Forks in the Road
2009; Routledge; Volume: 65; Issue: 5 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
2769-4046
Autores Tópico(s)Musicology and Musical Analysis
ResumoTwo roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth . . . The Road Not Taken, v. 1 ROBERT FROST (1874-1963) WITH THIS ISSUE, another publication cycle is complete, and I, typically for a recovering Calvinist of Dutch dissent, find such consummative events opportunities for introspection and reflection. When I contemplate that this concludes my eighth complete volume as Editor in Chief, many of the usual cliches resonate in my consciousness: Where has the time gone? seems like only yesterday ... Add to the mix that this occasion coincides with the second anniversary of my retirement from active teaching, and it is little wonder that I look back so often that I bump into present reality with alarming frequency. A significant portion of my reveries concerns choices-forks in the metaphoric road. It is simultaneously interesting, enlightening, and instructive to contemplate decisions, major and minor, that have brought one to the place where one finds oneself today. My own career as singer/voice pedagogue resulted from a series of divergences on smaller paths that led to a huge fork on a major thoroughfare-and therein lies a tale. Upon graduation from college, I began my career as a choral music director at one of my denomination's parochial high schools in South Dakota. While there, I completed a masters degree at the University of South Dakota. At that time, at least, the institution certainly could not claim to be counted among the leading performance programs in the nation; nevertheless, I had the good fortune to study singing with Frank Streim, a great teacher and musician who used his admittedly modest vocal equipment with paradigmatically sound technique, and I took every class he had to offer. He also was the first to recognize a budding tenor in my then lyric baritone voice. At the Ohio State University, a fascinating course in early notation, taught by medieval scholar Richard Hoppin, who subsequently became my dissertation adviser and friend, caused me to change course from a PhD in music education to one in musicology. I continued voice study with Dale Gilliland, a past president of NATS (1958-1960), and I was a teaching assistant in opera, assisting first Irma Cooper, then Clifford Reims. One summer, Gilliland suffered a sudden, debilitating stroke, one from which he never really recovered, and I was asked to assume his teaching load. …
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