CLAUDIA'S COMMENTS
Dear Mu Phis,
I hope you have had a happy holiday and though it’s certainly a busy time for musicians, taking breaks to be with friends and family make Christmas and New Year festivities all the more important for our well-being and enjoyment.
This year, in addition to performing at church and at other music club meetings, I was able to attend some concerts, Lessons and Carol services as well as the Dallas opera. There’s so much to choose from in the DFW area. I hope you were able to enjoy the music as well, and for those who traveled, enjoyed your time away and made it safely back.
Our next meeting will be on January 13th at 7 p.m. at the home of Susan Poelchau. We will perform some early music. I hope to see you there and hear about your holiday.
With friendship and harmony ❤️,
Claudia Jameson, President
NEXT MEETINGS
This year's meetings are Better than Ever
January: Early Music Fun
Monday, January 13, 7 pm
Location: Home of Susan Poelchau
Host: Susan Poelchau
Co-hosts: Mary Alice Rich and Julie Schmitt
Program:
- Early Music selections - Claudia Jameson, soprano; Harald and Susan Poelchau, recorders and viola da gamba.
- Claudia Jameson and Susan Poelchau – “River” by Julie Schmitt and Beth Williams Aaron
February: Connecting with SAIs
Monday, February 24, 7 pm
NOTE: THIS IS A CHANGE OF DATE
Location: Presbyterian Village North
8600 Skyline Dr, Dallas 75234
(1 block S of Forest Lane, between Central Expwy and Greenville)
Auditorium
SAIs hosting
Program:
MPEs:
- Songs and Dances by William Byrd (1540-1623)
Amy Canchola, soprano; Haley Moore, treble viol, Marilyn Browne and Susan Poelchau, tenor viols, Allen Garvin, bass viol
- Noe Garcia, guitar
- Sonata in C Major by Robert Valentine - Mary Ann Taylor, flute
SAIs: TBD
LAST MEETING
November: Choosing the Sublime
Monday, November 11, 7 pm
Thanks to Claudia Jameson for hosting us with assistance from Tena Hehn.
We opened with a performance by guest Mu Phi pianist Leslie Spotz, who performed Kingdom Hearts, an anime video game theme, by Yoko Shimomura.
She thanked our chapter for our service especially to the Library patrons who would otherwise have limited opportunity to hear classical music.
November: Choosing the Sublime
Lisa Beyer and Ashley Bouras led us through some examples of “Mindful Movement,” the program they have developed for elementary school music which they presented at the Orff Schulwerk conference in Iowa, followed by a Q&A about the work they do, particularly with special needs students.
We continue to be amazed at the fun and imaginative musical lessons they create.
The program closed with the Founders Day ceremony.
CHAPTER NEWS
Celebration
Barbara Hill Moore was honored for her 50-year career at SMU. Mary Alice Rich participated in the 50th Anniversary celebration. Barbara's "Bruce Foote/Barbara Hill Moore Scholarship Fund" is dear to her heart because it has helped MANY students to study at SMU; lots have been recruited from South Africa.
Edits
Please change your yearbook listing for Meghan Gomen to:
Gomen, Meghan
[email protected]
Next Newsletter
Send your news to Mary Williams – [email protected] by March 1 for next newsletter.
Our Famous Concert Series, Cont.
It looks like Mary Ann Taylor's article on our concert series at the Library will appear in the spring issue of The Triangle. BE SURE TO LOOK FOR IT!
MEMBER NEWS
Susan and Harald Poelchau enjoyed lots of Christmas music in Colorado. Each of their grown daughters sings in a different choir, so they heard those two programs plus a Denver Brass program. Susan, Harald and their daughters all went to hear the complete Bach Christmas Oratorio - all six sections! - performed by the excellent Colorado Baroque Ensemble. Whew!
[Photo is from a different event, but the best I had of both of them.]
Our new member Meghan Gomen, performed with a harp trio at Musical Arts December meeting on December 4th. Her husband Daniel and new baby, Maeve, attended.
We saw Meghan’s Texas Winds Outreach brochure at our last meeting.
Leslie Spotz spent her extra day in Dallas at the Arboretum with Mary Williams.
Mary Alice Rich commented at the Barbara Hill Moore celebration: “Author Rosalyn Story and I are forever grateful that Donnie Ray Albert starred in our opera WADING HOME. But I have a special gratitude for his wife Gwen Albert and two members of their beautiful family: Gwen has been extraordinarily encouraging to my daughter at a time when she really needed it. Grateful, grateful...”
Our new Dallas Alum member Akosua Adwini-Poku (right) sang her beautiful graduate recital with chamber players on December 7 at Caruth Auditorium, SMU. Mary Williams attended and had a quick hello with her teacher, Barbara Hill Moore.
Claudia Jameson's son William came to Dallas for several days for work recently and they had a chance to visit. It was great!
Claudia spent the holidays in Alameda, CA visiting her little granddaughter Suzu.
Amy Canchola’s family got all dressed up for Christmas.
Concert Series
Renowned pianist Eldred Marshall (center – black hat) gave an all-Bach recital in November.
In the audience were Melody Gramblin and 14 students from Dallas College - Brookhaven. They had a nice chat with Eldred after the concert. Melody leads a madrigal group at Brookhaven and would be interested in having her group perform on our series sometime. Yes!
Leslie Spotz played her beautiful program on November 10th and visited our November meeting on Nov 11th.
There is a great lineup of performers for spring, so put Sunday afternoons at 2 pm on your calendar starting Feb 16th when Leslie Spotz will play piano along with Ivo Ivanov, violinist with the Fort Worth Symphony.
Andrew Anderson has been able to introduce the programs so far and Mary Williams has been at the lobby desk, but; we may still need volunteers to take care of the table and introduce the performers in future. Let Mary if you can volunteer. We have had fair audiences so far, but could have many more. Please spread the word and come, bringing friends.
Concerts are at 2 pm at the downtown Library and are FREE. Parking in the garage under the Library is also free – enter from Wood St, behind the Library. Please support these talented musicians who are volunteering their time and talent to help us achieve our goal of bringing music to Dallas, especially under-served populations. Our website has the concert series schedule, performer biographies and photos as we receive them and their programs as we receive them.
Chrome is still slow to update news – use Firefox or Edge.
Click on Concert Series – Select Schedule, Performers, Programs, or History.
Spring Schedule 2025
Feb 16 Ivo Ivanov, violin and Leslie Spotz, piano
Feb 23 Yongseok Kwon, piano
Mar 2 Uchrio Trio: Julee Kim Walker, flute, Natasha Merchant, oboe, and Bobby Lapinski, clarinet
Mar 9 Dallas Harp Society (harp competition winner TBA)
Mar 16 Seonghun Oh, flute
Mar 23 Motoi Takeda, violin and Fenia Chang, piano
Mar 30 Carelle Flores, soprano
Apr 6 Seonghun Jeong, piano
Apr 13 Catalin Dima, piano
INTERNATIONAL
See the Foundation website if you are interested in getting a grant or scholarship.
http://www.MPEFoundation.org
Mu Phi Epsilon Foundation Board
[email protected]
Kurt-Alexander Zeller's Founder's Day Message 2024
Mu Phi Epsilon was founded on 13 November 1903. This Founders Day, our fraternity will be 121 years old. That means we are older than the National Broadcasting Company (1926) or General Motors (1908). We’ve been around longer than synthetic plastics (1907), commercial aviation (1910), or antibiotic drugs (1928). Mu Phi Epsilon has outlasted hearing music on the Victrola, the LP hi-fi, the cassette Walkman, the CD player, and the iPod.
Our longevity can make us feel like a venerable institution: Solid. Stable. Maybe even stodgy. If we think that, however, we forget that the existence of Mu Phi Epsilon represents one success of a profoundly radical idea—an idea as old as our nation and yet as new as this moment, expressed in this triennium’s theme as “Together in Harmony” but long known to all Americans as “E pluribus unum.”
Just as music has grown to embrace a whole spectrum of pitches and elements that once were considered outside the harmony, our notion of the elements integral to our American society has progressed since the time when the full rights of citizenship applied only to property-owning white males. We musicians are never going back to the medieval idea that thirds are dissonant and major triads have no place in perfect harmony, and our nation cannot backslide on the inclusion of all our people—women, people of color, many waves of immigrants and indigenous people too, LGTBQ+ individuals, and those with disabilities—in the “pluribus” of our American “unum.”
Mu Phi Epsilon has played its role in these developments. It was a radical act for Winthrop Sterling and Elizabeth Mathias to found an organization for professional musicians with 13 young women who in 1903 had no legal right to vote or get a bank loan without a male co-signer. It was a radical act for Mu Phi Epsilon to embrace and support Ruth Watanabe when her neighbors were being sent to internment camps during World War II. In 1977, it was a radical act when Mu Phi Epsilon rejected the idea of excluding members on the basis of sex and thus became the first professional music fraternity open to members of every sex and sexual orientation. On this Founders Day, I invite us all to celebrate and honor not only our Founders, but all the people who have joined “Together in Harmony” to build everything we now value so deeply.
Kurt-Alexander Zeller
International President
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