Thank You: CCM Celebrates Faculty and Staff Retirements

As the academic year comes to a close, we celebrate the careers of nine retiring faculty and staff members who have given nearly 250 years of combined service to UC’s College-Conservatory of Music. These members of the CCM family have dedicated themselves to continuing the college’s legacy as a leading training center for the performing and media arts.

• Yvonne Becknell, Performance Management Program Manager, 1969-2016
• Lee Fiser, Professor of Violincello and former member of the LaSalle Quartet, 1975-2017
• Allen Otte, Professor of Percussion and member of Percussion Group Cincinnati, 1977-2017
• Mary Stucky, Professor of Voice, 1990-2017
• Sandra Vanlandingham, Theatre Arts, Production and Arts Administration Program Manager, 1990-2005 and 2007-2016
• Piotr Milewski, Professor of Violin, 1995-2017
• Patti James, Professor of Dance, 1999-2017
• Ben Terry Lusk, Professor of Opera/Vocal Coaching, 1999-2017
• Kimberly Daniel de Acha, Professor of Voice, 2010-2017

View photos of their time at CCM:

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Retiring Faculty Members Share Memories:

This year marks my 48th year of continuous work — 21 years as a singer/actress, and another 20 years as a college professor and theatre producer. In 2009 my husband and I retired to Cincinnati, where I received an unexpected invitation to return to CCM — my alma mater — to teach musical theatre voice as an adjunct professor. These past seven years have been a total joy. I call it simply “the gift I gave myself.” As an older professional, it means so much to continue to contribute and feel appreciated. I’ve been truly honored to work with wonderful colleagues, and to have been given the opportunity to teach and mentor my talented and remarkable students. A number of my students surprised me in New York with a champagne brunch on April 2 to celebrate my retirement. I have no words to express what that meant to me, and the joy I feel, seeing them claim their places on Broadway and other stages, following their dreams. I would like to thank UC for recognizing and honoring the work of adjunct faculty. It is rare for a university to recognize adjunct contributions, and I salute UC for doing so. I’ll be forever grateful that I have been able to come full circle, and share the training I received at CCM with another generation of students. CCM is about to celebrate its 150th anniversary. I look forward to continuing to serve on the CCMPower board, raising money for scholarships, and helping to ensure that CCM will be here for another 150 years, training and graduating outstanding music professionals. – Kimberly Daniel de Acha
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Some of my favorite times at CCM revolve around hearing and interacting with such a wonderful faculty, be it at their concerts, at committee meetings, or in day by day interaction. I feel honored to have worked with such stellar teachers and artists! – Mary Stucky
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When I started fall 1975, DVAC was the Schmidlapp Gymnasium, Memorial was a women’s dorm, the main way to the garage was from Calhoun down to CCM garage — the connector tunnel didn’t exist. Werner Hall and Starbucks weren’t here and CCM had about half of the students it does now. It was an exciting time for me, as I was starting in LaSalle Quartet. We did four concerts a year in Corbett and two to four international tours a year. I worked with so many wonderful colleagues over all these years, some are sadly no longer with us. Almost my whole professional life has been at CCM, more than four decades worth of experiences. – Lee Fiser
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In 1999, I received a call asking me to teach at CCM. Who would have thought that almost two decades later my passion for teaching has only increased because of the talented students and faculty that I have had the pleasure of working with! Thank you all so much! – Patti James
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There’s something a touch poetic for me about retiring along with Lee Fiser — the final retirement from the LaSalle String Quartet. I came to the CCM faculty as a quite young person. It was the Quartet who were instrumental in getting Percussion Group Cincinnati the appointment to CCM. Some of my strongest memories of that first decade here are the Quartet’s concerts on Corbett stage, and I endeavored to live up to the beautiful standards that they had set. I wanted a percussion group in the late 20th century to be able to function just as the greatest string quartets always had, and I am grateful to CCM for giving me and my colleagues that opportunity and support. – Allen Otte

CCM Slideshows: Don Pasquale

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Mary Ellyn Hutton calls CCM’s Mainstage Series production of Don Pasquale a “fast-moving delight start to finish, with beautiful singing, lively acting and a lovely-to-look-at, period production” in her review for the Cincinnati Enquirer! Read the full review here.

This week’s issue of CityBeat features an excellent profile of Don Pasquale‘s director, CCM graduate student Omer Ben-Seadia. You can read that Anne Arenstein-penned story online here.

Don Pasquale plays through this Sunday, April 6, and tickets are still available. Tickets can be purchased in person at the CCM Box Office, over the telephone at 513-556-4183 or online at ccm.uc.edu/boxoffice/donpasquale.

CCM’s Mainstage Opera Series Presents Donizetti’s ‘Don Pasquale’ April 3-6

William Tvrdik as the title character in CCM’s Mainstage Series production of ‘Don Pasquale.’ Photography by Mark Lyons.

CCM’s Mainstage Opera Series proudly presents Gaetano Donizetti’s Don Pasquale from April 3–6 in UC’s Patricia Corbett Theater. This beloved opera buffa is conducted by Mark Gibson with stage direction by accomplished artist’s diploma student Omer Ben-Seadia. The opera will be sung in Italian with English supertitles.

A comedic masterpiece that has captivated audiences since its 1843 premiere, Don Pasquale remains one of the most popular of Donizetti’s nearly 70 operas. On its surface, the opera details the plight of Ernesto, who fights to follow his heart rather than marry the woman his haughty old uncle Don Pasquale thinks he should. Outraged, the lifelong bachelor Pasquale decides to cut Ernesto out of his will and simply father his own heir, instead! A series of uproarious twists and turns ensues as a raucous ensemble of characters begin to take over the Pasquale homestead.

While it is easy to root for Ernesto and true love to prevail, Ben-Seadia suggests that it is Don Pasquale who serves as the true hero of this opera. She explains, “With all that is at stake, Pasquale is the one willing to risk it all… not just for love but for life. Sure we love to see him fail, but after all is said and done we look at Pasquale not with pity, but with the hope that he in fact will try again.”

Don Pasquale’s house staff. Photography by Tom Umfrid.

CCM Slideshows: The Rake’s Progress

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You only have two more chances to experience CCM’s innovative new take on Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress: 8 p.m. Saturday, May 12 and 2 p.m. Sunday, May 13 in UC’s Corbett Auditorium.

All photography by Mark Lyons.

CityBeat Spotlights CCM’s ‘The Rake’s Progress’ as ‘One Hell of a Collaboration’

Anne Arenstein takes a detailed look at the collaborative efforts that went into CCM’s production of The Rake’s Progress in this week’s issue of CityBeat (on newsstands now and available digitally here).

The Rake’s Progress runs at 8 p.m. Thursday, May 10 and Saturday, May 12, with a 2 p.m. matinee performance scheduled for Sunday, May 13.

Learn more about the opera here.

CCM Slideshow: Behind the Scenes of ‘The Rake’s Progress’

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Today, CCM Technical Director Stirling Shelton provides a behind-the-scenes look at some of the work that went into our final Mainstage production of the season, The Rake’s Progress, opening this Thursday, May 10.

Learn more about the opera here.

Enquirer Previews Technology Behind CCM’s Next Opera

Janelle Gelfand took a closer look at the digital media incorporated CCM’s Mainstage production of The Rake’s Progress in Sunday’s issue of the Cincinnati Enquirer. If you missed the issue, you can view the feature online here.

Learn more about The Rake’s Progress here.

CCM Opera, Theatre Design & Production and Electronic Media Collaborate on ‘The Rake’s Progress’

‘The Rake’s Progress’ depicts the corruption and downfall of spendthrift Tom Rakewell, portrayed in this double-cast production by Dashiell Waterbury (pictured) and Daniel Ross. Photography by Mark Lyons.

“For idle hearts and hands and minds, the Devil finds a work to do.” The CCM Opera department discovers just how true that adage is in their rendition of Stravinsky’s comedic opera The Rake’s Progress. Unique to this production is a first-time collaboration between CCM’s Departments of Opera and Theatre Design & Production with the Division of Electronic Media, providing an updated technological aspect. Mark Gibson conducts with stage direction by Robin Guarino. This outrageous tale of love, lust, greed and the repercussions of a life of sin plays May 10, 12 and 13 in Corbett Auditorium on the University of Cincinnati campus.

The subject matter of The Rake’s Progress is adult in nature and the production of the opera is intended for mature audiences. This production also makes use of haze, smoke and strobe lighting effects.

CCM Slideshows: Don Giovanni

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CCM’s Mainstage Opera Season opened last evening with Mozart’s extraordinary take on the Don Juan legend, Don Giovanni.

The Cincinnati Enquirer‘s Janelle Gelfand includes the opera in her round up of entertainment options for a Valentine treat here and CityBeat‘s Anne Arenstein provides a similar recommendation here.

LISTEN: CCM’s ‘Don Giovanni’ Featured on Around Cincinnati

Director Nicholas Muni discussed CCM’s Mainstage Opera Series production of Don Giovanni with Anne Arenstein on this past Sunday’s installment of WVXU’s Around Cincinnati. You can listen to the full discussion here.