2003 Chautauqua
September 27, 9:30-8:30pm
THE AMERICAN WEST:
AN IDEA THAT BECAME A PLACE
Keynote: THE EVOLUTION OF THE AMERICAN WEST: MYTH AND REALITY
Dr. Don Graham, J. Frank Dobie regents Professor of American and English Literature, University of Texas, Austin, Texas
Dr. Graham teaches Dobie's famous course, Life and Literature of the Southwest and a course in Australian Literature and Film. His books include "Cowboys and Cadillacs: How Hollywood looks at Texas", "Texas: A literary portrait", "Southwest: Twenty-Four Stories from Modern Texas", which he edited and "No Name on the Bullet: a biography of Audie Murphy".
Photo by: Bridgett Amos
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BEYOND THE BATTLEFIELD:
Dr. Sherry L. Smith, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, Texas
Examine the confluence of Native Americans and military officers and their wives. Sherry L. Smith is Accomplished Historian, Professor, and Associate Director of the Clements Center for Southwest Studies at Southern Methodist University in Dallas Texas.
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THREADNEEDLE STREET: IRON HORSES, STEEL RAILS AND TIN WHISTLES
Threadneedle Street (Peggy Turner, Jim Brunde, Melina Wilkins, Bobby Bush) Fort Worth, Texas
In keeping with the Waxahachie Chautauqua's 2003 theme, the American West, Threadneedle Street Band brings "Iron Horses, Steel Rails, and Tin Whistles" to the Chautauqua stage. This program is a musical history of the American railroads that includes railroad classics such as "Casey Jones" and "Orange Blossom Special." It also explores the work songs traditions of the railroad laborers and gives tribute to special history in songs like "Wreck of '97."
Threadneedle Street got rave revues at the 2000 Waxahachie Chautauqua with their historical musical program "From Celts to Cowboys" which traced the development of songs and music of the British Isles into traditional Texas music. Now they're back, bringing us another aspect of our American musical heritage.
Threadneedle Street has been performing throughout Texas for ten years. They perform traditional dance music and songs of America, Ireland, Wales, Scotland and England. They combine a high level of musicianship with a warm personal style on stage to create an entertaining performance.
Jim Brunke (bodhran and other ethnic drums) and Peggy Turner (flute, recorder, tin whistle) met in a band in their native Milwaukee in the late 1970s. They have lived in the Fort Worth area since 1981 and have traveled to all parts of the country playing at Renaissance and Irish festivals. In between tours, they give lessons and perform regularly at area schools.
Melina Wilkins (violin/fiddle) started playing in Odessa at the age of 6. She later teamed with her father and sisters in a string quartet and played regularly with the Odessa and Lubbock Symphonies. She is now the head orchestra director at a large high school in Arlington.
Bobby Bush (guitar, mandolin, banjo) grew up in the Fort Worth area and has been playing a wide variety of styles for over 35 years.
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KATHERINE ANNE PORTER AND TEXAS
Dr. Mark Busby, Director of the Center for Study of the Southwest and Professor of English, Southwest Texas State University, San Marcos, Texas
Professor Mark Busby tells us that Katherine Anne Porter is arguably Texas' most distinguished writer. Dr. Busby, who is Director of the Center for the Study of the Southwest and Professor of English at Southwest Texas State University, is coming to the September 27th Waxahachie Chautauqua Assembly to tell us about this important author.
Katherine Anne Porter (1890-1980) was a Pulitzer-winning short-story writer and novelist whose elegant prose earned her wide renown. Porter's work includes the collections Pale Horse, Pale Rider (1939), The Leaning Tower (1944) and The Collected Short Stories of Katherine Ann Porter (1965), as well as the best-selling novel Ship of Fools (1962).
Dr. Busby is coeditor with Dr. Dickie M. Heaberlin of the book From Texas to the World and Back: The Journeys of Katherine Anne Porter, which was selected as the "Best of 2001" in Texas nonfiction by the San Antonio Express-News. The collection includes essays by scholars of Porter's work and of Texas literature. Some concern specific aspects of her life, such as her love for her birthday or her marital record. Others focus on the main elements of her relationship with Texas, while still others deal with specific works, often relating them to her Texas heritage. This important addition to Porter studies provides new insight into the ways in which Porter's Texas heritage shaped her life and her fiction. (From the Texas A&M University Press Consortium website)
Dr. Busby, a native of Ennis, Texas, received his Ph.D. from the University of Colorado, Boulder, in 1977, and his BA and MA from Texas A&M University Commerce. He taught at Texas A&M University, Indiana University-Purdue University, the U.S. Army Adjutant General School, and the University of Colorado. He is currently serving as President of the Texas Institute of Letters, a position he will hold until 2004.
In addition, he is author of Larry McMurtry and the West: An Ambivalent Relationship (U of North Texas P, 1995); Ralph Ellison (Twayne/Macmillan 1991); and editor of New Growth/2: Short Stories of Contemporary Texas (Corona, 1993). He has also published Preston Jones (1983) and Lanford Wilson (1987) in the Western Writers Series at Boise State University, coedited The Frontier Experience and the American Dream (Texas A&M UP, 1989).
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THE AMERICAN WEST: A MUSICAL INSPIRATION
Felicity Coltman and Kay Sparks, Austin, Texas
Felicity Coltman and Kay Sparks of the Austin Chamber Music Center will combine their piano expertise to bring music of the southwest to the Waxahachie Chautauqua Assembly. For the first time (in our knowledge), two baby grand pianos will grace the Chautauqua stage while the music of piano duets fills the Chautauqua Auditorium, including excerpts from Rodeo and music written by Texas and other Western composers during the frontier days.
Felicity Coltman has performed as solo pianist and soloist with orchestras in South Africa, and performs frequently with chamber ensembles in Europe and the United States. She teaches piano, theory, and chamber music in addition to organizing and managing the education and performance programs of the Austin Chamber Music Center. She holds diplomas from the Royal School of Music, London, the Trinity College of Music, London and the University of South Africa, and has a degree from the University of Kansas. Last summer she performed at the Park Avenue North Chamber Music series in London and at the San Luis Obispo Mozart Festival in California.
Felicity Coltman, along with two other members of the Arundel Trio, presented "Three Composers, Three Styles" at last year's Waxahachie Chautauqua Assembly. There they played the music and told the stories of turn of the century composers, Dvorak, Debussy, Rachmaninoff in a popular and informative program:
In addition to performing and teaching, Felicity Coltman is the Founder and Artistic Director of the Austin Chamber Music Center (founded 1981), whose mission is to help musicians and audiences discover the joys and benefits of chamber music through year-long teaching and coaching of students, a two-week summer institute, a professional performance program (Intimate Concerts) and, beginning in 1997, the annual Austin Chamber Music Festival. For more information, see www.austinchambermusic.org.
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MUSIC OF A SMALL TOWN BAND: A PREVIEW
Dr. Carol Reynolds, Associate Professor of Music History, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, Texas
Straight from the lecture halls of the Myerson Center and Bass Hall, Professor Carol Reynolds will come to Chautauqua, bringing along her insights into the music, the composers, and the era of the New Lone Star Band. We are lucky to have this highly respected and dynamic music historian to help us expand and deepen our understanding of our own evening concert - with piano accompaniment too! Dr. Reynolds will present a lively discussion of early 20th century small town American music.
Dr. Carol Reynolds is a uniquely talented and much sought-after speaker for general audiences. She frequently lectures for such arts organizations as the Dallas Symphony, the Dallas Opera, the Dallas Museum of Art, and the Kimball Museum, and has served as the Principal Lecturer of the Van Cliburn Series. Never dull or superficial, Carol brings to her audiences a unique mix of humor, substance, and skilled piano performance to make the arts more accessible and meaningful to all.
Carol Reynolds is Associate Professor of Music History at the Meadows School of the Arts, Southern Methodist University in Dallas.. She obtained an MA in piano performance and a Ph.D. in Musicology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her primary field of expertise lies in Russian music and culture, the oratorio, and Russian vocal music. She pursued her graduate studies at the [then] Leningrad Conservatory of Music and has developed particular expertise concerning the inter-relationship of German and Russian art, music, and history.
Carol has been a regular speaker and tour guide for SMU's Godbey Lecture Series. She began leading tours on her own to Russia in 1995. Her enthusiasm and boundless energy made these tours highly popular, and at the urging of many she has expanded her tour work under the banner Tour of the Arts (www.tourofthearts.com).
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FRANCISCAN CONVERSION OF THE INDIANS: A CENTURY-LONG EXPERIMENT
Dr. Jesus de la Teja Professor of History at Southwest Texas State University, San Marcos, Texas
Professor Jesus Frank de la Teja tells us that the story of the Spanish missionary program to convert Indians in Texas to the Catholic religion is relevant in the world today. On September 27, Dr. de la Teja will discuss how the Franciscan priests, as instruments of the Spanish Empire, were part of a century-long experiment in acculturation and social control in early Texas history.
He says: "Raised as we have been with the concept of separation of church and state, it is often hard to understand the extremely close relationship between the Spanish Crown and the Catholic Church". Dr. de la Teja believes that by learning about this part of our own state's history, we can better understand places in the world today where religion is intertwined with civil authority.
Dr. de la Teja is a history professor at Southwest Texas State University, San Marcos, Texas. He is also Managing Editor of Catholic Southwest: A Journal of History and Culture. He served as a researcher for James Michener during the writing of the novel TEXAS.
After his recent appearance at the Seguin Family Historical Society, Dr. de la Teja was described as remarkably informative with a flare for speaking and making history interesting - as if he were telling the story for the first time. "He captures not only your attention but your mind as well." (www.seguinfamilyhistory.com)
Dr. de la Teja is a prolific author; his most recent book is San Antonio de Bexar: A Community on New Spain's Northern Frontier. It covers the early (Spanish) period of the city and provides the opportunity to see the early settlement, to imagine the lives of those who began a new life here on the far northern reaches of New Spain, back in the early 18th century.
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DALLAS WIND SYMPHONY : The New "Lone Star Band"
Debut Performance
On September 27 the Dallas Wind Symphony will debut its newest band, the New Lone Star Band, named and inspired by Waxahachie's own historic Lone Star Band! Thirteen of DWS's finest musicians will comprise this group and perform music of turn-of-the-century small town brass bands - in the most appropriate of settings, the historic Chautauqua Auditorium.
You may remember the Dallas Wind Symphony's Sousa Band that brought down the house at the 2002 Chautauqua Assembly, as they recreated a typical John Philip Sousa concert - complete with Mr. Sousa himself. Now, "America's Premier Wind Band" is back again. This time they will provide the Chautauqua audience the chance to participate in this ground-breaking band debut while, at the same time, celebrate Waxahachie's own musical history.
For more information on the Dallas Wind Symphony, see www.dws.org.
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PRESERVING IMAGES OF THE WEST
Helen Plumber, Assistant Curator, Photography, Amon Carter Museum, Fort Worth, Texas
Charles F. Lummus' personal odyssey was to capture the images and record and preserve the vestiges of a vanishing era through illustrations, stories, photographs, and a museum. Through this program, relive Lummus' journey as he walked across the West capturing photographic images of threatened native cultures. Lummus was the first to make a business in photography and write a Southwestern cookbook. He also established the Southwest Museum in Los Angeles, California and he also wrote a book of poetry. Helen Plummer is the Assistant Curator of Photography at the Amon Carter Museum in Fort Worth, Texas.
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THE WANDERINGS OF CABAZA DE VACA:
Charles Finsley Retired from Dallas Museum of Natural History, Dallas, Texas
Cabeza de Vaca came in search of gold, but mishaps caused his wanderings. Learn some unique Texas history and how Texas native plants helped him survive. Charles S. Finsley is the retired curator of Education, Botany, and Earth Sciences at the Dallas Natural History Museum in Dallas, Texas
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GRAPEVINE HOOPSKIRTS: Fashion On The Frontier
Dr. Michaele Haynes, Witte Musuem, San Antonio, Texas
The style of Texas frontier clothing is more complex and interesting than calico and buckskin. Michaele Haynes, PhD is Curator of Anthropology at the Witte Museum in San Antonio. She is also on the faculty of University of Texas at San Antonio and San Antonio College.
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THE INADVERTENT SANTA FE TRAIL BLAZER:
Larry Beachum, Mountain View Community College, Dallas, Texas
William Becknell's life as an Indian trader, soldier, harried businessman, and entrepreneur accidentally lead him into history as the Father of the Santa Fe Trail. Larry Beachum is an Administrator in the Waxahachie Independent School District and Adjunct Instructor of American History at Mountain View College in Dallas, Texas.
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AN ORAL HISTORY OF THE BUFFALO SOLDIER:
Ken Pollard, RosieLeeta Abram, Wendell Prince, Texas Parks and Wildlife, Austin, Texas
Living historians depict the lives of the Buffalo Soldiers from the perspective of an officer and the infantry. The stories they tell are true. Ken Pollard is a Program Supervisor at Texas Parks and Wildlife in Austin, Texas.
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BLACKLAND AND THE BOUNTY:
Charlene Rowell, Heard Museum of Natural Science and Wildlife, McKinney, Texas
Why do native plants have a respectable place in the urban landscape? Charlene Rowell has been native plant horticulturist at the Heard Museum of Natural Science and Wildlife in McKinney, Texas for the past six years. She is also a freelance writer for Neil Sperry's GARDENS magazine. She is a Certified Nursery Personnel and member of Texas Nurserymen and Landscapers Association
