PineCone’s Longtime Director Retires
Effective April 4, 2008, Raleigh, N.C.: The Piedmont Council of Traditional Music (PineCone) announces… that Susan Newberry, PineCone’s longtime Executive Director, will retire on Friday, April 4, 2008. William Lewis, PineCone’s Program Associate, will replace Newberry as Executive Director of the organization.
Susan Newberry has served as PineCone’s Executive Director for more than 20 years. She was hired as PineCone’s first full-time director in 1987, about two-and-a-half years after the organization was incorporated as a non-profit. Under her leadership, PineCone became the largest, most active traditional music organization in North Carolina. Each year, PineCone presents 125-150 events, with approximately 100 that are free to the public. More than 25,000 people attend PineCone events annually, with an additional 4.5 million tuning in each year to “The PineCone Bluegrass Show” on 94.7FM WQDR-celebrating its twentieth year on the air in 2008-09.
During Newberry’s long tenure, PineCone has presented a list of performers that reads like a “Who’s Who” in the world of roots music, including Bill Monroe, Ralph Stanley, Earl Scruggs, Alison Krauss, Emmylou Harris, Merle Haggard, Kris Kristofferson, Taj Mahal, Mary Black, and many more. While bringing in high quality national and international acts, Newberry remained equally committed to showcasing the very best traditional musicians found in our own state and region. She is particularly proud of the fact that PineCone has presented nearly every musician honored by the NC Arts Council with the North Carolina Folk Heritage Award, including Etta Baker, Doc Watson, Joe Thompson, Benton Flippen, John Dee Holeman, and others. Always thinking outside the box, Newberry enjoyed a curatorial role in programming, putting together innovative combinations of artists (i..e., Tony Rice with Bryan Sutton, R. Carlos Nakai with Keola Beamer) and organizing concerts around artistic themes (i.e., “The Women of Bluegrass”, “Monsters of the Mandolin”). Several of these concerts have gone on to become nationally touring special events in subsequent seasons.
Susan Newberry believed in taking the music to the people. Thus, PineCone became one of the first arts organizations to actively seek out partnerships with Parks and Recreation Departments across the Triangle in order to take quality free programs to audiences in their own communities. In addition to working with various Parks and Recreation Departments, PineCone has partnered with NCSU, Duke University, UNC-CH, the Governor’s Inaugural Committee, the News & Observer, NC Museum of Art, Artsplosure, Mordecai Historic Park, the Festival for the Eno, the Durham Arts Council, the ArtsCenter, The Hayti Center, the NC Arts Council and others to provided quality programming to a broad range of audiences.
Thirteen years ago, Newberry helped PineCone launch the North Carolina/Northern Ireland Exchange, a partnership with the Ulster-American Folk Park in Northern Ireland to provide performance opportunities in Northern Ireland for North Carolina traditional artists and in North Carolina for traditional artists from Northern Ireland. Over this time, PineCone has introduced more than 170 North Carolina artists to European audiences.
Susan Newberry is recognized as a leader in the traditional music field, having been selected to Leadership Bluegrass 2004. She was a coordinator of the “Gig Fair” at the International Bluegrass Music Association’s (IBMA) annual conference and a panelist at Leadership Bluegrass 2006 and 2007. She has served on the Boards of United Arts, Arts North Carolina, NC Presenters Consortium, NCSU Theatre Endowment, Arts Access, NC Dance Alliance, NC Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts, and the American Dance Festival.
On behalf of the PineCone staff and board of directors, we thank Susan Newberry for her tremendous service to the arts and her immense contribution to the well-being of traditional music in North Carolina today. We wish her the very best in her retirement.
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PineCone Appoints New Executive Director
Raleigh, N.C.: The Piedmont Council of Traditional Music (PineCone) announces that William Lewis has been selected to succeed Susan Newberry (retiring) as the Executive Director of the organization, effective immediately. William Lewis has served as PineCone’s Program Associate since July 2004.
“Susan is a great friend and has been an even greater mentor to me,” says Lewis. “We made a good team, and I’ve enjoyed working with her and learning from her over the past four years. I am honored to have been selected to bear PineCone’s torch for the next twenty years, or more.”
Susan Newberry has served as PineCone’s Executive Director since 1987. During her long tenure, PineCone grew from a small, local group of traditional music enthusiasts into the largest, most active folk music organization in North Carolina with a national reputation for presenting high quality programs.
Planning for Newberry’s retirement first began to take shape in October of 2004, when PineCone applied for and received funding from the North Carolina Arts Council for Newberry and Lewis to attend workshops related to leadership transitions, sponsored by the N.C. Center for Nonprofits. In 2005, PineCone received additional funding from the Arts Council for staff to work closely with a consultant on matters related to executive transition management. As a result of these activities, PineCone’s staff and board leaders were able to begin planning for executive transition well in advance so as to manage succession and transition in ways that enhanced the organization’s capacity and effectiveness.
“Susan Newberry leaves behind a solid foundation,” continues Lewis. “I look forward to building on that foundation and continuing the PineCone tradition of producing the first rate programs that our audiences have come to expect.”
William Lewis hails from Greene County, Georgia, and has lived in North Carolina for the past fourteen years. He has a Bachelor’s degree from Appalachian State University and a Master’s degree in Folklore from the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. He lives in Cary, NC, with his wife, Jessica, and two daughters, Anna and Eliza.
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NCSA School of Music Dean Thomas Clark Moves Back to Texas
Winston-Salem, N.C.: Thomas Clark, the dean of the School of Music at the North Carolina School of the Arts, will step down this summer from the position he has held for the past four years to take a new position in Texas.
Clark’s resignation is effective July 25. He will become director of the School of Music at Texas State University, the flagship school of the Texas state university system, in San Marcos, Texas.
Clark originally came to NCSA in August 2004 from the University of North Texas College of Music in Denton, where he had been associate dean for academic affairs since 1995.
“Tom Clark has done a tremendous job of stewardship with the School of Music,” said NCSA Chancellor John Mauceri, who is himself a musician. “We have been lucky to have had Tom as part of our family. He is a very gracious and warm person and his gentle nature and generous spirit will be missed.
“We wish him the best with this new opportunity as he returns to Texas, which he holds so dear, to carry on the next chapter of his life and to spend more time with his family and new grandchild.”
Mauceri said he expects to name an interim dean later this spring, prior to conducting a nationwide search for a permanent School of Music dean.
Born 1949 in Michigan, Thomas Clark earned three degrees from The University of Michigan, including a Doctor of Musical Arts in 1976. He studied composition with Pulitzer Prize-winner Leslie Bassett and Eugene Kurtz, electro-acoustic music with George Balch Wilson, conducting with Sydney Hodkinson, and music theory with Wallace Berry and Richmond Browne. He was trombonist for Contemporary Directions, Michigan’s Rockefeller Foundation-supported new music repertory ensemble, and elsewhere studied trombone with contemporary virtuoso trombonist Stuart Dempster.
After teaching at The University of Michigan, Indiana University, Pacific Lutheran University, and for 10 summers at the National Music Camp in Interlochen, Mich., in 1976 Clark joined the composition and music theory faculties of the University of North Texas. There he developed the New Music Performance Lab and served as chair of the Doctor of Musical Arts program and director of CEMI, the Center for Experimental Music and Intermedia. He went on to serve eight years as associate dean for Academic Affairs and one year (2000-2001) as interim dean of the UNT College of Music. Clark retired in August of 2004 from the UNT faculty after a 33-year college teaching career.
Active in music societies, he has served as president of the Texas Society for Music Theory, regional chair and National Council member of the American Society of University Composers (now S.C.I.), and South Central Chapter president of the College Music Society. He is a member of Pi Kappa Lambda music honors fraternity and an honorary member of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia.
Clark’s compositions have been performed at festivals throughout the United States, in Canada and Japan, three times at the Brno International Music Festival in the Czech Republic, and at the Festival Internacional Alfonso Reyes in Monterrey, Mexico. Several of his works, affiliated with BMI, are published by Borik Press and recorded on Centaur Records. His writing has appeared in Perspectives of New Music, In Theory Only, Computer Music Journal, New Grove Dictionary of American Music, and Contemporary Composers….. Co-author with Larry Austin of the text “Learning to Compose” (1989), Clark also authored “ARRAYS: A Worktext of Musical Patterns for Aural Development,” published in 1992.
The School of Music at NCSA is the only U.S. music school with residential high school, college and graduate programs. It offers concentrations in instrumental performance, vocal performance, composition, and conducting. Students who study from the ninth grade to post-master’s level can receive the high school diploma, College Arts Diploma, Bachelor of Music, Master of Music, or Professional Artist Certificate.
An arts conservatory of international renown, the North Carolina School of the Arts was the first state-supported, residential school of its kind in the nation. Established by the N.C. General Assembly in 1963, NCSA became part of the University of North Carolina in 1972. Students from middle school through graduate school train for careers in the arts in five professional schools: Dance, Design and Production (including a Visual Arts Program), Drama, Filmmaking, and Music. More than 1,100 students are enrolled annually; they must audition or interview for admission. For more information, visit the School’s website at www.ncarts.edu [inactive 8/09].
Note: Press release courtesy of the NCSA.
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