Nathaniel Pierce, Alan Tilley, Lee Anderson and Alex Ayers, posing for a photo taken at the Camp’s new scholarship fundraising event, the Madeline Island Musical Feast.
A friend and donor of the Music Camp for many years, Jane Havens died in 2010 and specified in her will that funds from her charitable remainder trust be used to support the Madeline Island Music Camp. She and her late husband Fred had bequeathed the trust to a family foundation naming their three children as trustees. After several meetings with Executive Director Tom George, Jane’s son, Peter, informed the Camp that the Fred and Jane Havens Family Foundation would pledge $72,000 to fund two fellowships for three years beginning in 2011. The family chose to name one the Edith Wells Bristol Fellowship because of Jane’s longtime friendship with Madeline Island summer resident and Music Camp Board member Edie Bristol. They named the other the Jane and Fred Havens Fellowship.
The Jane and Fred Havens Fellowship was awarded to Lee Anderson, who is pursuing degrees in viola performance and music education at Indiana University. He and three other equally talented “fellows” were grouped as an ensemble by Music Director Evelina Chao and performed the complete Beethoven “Harp” String Quartet Op. 74 at the Music Camp last summer and at the Landmark Center on September 16. The Edith Wells Bristol Fellowship was awarded to Ashley Ng who graduated last May with a Bachelor’s degree in Violin Performance from the Boston Conservatory of Music. She performed the second violin in a Fellowship Quartet made up of young women who performed the complete String Quartet in C Minor, Op. 51 by Johannes Brahms.
The Fellowship Program is part of the Camp’s new Advanced String Quartet/Fellowship Program launched this year and which was piloted during the 25th Anniversary Season in 2010 when 16 college age students stayed on for a fourth week and joined alumni who are professional musicians and faculty to celebrate the 25th Anniversary with a chamber orchestra performance conducted by Minnesota Orchestra’s Music Director Osmo Vänskä. The Fellowship Program underwrites the participation of advanced musicians who are in their last years of conservatory, in graduate school or between graduation and their first jobs as professional musicians. Fellows are offered a variety of professional development opportunities that include concertizing around the region and a chance to play some of a composer’s most difficult repertoire with a group of equally talented peers and pursue greater depth in musical interpretation.
Students accepted into the program for 2012 will work with the internationally renowned Shanghai String Quartet. In addition to intensive string quartet study and performance, they will also participate in a piano and string collaborative program led by former Minnesota Orchestra Concertmaster and Professor of Violin at Indiana University, Jorja Fleezanis and concert pianist, Zeyda Ruga Suzuki.