Buffalo Philharmonic this season.”
1999
Pianist Ramasoon Sitalayan (MM) gave a recital
last July at the Chintakarn Music Institute in Bangkok, Thailand. Ramasoon won
the Bangkok Chopin Competition and the fourth Piyabhand Sanitwongse Piano Competition.
2000
Assata Alim-Clark and her husband, Paul, announce
the birth their son, Morgan Elijah, on April 20. . . . J.
Christopher Pardini (MM) is the music director and organist for the Shadyside
Presbyterian Church in Pittsburgh. Previously, he was senior organist at Crystal
Cathedral in Garden Grove, Calif. . . . Joshua Valleau
(see ’97). . . . Chris Vatalaro (see
’97).
2001
Guitarist Ben Altman opened Mercer University’s
concert series last summer in Atlanta, Ga. . . . Eric
Dudley has been appointed assistant conductor for the Cincinnati Symphony
Orchestra.
2002s
Emily Sotherden John is director of Treble Voices
of Queens, a choral program for singers between the ages of 10 and 18. Emily
also conducts four choirs for children and young adults at the Center for Preparatory
Studies.
2003
Violinist Solomiya Soroka (DMA) was featured in
the opening concert of the 2004 summer concert series at the Grazhda Music and
Art Center of Green County in Jewett, N.Y.
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