Fall 2017

the Crowden Letter

Storied Instruments

Have you ever wondered how Crowden acquires our instrument collection?

There are many ways to support Crowden, and a popular choice for a number of donors is to make in-kind donations of musical instruments and sheet music.

These gifts have included very valuable older instruments, which we either resell to benefit our programs or keep as loaner instruments for professional players visiting Crowden. Some instruments, while too highquality to be in general everyday use in our

programs, are loaned to students preparing for conservatory auditions, or loaned on a longer term basis to adult students. Other gifts have helped us modernize our piano collection and enlarge our collection of fractional-sized string instruments, which are so important for our summer camps. Instrument donations support Crowden’s outreach programs, and have even provided replacements for music students who lost their instruments in the recent North Bay fires. Pianos and stringed instruments are not the only gifts that have helped our programs: we use donated recorders, flutes and clarinets, children’s percussion, and a full drum set for uses as varied as our annual Community Music Day, Crowden School theatrical productions, and early childhood music classes.

Nearly everyone preparing to donate an

instrument has a special emotional attachment to them, and Crowden is the last place where musical instruments are seen as only objects. That being said, we need to be clear-eyed, and sensitively dispassionate when making decisions about which instruments to accept, as not all of them will fit our specific needs at Crowden.

All of the instruments we accept have a meaningful tale behind them; in this issue of the Crowden Letter, we explore a few stories we found particularly worthy of sharing.

Go behind the scenes of our instrument collection on pages 4–5!

News Flashes

Board Update

The Crowden Board of Trustees approved new officers and member changes this fall. With deep gratitude, we said goodbye to departing Treasurer and former Chair EARL RUPP . We are very pleased to welcome Crowden School parent SHAWN FREEDBERG ANNE NESBET will serve as our Board Chair, while departing Chair TIMOTHY DER will serve as Vice Chair along with CARY KOH ( ’ 85) TRACY DOOLEY ( ’ 95) continues as Secretary, and JAMES MARKS will serve as Treasurer.

Winter Benefit Concert

Crowden School alumnus NATHAN OLSON ( ’ 00) will perform with faculty pianist JEFFREY LADEUR for this year’s Winter Benefit concert. Nathan writes us, “I feel

so lucky to have grown up in Berkeley with a chance to attend The Crowden School. I got to play chamber music about a year after I started playing violin, which is unheard of! My parents first enrolled me in an after-school chamber music program run by Doris Fukawa when I was eight, so I will forever be indebted to Doris, Anne, Brigitte [Mancini], and the whole Crowden community for getting me hooked on chamber music. I’ve been able to return for several summers as part of Crowden's Chamber Music Workshop, and it is an amazing feeling to now be a teacher and coach at the middle school I attended, and to give something back to the next generation of musicians. I can’t wait to perform with Jeff LaDeur in January!”

NYC Reunion

One of our favorite excuses to visit New York is becoming a regular event. On October 15, Executive and Artistic Director Doris Fukawa and Development Director Kerri Gawryn spent

Nathan Olson, ’00 Co-Concertmaster of the Dallas Symphony

January 27, 7:30pm

a perfect Sunday evening in New York City for our third-annual East Coast Alumni Reunion. During an intimate cocktail reception in the lovely Roof at South Park, we caught up on the news from alums GIDEON LAZARUS (’08), KATHERINE LEVENTHAL (’01) with her husband, son, and father, DANIEL HOLTMANN-RICE (’00) and his wife and daughter, SEBASTIAN SCHWELM (’00), and former student RACHEL RUGGLES

“Nothing is more rewarding than spending time with the young adults who are such a part of Crowden’s history,” Doris notes. “I am always delighted when our graduates share their successes with me, and it is such a joy to meet new family and babies! The best part of my day is often hearing from past students.”

We want to keep up with all of our alumni, near and far, and you don’t have to wait for our next gathering to share updates from your life: email us at alumni@crowden.org!

Celebrate 35 Years and Double Your Impact with a Matched Gift

Crowden’s 35th Anniversary is upon us, and to help us continue to build this remarkable community, a generous donor has offered to match your donations up to $135,000.

Since 1983, Crowden has been at the heart of a unique community of musicians, students, friends, and neighbors. Together, we have built something truly remarkable.

We are especially grateful this season for such an opportunity: Every dollar you give will be doubled when you donate now, helping us to reach our crucial fundraising goal for the year.

As a community, we have already accomplished so much. With Anne Crowden’s vision, we developed a world-class school that nurtures young students in music education as well as excellent academic studies. For the past decade, under Doris Fukawa, Crowden has grown to reach even greater numbers of students, performers, and audience members. We are breaking down barriers to music appreciation, and planting the seeds for rich musical lives throughout our community. Now, we need your support to ensure that we continue our growth for the next 35 years.

Please make your gift today, so that others like you will have the opportunity to develop their passion for exceptional chamber music in this unique environment.

With your support, music changes everything.

Storied Instruments

Continued from page 1

One of the most significant gifts we have received in recent years was a group of instruments, including a violin, two violas, bows, and an upright piano from the estate of Helene Conant, who was a keen amateur chamber musician, and heiress to the Chock-Full-o’-Nuts coffee and automat restaurant fortune. Helene’s husband Michael Conant, an emeritus professor at UC Berkeley, had considered donating to the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, but his cousin and Crowden alumna mom and former trustee Vickie Leonard steered the gift to us. We still have one of the violas, a Giovanni Battista Morassi that was played by former Community Programs Director Elisabeth Christensen at Crowden’s 30th Anniversary Concert, sparing her the need to travel

with her instrument, increasingly difficult these days. Two of the instruments were sold at auction to support our programs, and the bows were consigned.

Other examples of outstanding loaner instruments include the viola belonging to the late Nobel Prize laureate and scientist Donald Glaser, donated by his wife Lynn, which will remain in our collection, and a viola recently donated to us by Ida Braun, which is a modern copy of the Amati played by Detlev Olshausen, longtime Associate Principal Viola of the San Francisco Symphony.

Another example of an instrument too valuable for everyday use at Crowden, but which nonetheless has served to enrich our programs here, was the gorgeous Vuillaume viola owned by the late Elizabeth Birnbaum, and donated by her sons. When they realized we would have been required by tax law to hold onto the instrument, without being able to use it to its fullest potential, they sold it and donated the proceeds to Crowden. We also

received an amazingly comprehensive library of viola music from the bequest. Before the sale, we were privileged to have taken part in the memorial service for Mrs. Birnbaum, with both faculty member Lisa Grodin and then-student Nathan Yamamoto participating, allowing the family to hear the instrument played by a representative of the institution it would eventually benefit.

Not every instrument we receive is a precious instrument suitable for professional use, of course. Joan Glassey donated a lovely quarter-sized cello which is quite old, but intended for student use. Legendary cello pedagogue Margaret Rowell considered the sweet little instrument to have been the best sounding small cello she had ever heard. This cello, like many gift instruments, has been steered to us by trustee and luthière extraordinaire Joan Balter.

Fractional-sized instruments are crucial to our mission, enabling young people to try stringed instruments for the very first time at

our petting zoos at Community Music Day or the Solano Stroll, and for our summer camps Scrape, Squawk, and Bang, and Summer Strings. We periodically receive instruments students from our community have outgrown, and Jay and Leslie Ifshin of Ifshin Violins made a significant gift of fractional instruments retired from their rental collection several years ago.

As we watch our younger students grow both as musicians and as people, a variety of different sized instruments are necessary to have in our collection. This is exemplified by our double bass collection, which has possibly grown faster than any other single category of instrument at the school. These range from a little bass made in Mexico that is about equivalent to a one-eighth sized instrument (and probably intended for mariachis rather than smaller students), to a quarter-sized bass (played at various times by alumni Samuel Carl Adams and Keith Doelling), to half-sized, and finally to three-quarter sized instruments (most adult players remain at three-quarter).

Our three-quarter basses include carved Mittenwald German instruments of good quality donated by alumni father Daniel Leventhal and by Janet Mengle, whose daughter Cheryl was a favorite student of Anne Crowden’s from the days before the Crowden School even existed. This last bass was named “Fred” by its owner, and renamed “Buttercup” by Crowden School students inspired by its yellow hued varnish. The bass is set up with low action and thinner-gauge strings, making it comfortable for either an older player or quite a young player to use. The instrument continues to be used weekly for private lessons at Crowden, and has at different times been loaned to adult amateur students or used specifically for an elderly student who appreciated the ease of play.

We are approached frequently with offers of pianos, and must typically decline the offers, as we have many instruments, and can generally accept those pianos that either represent an improvement over an existing instrument, or fill a need we currently have, such as having a

first-rate concert grand for the Hoefer Auditorium stage. Some of the pianos in our collection are both fine instruments and have a provenance intimately connected with Crowden’s history. The Bechstein piano currently on the Hoefer Auditorium stage was purchased by the Crowden School’s first Art teacher and first director of the Extension program, Hannah Zender, for her son Mark. The piano was then purchased by the great cellist and friend of Crowden, Bonnie Hampton, before it was acquired by Joan Balter, and donated in honor of her parents. The Yamaha piano in Studio A was the longtime instrument in the teaching studio of Anne Crowden, and had also been owned by the pianist Nathan Schwartz.

If you have or know of instruments to donate that can support Crowden’s mission, either through incorporation into our collections or sold to benefit our programs, contact Michel Taddei at mtaddei@crowden.org.

With Your Support, Music Changes Everything!

The Crowden Music Center gratefully acknowledges the support of the following Crowden families, employees, individual members, government agencies, foundations, and businesses between November 15, 2016 and November 14, 2017. Kindly notify us of any inadvertent omissions. Thank you!

Crowden School Families

Donna Jones-Bhandari and Rakesh Bhandari

Jane Gottesman and Geoffrey Biddle

Cola Chan-Xie and Kevin Xie

Kendra Dodsworth and William Miller

Jessica and Robert Duran

Donna and James Eyestone

Leah and Joel Goldberg

Elif and Bora Kalkan

Jasper Kamperman and Wieneke Gorter

Gina and Harry Loucks

Myla and Charlie Manese

Naomi Marks and Michelle Klucsor

Jerome Matthews and Jenny Yu

Quang Nguyen and Nica Uk

Emanuela Tallo and Dylan Riley

Eugene Sor and Karen Shinozaki Sor

Charlotte and Drew Waters

Tim Wilkinson and Nomi Harris

Jovina and Vita Yee

Faculty and Staff

Mori Achen and Maryann D'Onofrio

Marion Atherton and John Reager

Lisa Barratt

Göran and Christina Berg

Michael and Heghine Boloyan

Maria and John Danielson

Rachel Durling

Jory Fankuchen and Natasha Makhijani

Doris Fukawa and Marijan Pevec

Brad Johnson

Larry London

Alyona Marenchuk

Lisa Maresch

Betsy Marvit

Heidi Mattson and Michael Ferencz

Debra Mauro

Annie Nalezny

Jessica Schaeffer

Monica Scott and Dominique Pelletey

Eugene Sor and Karen Shinozaki Sor

Michel Taddei

Michael Tillotson

Op. 18 Alumni Society

Emily Adams

Samuel Adams

Noah Bendix-Balgley

Quen Cheng

Meena Bhasin-Dalby and Owen Dalby

Tracy Dooley

Cary Koh and Ting Chin

Helene Lee Toralba

Tracy Miller Sanborn

Karna Jean Nisewaner and Arne Stokstad

Individual Donors

conductor ($25,000 & up)

Anonymous

Sallie and Edward Arens

Jennifer and Elwyn Berlekamp

Shelby and Frederick Gans

benefactor ($10,000–24,999)

Anonymous

John Adams and Deborah O'Grady

Lois De Domenico

Soo Hyang Kang and Jacob Pak

James Marks and Edna Lee Warnecke

Helen and John Meyer

Amy and Eddie Orton

sponsor ($5,000–9,999)

Anonymous

Sue Coblens Young

Peter Fang and Erlinda Sy Fang

Nick Gerson

Patrick Golden and Susan Overhauser

Zach and Peggy Griffin

Donn Logan and Marcy Wong

Anne Nesbet and Eric Naiman

presenter ($2,500–4,999)

Angela Archie

Carol Davis and Joel Marcus

Timothy and Cathy Der

Tracy Dooley

Bonnie Hampton

John Lowitz and Fran Krieger-Lowitz

Richard and Myriam Misrach

Maria and Jose Luis Poncel

Earl and Rosalinda Rupp

composer ($1,000–2,499)

Susan and Norman Abrahamson

Joan Balter

Dorianne Cotter-Lockard

Liza and Michael Dalby

Iden Goodman and Roberta Schwartz

Cary Koh and Ting Chin

Douglas MacLaughlin

Cara and Timothy Hoxie

Elaine and Herrick Jackson

Sukey Lilienthal and David Roe

Ingrid Madsen and Victor Rauch

John and Annamarie McCarthy

Elizabeth McCoy and Carl Haber

Mary Lynn Miller and Ray Meister

Sangam Prasad

Debbra Wood Schwartz

Iris and Tom Stone

Lisa and James Taylor

David Ward

patron ($500–999)

Elizabeth Axelson and Don Regan

Judith Bloom

Roberta Brokaw

Richard Carll

Judy Chu

Scott and Peggy Cmiel

Peter and Patricia Coffin

Renee Cole Clyde and Tom Clyde

John Croizat

Janet Der

Carol Franc Buck

Gregory Freidin and Victoria Bonnell

Eugene Hanacek

Valerie and Richard Herr

Sherry Hsi

Martha and Vaughan Jones

Bennett Markel

Claire Max and Jonathan Arons

Jack McPhail

John and Nancy Menke

Sally Nichols

Ann and Michael Parker

Alex and Ditsa Pines

Janice Hui and Dan Rohn

Sharon Seim

Elizabeth and Frank Sor

Julie and Robert Stokstad

Michael Tilson Thomas and Joshua Robison

June Wiley and Bruce McCubbrey

Kent Young

friend ($250–499)

Karol and Anna Maria Busse Berger

Nathan Birnbaum and Claire Peeps

Claudia Bloom and Daniel Pitt

Ragnar and Tamara Bohlin

Jim Chou

Elisabeth Christensen

Owen Dalby

Kumiko and Haruko Fukawa

Neil Goteiner and Nadine Joseph

Natalie Hahn

Edith Haritatos and Geoffrey Gowan

Eric Hsu and Ellen Rigsby

Sophia Kessinger and Shmuel Katz

Rene Mandel

Phyllis Moore

Alexander Nichols and Sonya DelwaideNichols

Carol Robertson

Michael Ronin

Tricia Swift

Maria and Otto Taddei

Elizabeth Varnhagen

associate ($100–249)

Alan and Helen Appleford

Roy and Susan Bogas

Eleanor Briccetti

Robert Clear and Barbara Judd

Linda Deaktor

Jacqueline Divenyi

Emerson and Sara Dubois

Patricia Durham and Douglas Hammer

Robert Ellis and Jane Bernstein

Henry Field and Lessly Wikle Field

Mary Ellen Fine

Thomas Foor

Marsha and Michael Gardner

Roger and Joan Glassey

David Lance Goines

Gail Graves

Margot Harrison

Lorraine Hauser

Rachel Fine and Christopher Hawthorne

Dr. John Hege

Fran Hill and Larry Frost

Naomi Janowitz and Andrew Lazarus

Sandra Jennings and Shinji Eshima

Steven Joseph and Corey Hansen-Joseph

Myo Kim

David Koh and Nora Chieng

Fred Konkel and Kathy Kaspar

Jan Kuchinsky

Jeanne Lageson

Alan and Portia Lee

Jonathan Leichtling and Wendy Stern

Marcos and Janet Maestre

Councilwoman Linda Maio

Nancy Merrill

Richard Muller

Stacy Neale

Etsuyo Nishikimi

Anthonia Roller and Wayne Heiser

Diane Rosenberg

Ron and Gail Rubenstein

Jonathan and Saori Russell

Sarah Satterlee and Robinson Brown

Kary Schulman

Timothy Smith

Ilknur and Ilker Sozat

Anna-Marie and John Strauss

Linda Walls

Janet Weinstein

Florence Wong

Linda Wood

supporter ($50–99)

Barbara and Mark Altenberg

Susie and Schuyler Bailey

Julianne Feldman

Christine and Victor Gold

Jose Gomez and Chen Mill

Gretchen and Richard Grant

Ellen Hahn

Harriet and Peter Hanauer

Keiko and Peter Hjersman

Olivia and Thacher Hurd

Jihee Hwang

Donald E. Kelley Jr.

Robert and Ileana Krumme

Michael and Ayelet Lindenstrauss Larsen

Isabelle Leduc and Irfan Akbar

Deborah Lee and Kaipo Baysa

JB Leibovitch

Anthony and Rosa Martin

Michiko Matsuo Luzmoor and Stephen Luzmoor

Joan Murray

W. B. Peale and Kristina Sepetys

James and Diane Pennington

Normita and George Santore

Rick Shinozaki and Irene Jacobson

Margaret Traylor

In Kind Gifts

Meena Bhasin-Dalby and Owen Dalby

Virginia Callahan

Jennifer Davies

Hyacinth Fleming

Michele Fromson and Cordell Ho

Doris Fukawa and Marijan Pevec

Zach and Peggy Griffin

Jasper Kamperman and Wieneke Gorter

Peter and Joan Klatt

Jay Mumford

Anne Rosenthal

Linda Sigel and Ming Kwong

Michel Taddei

Charlotte and Drew Waters

Julian Weingart

Andrea Yannone

Businesses & Organizations

Amazon Smile

Bank of America

Dealey, Renton & Associates

ebay foundation

Ifshin Violins

Meyer Sound

Papa Murphy's

Piedmont Piano Company

String Letter Publishing

The Benevity Community Impact Fund

Wells Fargo Community Support and Matching Gifts Program

Institutional Donors

Alameda County Arts Commission/ ARTSFUND Grants

Ann and Gordon Getty Foundation

Berkeley Civic Arts Commission

Crowden

Board of Trustees

officers

Anne Nesbet, Chair

Timothy Der, Cary Koh Vice Chairs

James Marks, Treasurer Tracy Dooley, Secretary

members

Angela Archie, Joan Balter, Shawn Freedberg, Zachary Griffin, Cary Koh, Jerome Matthews, Jacob Pak, Maria Poncel, Sangam Prasad, and Doris Fukawa, ex officio

music advisory board

John Adams, Bonnie Hampton, Gary Karr, Michael Morgan, Sir Simon Rattle

advisory board

Sallie Arens, Patrick Golden, John Lowitz, Bennett Markel, John McCarthy, Helen Meyer, Deborah O’Grady

California Arts Council

Hurlbut-Johnson Charitable Trust

Jewish Community Federation

Pacific Harmony Foundation

The Bernard Osher Foundation

Gifts in Tribute

in memory of willie archie

Richard Muller

in honor of joan balter, on the occasion of her birthday

Nick Gerson

in honor of petra biddle-gottesman

Dee Ann Morency

in memory of jesse & beth birnbaum

Jan Kuchinsky

in honor of stephan and caelin boman

Carol Robertson

albert braver musical instrument fund

Mark Moss and Lisa Braver Moss

in memory of anne crowden

Emily Adams

Noah Bendix-Balgley

in honor of serene fang

Peter Fang and Erlinda Sy Fang

in memory of mary ellen fine

Rachel Fine and Christopher Hawthorne

in honor of doris fukawa

Dorianne Cotter-Lockard

Gregory Freidin and Victoria Bonnell

Fran Hill and Larry Frost

John and Annamarie McCarthy

Nancy Merrill

Ditsa and Alex Pines

Kary Schulman

in memory of susan gerson

Nick Gerson

founder

Anne Crowden (1928–2004)

honorary president

Lord Yehudi Menuhin (1916–1999)

founding president

Colin Hampton (1911–1996)

Administration

Doris Fukawa, Executive and Artistic Director

Marion Atherton, Chief Operations Officer

Sarah Barnett, Receptionist

William Betts, Community Programs Assistant

Maria Danielson, Staff Accountant

Monica Frame, tcs Counselor

Kerri Gawryn, Director of Development

Sharon Han, Communications and Development Assistant

Brad Johnson, tcs Principal

Heidi Mattson, tcs Assistant Principal

Debra Mauro, Director of Finance

Jorge Mendoza, Building and Grounds Assistant

Moana Newman, Associate Development Director

in honor of lisa grodin

Mai Lieu and Douglas Palacios

in memory of erwin hahn

Natalie Hahn

in honor of john lowitz

Eugene Hanacek

in memory of milly rosner

Patricia Durham and Douglas Hammer

in honor of michael rubinstein

Diane Rosenberg

Reynaldo Rodriguez, Building and Grounds Supervisor

Nicole Rodriguez, Receptionist

Eugene Sor, Associate Artistic Director, Director of tcs Music

Jennifer Strauss, Director of Communications

Elizabeth Tackett, Admissions Manager

Michel Taddei, Director of Artistic Administration

Stephannie Tornow, tcs Secretary

Crowden Letter

Michel Taddei, Moana Newman, writers

Geoffrey Biddle, photography (except as noted)

Jennifer Strauss, editor, graphic designer

Front cover photo by Geoffrey Biddle.

Back cover photo by Sam Breach.

Music Changes Everything

In this Issue

1. Learn the stories behind Crowden’s instrument collection.

2. Double your impact with our new matching gift challenge.

3. Save the date for Crowden’s 2018 Gala!