Faculty & Staff News
Orchestra Director Kalena Bovell conducted the Chicago Sinfonietta on January 16 to a sold-out crowd of more than 2,400 people in Chicago Symphony Center. The Chicago Sinfonietta is an ensemble that prides itself on promoting diversity and inclusion as only 3 percent of minorities are represented in classical music today. To see a video of Kalena conducting at the concert, go to www. loomischaffee.org/magazine. Attendees of the Community Arts Celebration and Mercy Gallery exhibit opening on January 10 in the Richmond Art Center were treated
to the unique blend of old time, bluegrass, jazz, and rock music of a faculty acoustic quartet, Beards of a Feather. The band features Director of Studies Timothy Lawrence on mandolin, fiddle, banjolin, and vocals; Director of the Alvord Center for Global & Environmental Studies Alexander McCandless on guitar; music teacher and Associate Director of Communications Keller Glass on guitar, harmonica, and vocals; and English Department Head John Morrell on guitar, banjo, and vocals. Donald McKillop joined the Athletics Department this winter as assistant athletic director, head varsity baseball coach, and assis-
“Fretful Mickey” ceramic by Jennifer McCandless
tant football coach. A baseball and football standout and captain of both teams at Middlebury College, where he graduated in 2011, Donnie assistant coached baseball at Middlebury and assistant coached football at Springfield College and Amherst College. He also taught history and coached baseball, football, and basketball at Williston Northampton School from 2011 to 2014. Artwork by Head of the Visual Arts Department Jennifer McCandless appears in two exhibitions this spring. “Fretful Mickey” is included in the Ceramic Innovations exhibition in the Davenport Gallery of the Wayne Art Center in Wayne, Pennsylvania through April 29. And Jen’s ceramic sculptural work is included in the Narrative Abstracts exhibition at Perspectives…The Gallery at Whitney Center in Hamden, Connecticut, through April 28.
the Bradley, Chaffee, and Loomis families until she died in 1857 at the age of 82. She is listed as a free person in Windsor census records from the 1830s although slavery was not officially outlawed in Connecticut until 1844. As Karen wrote in an article about Nancy Toney in Loomis Chaffee Magazine in 2008, “While many remember her as one of the last slaves in Connecticut, Toney’s story — like that of many 19th-century formerly enslaved African-Americans living in New England — is one of ambiguous freedom.”
web+ To read Karen’s article about Nancy Toney, go to www.loomis chaffee.org/magazine.
Penn Fellow and economics teacher Mat Denunzio presented this winter at a conference sponsored by the Connecticut Association of Independent Schools Commission on Professional Development. Mat reported on a recent project in his Loomis economics class.
Kalena Bovell conducts the Loomis Chaffee Orchestra at the 2016 Winter Concert. Photo: John Groo
Loomis Chaffee archivist and history teacher Karen Parsons presented a program in February at the Windsor Historical Society about Nancy Toney, an African-American woman who was born into slavery in Connecticut in the 18th century and lived with three generations of Spring 2017
21