dual majors, dual careers:
AJ Eskridge ’05 “jumped in head first” when he arrived on campus. With gusto, the St. Paul native pursued two majors, management and music, became a campus ambassador as a firstyear student and a diversity peer educator, participated in cocurricular activities like choir and a theatre production, and joined organizations such as IMANI and Dance Ensemble, just to name a few. Now, as a young professional, he approaches his high-energy “dual career” with vigor, too. Since graduating, Eskridge’s “day job” is working in the area of personal finance at Dellwood Financial Services Company. His “night job” is music, a passion since high school. Eskridge has performed as a vocalist with artists The New Congress and Kerri Noble, and last year performed in the Twin Cities annual Michael Jackson Tribute. A chance meeting during a music gig at The Lab Theater added a new angle to his dynamic life—musical theatre. “I was asked that evening if I would be interested in auditioning for Cardinal Theatricals’ production of Rent. I got a part, and I’ve been auditioning for shows ever since.” Last fall, Eskridge was cast as Asher in the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts’ production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. That part has lead to a new opportunity and perhaps a difficult decision in the future. “Joseph was very fun, a ‘top of the line’ professional setting starting from signing the contract to the final performance. Now, I’ve accepted an invitation to travel with the production to Tokyo, Japan, for a month. I was able to take the time off from my financial work, but I think I am ‘on the edge’ of having to make a choice between two career paths.” Eskridge says that Morris prepared him for all of the planned and unplanned turns in his life. “Sometimes students think Morris is so remote, so far away from everything, but after graduation you learn that isn’t true. What you take away from Morris applies to life everywhere.”
Karin Wolverton ’97, Some experiences affect and interlink with the rest of our lives. For Karin Wolverton ’97, Roseville, encountering some of the world’s greatest operas shaped her life’s work. She recalls being drawn to a touring production of Mozart’s Don Giovanni at Morris during her sophomore year, foreshadowing her future. But that was not the defining moment of her career. Originally a pre-med chemistry major, Wolverton says that the Morris environment enabled her “to reevaluate my choices and pursue a degree in music allowing me to meld my passion with my career.” Janet Ahern, retired music teaching specialist, opened the opera door, says Wolverton. “My freshman year, she encouraged me to take [her] opera workshop class, and I was captivated.” On a class trip to the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts in St. Paul, she experienced a Minnesota Opera’s production of Puccini’s classic Turandot. Wolverton remembers “sitting in the upper balcony and thinking ‘I want to be on that stage.’” The dream became reality. She was hired by the company a few years later, and singing as a chorister in a remount of the opera changed her world. Her solo debut came the following year, and she has since sung more than 10 roles on that stage, cast most recently as Musetta in Puccini’s La bohème, her favorite opera. Wolverton has also sung with the Minnesota Orchestra, touted by the New Yorker as “the greatest orchestra in the world,” advancing in one year from chorus to the role of the Mother in Amahl and the Night Visitors at Orchestra Hall. Before heading to Omaha, Nebraska, in January, she sang in Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute) and next fall will make her Carnegie
To hear Eskridge and cast sing “Season of Love,” the Rent theme song, go to Youtube and search RentMinneapolislive.
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Alexandra Weber ’11 University of Minnesota, Morris: a renewable, sustainable education.