OHIO UNIVERSITY 1950-1987

The responsibilities of my first year as director at Ohio University bore down upon me and I had to present myself in person to begin the new semester. The music building left a lot to be desired since it was formerly an Elementary School of the College of Education. But the building situation at Augustana was equally bad. Practice rooms in both places were woefully lacking. Dean Seigfred of the College of Fine Arts found us a two room apartment, one of several known as the Edgehill Apartments, because it was at the bottom of a big hill leading to the main campus. In the meantime, we had sold our house in Rock Island to the organist faculty member, Phillip McDermott. President Baker must have pulled a few strings for we were able to enroll Elaine in the already filled up three year nursery school which we felt was a big plus for her.

Two events of that first year at Ohio University serve me well in the remembering category. The first, known as the big snow of 1950 and the second, the Karl Ahrendt kidney stone. On Thanksgiving Day 1950 we headed out of town, passed the football stadium with a game in progress, and drove to Cincinnati to attend the N.A.S.M. (National Association of Schools of Music) convention held there that year. It snowed a little that day and heavily for the next two days, creating impossible driving conditions in Southeastern Ohio and Western Pennsylvania. My parents had driven down to Athens to baby-sit for Elaine while we were in Cincinnati and were marooned for several days while we were forced to delay our return and cool our heels at the hotel. That gave me the opportunity of meeting and talking with Sherwood Hall who was then a representative from Wesleyan College at Macon, Georgia and taught theory there. After several days the roads were passable again and we returned to Athens. On the outskirts we drive through canyons of snowdrifts pilled high on either side of the road. News reports said that Pittsburgh had declared martial law to cope with the situation. Later in the semester in January I had scheduled a performance of the Christmas Version of the "Messiah" with the large university chorus which I directed. With much rain melting the big snow, Athens experience one of its worst floods from the Hocking river, causing my 'Messiah" audience attendance to be several cut. By this time we had escaped from our very unsatisfactory Edgehill apartment to an upstairs apartment on Elmwood Place through the efforts of Prof. Deforest Ingerham, the man I had met at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria a few years before. He was the violin teacher and conductor of the University Symphony Orchestra. Housing was very tight in Athens in the few years following World Was II. One might almost say that the obituary column was the open door or key to a place to live. This was true in our case. A local judge did die and his apartment became available. Hence our new address on Elmwood Place.

The second event of my first year was as follows: In the waning weeks of the Winter of 1951, I had an attack of violent pain in my side. Dr. Goldberg was called and he diagnosed the problem as a classic case of kidney stone, lodged in the tube from the kidney to the bladder. He advised me to consult one of two urologists in Parkersburg, West Virginia. I picked one and saw him as soon as possible. An operation was scheduled after an X-ray corroborated the location of the stone. St. Josephs Hospital in Parkersburg was the place where this 'search and find' operation took place and was successful With that obstacle out of the way, recovery was fairly rapid and I was able to resume my duties at the School of Music.

Next on the agenda was to prepare for the, what turned out to be, annual visit of Ernst Dohnanyi, noted Hungarian composer and pianist. This was to be his third visit in as many years. Before he had held master classes in piano, culminating in a solo recital. In trying to figure out how best to utilized or take advantage of his visit, I asked my faculty for suggestions only to meet a stone mass of silence. They apparently had enough of the repeated visits under the enthusiastic sponsorship of President Baker. What were we to do? From the tone of things I gathered the master classes were not too successful chiefly because it was hard for the students to understand him and then too, there weren't enough advanced students to profit from the maestro's sage comments. My idea was to use him to conduct the University Symphony and also to participate in as much chamber music as possible. In any case, Chris and I drove to Columbus airport to meet him and a woman who was described as a close relative. In subsequent visits she turned out to be Mrs. Dohnanyi. In that first visit we became warm friends and had them out to number of dinners and parties, an activity Chris always pulled off with aplomb and finesse. Dohnanyi's full time position was as professor of piano at Florida State University in Tallahassee. He complained about the paucity of chamber music activity there, a situation we tried to rectify during his visits to Athens. One time we had a piano quartet session in our downstairs back room with it's old upright, and played through the Schuman E flat quartet, Chris playing viola. It was quite an experience after which he said, "Tiens, I haven't played this piece since 1904 when I played it with Joachim." Talk about a name dropping! Of course, when you played chamber music with Dohnanyi you followed him.

In the early nineteen fifties I had occasion to hire three much needed people on the music faculty. Most of the faculty I inherited were non performers or too old and we needed fresh points of view. The new ones were Leighton Conkling, a fine 'cellist just out of graduate school at Northwestern University, Sherwood Hall from the same school to teach the music theory courses, and Sally Comin, a good pianist and violist, to help Sherwood Hall in developing a strong theory department. She loved to play chamber music and became our viola mainstay. Thus we were able to play one year, two of Dohnanyi's chamber music compositions, his piano quintet with him as pianist and his Sonata for violin and piano with him and Chris as the Violinist. In one of the early visits Dohnanyi was soloist with the University Symphony Orchestra in his "nursery Rhyme Variations."

In 1954, Ohio University was to celebrate it's sesquicentennial anniversary and elaborate plans were made to adequately take notice of the event. Alan Smart, writer in residence, wrote a play, "The Green Adventure," which was performed by the School of Theater and Ernst Dohnanyi was commissioned to write a composition for the Ohio University Symphony Orchestra. The score of "American Rhapsody" was submitted in the Fall of 1953, but our orchestra conductor was unable for health reasons to follow through with preparing the orchestra for Dohnanyi to conduct on Founder's Day in February of 1954. I was the only logical one to take over that responsibility. Fortunately, I knew someone to extract and copy the parts, and old friend, Hobsrt Schoch, librarian of the Cincinnati Symphony. Copy the parts he did beautifully and worth every penny of his fee. Rehearsals began and, as a result of hard work and careful attention to detail, the concert on Founders Day in February 1954 came off very well. A very amusing incident occurred on one of Dohnanyi's visits, at an orchestral concert he was conducting some of the pieces. On this particular concert I was conducting the first half and Erno (I was on a first name basis by that time) the second half after the intermission. Erno came to the back stage dressing room with his wife, Helena, all worried and excited over the fact that he couldn't find the trousers to his dress suit, and couldn't I help him. I had a sudden fortuitous inspiration and said, "Erno, don't worry, I think I have the solution. You are about the same build as I so, when the first of the concert is over, I will give you my dress trousers to put on for your part of the conducting responsibilities and no one will be the wiser." The vital exchange took place as planned with, as I said, no one the wiser. Another time on his 1956 visit we featured him as piano soloist with the orchestra in two Mozart concertos in honor of the 200th anniversary of the composer's birth. In one of the concertos, during the first movement, our esteemed soloist had a lapse of memory, leaving me, the conductor, high and dry, wondering what he was going to do next. He didn't stop playing, just did some irrelevant finger exercises. Fortunately there was the life-saving 6/4 chord in the offing which I prayed would come none too soon. Then the orchestra would be off the hook and the soloist could go into his cadenza and get back on track which he did. Such events are gray hair producing and I'm sure I added to my store of the gray.

During the crowded months of the Ohio University Sesquicentennial Year we, of all things, decided to go on a building spree, the building of our own house. A friend of ours living on Peach Ridge Road notified us of the availability of a piece of property about 1/2 block along the ridge and took us to investigate it. It apparently made a deep impression on our middle aged sensitivity because we began to plan the implementation of our hopes for a place of our very own built for us. Leading into the implementation, I must first relate that the School of Art invited well known painters to the campus every Summer for a several week workshop. In the mid fifties Ben Shahan was the featured artist who attracted quite a number of artists and students among them a Mrs. Mary Montgomery whose husband was a young architect in Yellow Springs, Ohio. Mary was pregnant at the time and had a fall, resulting in a miscarriage. This mishap brought her husband, Roger, to Athens pell mell. He remained in Athens a few days, long enough for us to show him the property we were buying and confer with him on the possibility of designing a house for us. He suggested our seeing some of his houses in the Yellow Springs area which prompted a quick trip to that most interesting community near Dayton, Ohio. We were impressed with what we saw and instructed him to go ahead. He said he would oversee the construction by coming to Athens as often as would be necessary, flying over in his little airplane. However, shortly after construction began, he informed us he would be unable to do this as he was going to Harvard University to take advanced courses in architecture. That left us high and dry and the responsibility fell on our shoulders to monitor the building. Chris had to take over since I was completely absorbed with the increased demands of the School of Music in a sesquicentennial year. She did a masterly job of it. We had two men who gave us a price on the basic construction, that is, the masonry and carpenter work. The plumbing, heating and painting contracts were arranged separately. Eventually we were able to move in in the Spring of 1954 with much left to be done such as dry wall finishing, painting and laying down vinyl tile floors. We found that once the kitchen, bath room and bed rooms were finished, we could do the rest in residence. So began a long and loving relationship with our new home on Peach Ridge Road, one that has lasted so far thirty-three years.

Other well known painters invited to the Summer workshop were Will Barnett, Rudy Pezzati and Victor Candell. Victor Candell we knew at the MacDowell Colony and it was particularly gratifying to have him. These workshops furthered Chris' commitment and interest in becoming an artist. The prevailing art style of the early fifties was abstract expressionism in all it's glory and Chris took to it like a duck to water. She came up with painting after painting, each one showing more and more promise. These workshops attracted many artists from Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia. Among these was a painter from Parkersburg, Katherine Burnside who became a great friend of our over the succeeding years. The following Summer of Victor Candell's visit to Ohio University he and the painter, Leo Manso, founded a workshop in Provincetown, Massachusetts which was highly successful and started our Summer treks to that art colony along with Katherine Burnside. With that I sandwiched in several visits or residencies at the MacDowell Colony. Due to her progress as an artist, Chris also became a MacDowell colonist for several Summers, having won a number of prizes at the Museums of Columbus, Huntington, WV, and Youngstown, Ohio in contemporary art shows.

During our visits to the Provincetown workshop of Candell and Manso, we became acquainted with Joe Hawthorne who organized the Provincetown Symphony, a chamber group giving several concerts each Summer. The members were professionals, basically from the New York area, the New York Philharmonic and other orchestras. Since I was still a member of the Cincinnati Musician's Union and Chris of the Marietta, Ohio union, we joined the group of 802 members of the New York local and played with them for a number of Summers. Hawthorne, the conductor, had been the conductor of the Chattanooga Symphony and was currently the director of the Toledo, Ohio Symphony Orchestra. In February of 1956, my father died of emphysema. Mother and dad had visited us in Athens only 2 1/2 months before at Christmas time and it was hard to believe this tragic event at his age of 76. Mother faced up the the problem of widowhood in an amazing fashion. We exchanged weekly letters, describing the development of our lives which, with the telephone, served to keep us well-informed. The Summer of 1956 at the MacDowell Colony I composed my "Pastorale" for Strings which was in a sense, a musical tribute to my father. At a later date, my "Pastorale" was published by the Ludwig Company in Cleveland, Ohio and has taken on a separate life of it's own, including a number of performances at Ohio University.

The Ohio University School of Music has a well established tradition of hosting a music clinic workshop for high school band members. This was run by Dr. Neil Glenn, the talented head of music education. He had also organized and developed the School of Music graduate program at the master's level. A major in music therapy also claimed him as it's founder. He had much to be proud of and, as a result, other universities were interested in acquiring his services, namely the University of Iowa. He decided to mover there and develop their newly formed doctoral program in music education. To find a replacement for him I leaned heavily on our need for someone to take over our thriving music clinic workshop as well as to function as the head of music education. Our appointee for this position was Dr. Gilbert Stephenson who proved to be a fine choice. Under his direction, the clinic flourished and orchestral and choral activities were added. In time he was picked by the then president of the University, Dr. Vernon Alden (Dr. Baker having retired in 1960) to head the Ohio University project in South Vietnam. This involved Stephenson's eventual departure from the music faculty. I was left high and dry so to speak for someone to be the second in command, a kind of unofficial assistant or associate director. The head of our theory department, Sherwood Hall, was just the right man for that responsibility. Having met him in Cincinnati in the Fall of 1950, I chose to appoint him to teach both freshman and sophomore theory and gave him the responsibility of developing this area. This he did so well in a few years that we had to hire another person to help with the increased load. During the Summer of 1958, I wrote a composition while at the MacDowell Colony which I called "Festival Prelude" to be played by the Ohio University high school clinic orchestra. It received a premier performance by that group in the Summer of 1959 and lather by the Oklahoma City Symphony under Guy Fraser Harrison who also programmed my "Pastorale" on the same program.

We were all saddened by the death of Ernst Dohnanyi in 1960. He died at the age of eighty with his boots on one might say. He was making recordings in New York and contracted a bad cold which developed into pneumonia. Dr. Baker sent me to Tallahassee to represent Ohio University at the funeral. There I saw so many friends of our Tallahassee days. Gene Jennings of the Ohio University piano faculty was there on leave, working on a doctorate, the DMA degree. While there he met Lucille Hight, a harpist, whom he later married and brought to Athens. As a result, we appointed Lucille to teach harp on a half time basis. Through her I became interested in wring for the harp and my "Three Dimensions for Harp, Flute, Violin, 'Cello and Percussion" were written in the Spring of 1974. The following year Chris and I journeyed to the University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico to have it played at the national harp convention that year. In retrospect, I feel this piece is one of my best compositions.

The violin and orchestra situation at Ohio University was most interesting. I had to take over the orchestra conductorship in 1954 when Mr. Ingerham, for health reasons, felt he had to cut down on that responsibility. A few years later in the early sixties he had reached retirement age and we were faced with finding a replacement. I chose Sheldon Sanov from among the candidates, hoping he would draw good fiddle students. However, good as he was as a violinist the students didn't flock to his studio. Leighton Conkling's studio was just the opposite. In time he came to be known as Mr. 'Cello in the state of Ohio and was a key figure in the chamber music activity of the School.

There were a number of community orchestras in Ohio and West Virginia. The closest to Athens was the Charleston Symphony under the direction of Jeffrey Hobday. It was the custom to hire extra needed players from outside the community. Hence, a number of our school of music faculty were recruited namely Leighton Conkling, Gertrude Scharr and Karl Witzler. Gertrude taught piano and played viola rather well. She was a great help in our own viola section as was Maurel Hunkins, the Dean of Men. Karl Witzler was our woodwind teacher whose main instrument was the bassoon. Through these people, Chris was invited to join them in going to Charleston almost once a month to participate in the last rehearsals and concerts of the orchestra. At first I resisted the thought of joining them too, thinking my duties as director of the school would prevent. However, I found I was able to do so and began the monthly trek of Karl and Christine Ahrendt to Charleston which lasted about 15 years. After a few years, Hobday was replaced by Charles Schiff, a Juilliard graduate. Our last year with the orchestra coincided with his last season in 1975. The gratifying aspect of our tenure there was that Chris and I were stand partners in the first violin section. We often played our parts over at home so we always came to the concerts well prepared. By strange coincidence the symphony programmed on our last concert was Brahms' 4th Symphony in e minor, the same symphony the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra played when Chris and I met in November 1932.

In the Fall of 1960 I was given the o.k. for a full time secretary, a much needed assistance to keep pace with the growth of the school. One of the best appointments I made in my tenure as director was one in the person of Mrs. Doris Dorr. She proved again and again the wisdom of this choice. I needed this added help because the chairmanship of the Convocations Committee became more and more time consuming, a fact I presented to Dr. Baker, the president of the University. The convocations were held during the morning class hours, each class time being shortened to accommodate the hour long event which was usually a speaker of note. One of the best of these was Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt whom I had the privilege of escorting from the railroad station to the University guest house and Memorial Auditorium. For an evening convocation I brought the famous N.B.C. Opera Company to the campus, a real plus in my tenure as head of the Convocations Committee. Soon it became evident that the convocations activity had grown to such an extent that a person was needed full time to take it over. The person I recommended to the president was Maurel Hunkins, the then Dean of Men. I finessed this one I believe because some time later an announcement came from the president's office that a new position was created, that of Director of Public Occasions with Maurel Hunkins the appointee. My recommendation to the President had borne fruit.

Through the efforts of music faculty member, Gene Jennings and several others, a chamber music society was formed to bring visiting artists to the campus. This proved to be a thriving venture and numerous well known chamber music groups appeared on the yearly series. Chief among them was the Juilliard String Quartet. Eventually the Athens Chamber Music Society was absorbed by the office of Public Occasions where it properly belonged. It is now under the umbrella of the University Artist Series.

In the nineteen sixties, the general unrest in the country must have got to me because the water of administrative problems didn't seem to "roll off my back" as in earlier days and I began to think of resigning my directorship and go back to full time teaching. This idea started surreptitiously at first, but grew into reality upon the retirement of Dean Seigfred. I resolved to wait until a new dean was appointed and then make my move so the new dean could hire his own man. The new dean was Jack Morrision whose wife was the sister of James Cagney, former movie star. When I told Dean Morrison of my decision, coupled with a desire to have a one year sabbatical he said, "You've got it." Now the die was cast and we started to make plans for our year off. Elaine was by this time a student at Ohio University and resolved to leave school for a year and go to Columbus and get a job. We found a renter for our house in Ken Holland and his wife who was also on a year's leave from his position as chamber music director in the Toledo school system.

For the sabbatical we decided first to go to Munich and arrived in Southhampton, England via the ocean liner "France" of the French Line where we met our old friends, the Hills, of our 1936 trip to Europe. They lived in a very attractive house in a Southampton suburb. We stayed with them several nights and then they drive us to London again. Our next stop was Paris where we made the acquaintance of my godchild, Francois Pech Pinet, now married with two children. What a difference 30 years make! The same situation held true when we visited my second cousin, Lotte Pirch Russig and her family, the first we had seen her since our last visit back in 1939. She and her husband were in good surroundings in their newly built home in Marbach some few miles from Stuttgant.

We left our heavy baggage there and set out for a tour of Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Holland , really only the cities of Copenhagen, Stockholm, Oslo and Amsterdam. This we did on a eurail pass, enabling us to travel first class on the train systems of those countries. Returning to Marbach via Cologne and the Rhine river valley, we next headed for our main destination, Munich. We chose Munich because it represented a good balance of art and music activity. Getting settled there took a little time, but we did succeed in finding a small furnished apartment where we set up shop for three months, collaging and composing. I say collaging because Chris was into the collage medium at the time. Not having a piano available, I was forced to compose without this crutch. Being near the end of a twelve tone period was a help and I did pretty well, composing 'Variegations" for woodwind quintet, "Canzona" for two Violins and Viola and my Cantata-Oratorio, "The Lord Sun" to a text of Alan Smart.

The big event in our Munich sojourn was getting to know and become friends with Dr. Rolf and his wife, Dr. Gretl Babnik, through an address book of persons interested in playing chamber music. Dr. Rolf was a urologist who had a great interest in playing chamber music. Frau Babnik was a dentist and functioned as an ideal hostess for the many chamber music sessions we had at their apartment during the tree months we were in Munich. Through the suggestion of Rolf we played rehearsals and a concert with the Wilde Gungl Symphony Orchestra, an organization of doctors, lawyers and other professional people who were also good musicians. It was founded in the mid 19th century by a conductor named Gungl and soon they were know as "Die Wilde Gungl (Wild Gungls) a name still used currently. Richard Strauss's father was at one time the conductor with his young son, Richard, serving as concertmaster. Our next goal was Berlin where another second cousin, Hilde Pirch Lenz and her brother, Kurt Pirch. We even got into communist East Berlin where we saw to other Pirch brothers, Willy and Ernst, both of whom lived in East Berlin. Passing through the famous Berlin Wall was quite an experience. Being able to speak the language was a great help. It was wonderful seeing Willy and Ernst who I knew so well on my first trip to Berlin back in 1924 and 1925.

We retraced our steps to Munich in the Spring and then set out to visit Italy by way of Vienna. In Vienna we called on Heinrich Schnitzler, a friend of Dean Jack Morrison and son of the famous playwright, Schnitzler who invited us to his home for coffee. The house was built by Hans Richter, the renowned Wagnerian conductor. So we were surrounded by "Fame" twice over that afternoon. The Scnitzlers were delightful hosts and spoke English fluently. After all he taught at U.C.L.A. for 17 years. We got acquainted with Florence again where we stayed with our dear friend, Gulnar Bosch, then the director of the School of Art at Florida State University and also head of the University year abroad study program. Later we explored Rome and south to Pompeii before heading back north to return to Munich via Switzerland. In Zurich I must have eaten something that poisoned my digestive system and plagued me for the next weeks, finally culminating in Paris.

Our plan was to return to London and then pick up our return ship, the "France" back to New York. Alas for well laid plans. It didn't turn out that way at all. Our return to Paris coincided with the famous unrest and student riots of May 1968. Coupled with that, due to the great political climax with DeGaul as leader of the government, the sailing date of our ship was canceled, forcing us to rethink our prerogatives. Then the unthinkable happened. My digestive system worsened and at midnight Chris had to call the American Hospital in Paris to send an emergency ambulance for me. What a terrible strain on poor Chris. Fortunately the problem was a case of gastritis which antibiotic pills took care of rather quickly. After several days I was ready to return to the strike-bound city streets. Fortunately too, the great political problem was resolved and the collective tension relaxed. We were successful in getting passage on the S.S. "Rotterdam" of the Holland Amerika Line. Trains were still not running and the only way out of the country was by bus. The bus station was only a block or two from our hotel which was a most fortuitous situation in this taxi-less city. We dragged our voluminous baggage there and were able to ride out of politically ravaged France to the safety of Belgium and Holland. We overnighted in Brussels and then on to Rotterdam, Holland via train facilities. From there it was all "down hill" so to speak. No more problems at least until we arrived in New York.

Chris' brother, Russell, was at the pier to greet us and, lo and behold, our darling daughter also. It seems she ad had a harrowing experience in her Columbus apartment just a few days earlier. A uniformed man, posing as a police officer had knocked at her door and asked if he might use her phone. After gaining entrance he drew a gun and told her to lie on the floor, the object being a rape. She apparently reacted swiftly to this situation and grabbed his arm and gun. She somehow pulled his arm and gun from behind her at which time the gun fired and the bullet lodged in the wall. The man fled the premises at this dramatic point. After this incredible development, Elaine quite understandable was emotionally overwrought and didn't want to remain in the apartment. Hence, her decision to go to New York and meet us at the boat for a complete change of scenery. When we were apprised of the situation in retrospect we were pretty well shaken too. Then, taking her under our wing, we journeyed to Columbus to pick up our American Motors Wagon which Elaine had driven from Toledo where we had it stored in mother's garage. We drove it back to Toledo again to check up on mother, to find her doing beautifully for all of her ninety years. I had agreed to teach the Summer session so we managed to return to Athens in time for the opening and living in the home of Maurel and Usebia Hunkins while they were vacationing in Michigan. We had rented our house to Ken Holland and his wife while we were away and had to wait until the end of the Summer to regain our own home. Elaine stayed with us and took some Summer courses at the University. She was still shaken over her recent experience with it's demonstration of bravery and didn't want to talk about it. The assailant was subsequently caught, identified and pled guilty.

The Fall of 1968 opened up a new chapter in my life. Freed from the duties of the directorship, I had also asked to be relieved of the orchestral conductorship. Thus I had the time to compose more and explore the possibilities of teaching a sequence of music appreciation courses in which I had a lively interest. Sherwood Hall had served as interim head while the search was on for a new director. The one who was chosen was Clyde Thompson, the Associate Dean of the School of Music at the University of Michigan who, in my estimation, was a real "pro" who gave us the benefit of his valuable experience at Michigan.

Dr. Thompson's arrival as director, coincided with the construction of our new music building which we needed so badly. Over the years I had been campaigning openly and also ever so subtly for the new building and finally Dean Seigfred called me in his office to announce the stupendous news that a new building had been approved and meetings with the architect were to be scheduled. A School of Music building committee was formed with Sherwood Hall as the head. The other member besides myself was Karl Witzler. We had frequent visits with the architect and we made a number of visits to other schools with new buildings, the most important being the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. A propose of the decision for a new building at Ohio University, I remember the following conversation with the then president of the University, Dr. Vernon Alden. Dean Seigfred had invited the Aldens and the Ahrendts to dinner at his home at which time I remarked to President Alden that during my career, after each occasion of my leaving an institution, a much needed music building was built, namely, Florida State at Tallahassee and Augustana College at Rock Island. So, I said, "It would seem all I have to do is leave Ohio University and a new music facility will become a reality." In answer he said "Don't leave, Karl, you will get one anyway." Lo and behold, some months later came the approval of the new Ohio University School of Music building. I had already leaked out the fact that I had converted the third floor woman's toilet into a practice room, the occupancy of course limited to women only. I think such a situation had an embarrassing effect on the university administration in a small way to the decision to allow the School of Music to expand into new quarters. Sherwood Hall did yeoman service in guiding the architect to an understanding of the space needs of the school and as acting Director while I was on sabbatical.

Returning from my sabbatical, I entered a new phase in my professional life. Teaching composition and orchestration remained but the conducting and administration were dropped and music literature at the non-major level was added with a sequence of four literature courses, the Baroque, Classic, Romantic and 20th century periods. With a new building in the offing under the able direction of Dr. Thompson, the School of Music progressed noticeably. Interesting new faculty were appointed in the persons of the Borkowski's, he in music education, and Kay, his wife, as teacher of flute, and the Bebee's, he as teacher of violin and Nancy, his wife, as a voice teacher. With these new additions, the stage was set for me to be stimulated to write music for them. The artist pianist, George Katz, asked me to write a piece for him and my "Integrations" came into being. It did not receive a first performance until the Spring of 1974 in Oxford, Ohio on the Miami University Artist Series. This was just after George had left Ohio University to become the artist first teacher at Drake University. The second performance was given a few months later by another artist teacher at Ohio University, Richard Syracuse while Chris and I were on Sabbatical in Munich. The tape of that exciting performance was sent to me in Munich by Sherwood Hall, my tried and true friend then the Acting Director of the School of Music. Earlier in Munich I wrote my "Variegations" for woodwind quintet and, with a fine violinist around, I wrote a Duo, "Three Profiles" for violin and 'cello, taking advantage of our excellent 'cellist, Leighton Conkling. A year earlier I had written my "Trio 1972" for piano, violin and 'cello for our concert artists, Richard Syracuse, pianist and Bebee and Conkling. One Christmas vacation in 1972, I spent writing a piece for a competition sponsored by the National School Orchestra Association which I called, "Montage," and by golly it won the first prize with publication by Ludwig in Cleveland. Another piece which I wrote for a contest was, "Affirmations" for wind ensemble. It didn't win the prize although it was subsequently published by the Opus Publishing Company of Chicago. Speaking of prizes, another of my compositions did win first prize in the Ohio Music Teachers Association competition. It was the song cycle, "Three Poems from a Calendar" for mezzo soprano and flute, violin, piano and percussion, written at the MacDowell Colony during the Summer of 1971, dedicated to Nancy Bebee and premiered by her and Ohio University faculty at the state convention of the Ohio Music Teacher's Association in Cincinnati, October 21st, 1972. With the stimulation of fine performers like the Bebees, I wrote a string of pieces for violin, "Monologue" in 1976, a Concerto with orchestra in 1979, "Sonata" with piano in 1981, "Music" for violin and Strings in 1983, "Duo" for flute and violin in 1983 and "Suite" for violin alone in 1985.

The new music building was completed for service in January of 1970. The year before, Sheldon Sanov had been given a sabbatical leave which he spent in Los Angeles. He had become very interested in conducting ever since I had used him to conduct the chamber orchestra which I had formed from the large orchestra. In order for him to take the sabbatical, someone had to be found to take over his teaching duties. Fortunately for him Chris was prevailed upon to take over. That was the year of national student unrest which didn't reach Athens until May of 1970, forcing the University to close it's doors several weeks before the end of the quarter. With all the unrest, I managed to put on a dedication concert, featuring the premier of my "Lord Sun" and my "Alleluia" for chorus and orchestra which I had written the year before at the MacDowell Colony in exuberant anticipation of our new music building. What else by Alleluia? What a year. Let me backtrack a bit and pick up on an historical development in the Ahrendt household.

Several years before, while were were in Europe on Sabbatical and Elaine was working in Columbus, she had met a young man, Thomas Cornell by name, and had dated him off and on. During the Summer of 1969, while we were in Provincetown, she had written us that everybody but she seemed to know that Tom was going to marry her. With her he seemed to take for granted that she knew this. In any case, the plot thickened, if one can say so, and the marriage was decided very appropriately for Valentine's Day, February 14th, 1970. We had become acquainted with Tom some months earlier and, as they say, took to him easily. In the Fall we met his parents who lived in Mount Vernon, Ohio, the father of French-Belgian background and his mother whose parents were Roumanian. So linked up two families, the Ahrendts and the Cornells. Tom and Elaine, as they were known to all their friends, settled progressively in a series of homes, first in Huntington, West Virginia where Tom was a news man on the ABC Television station there and then in Charleston, WV where be broke in on the sales force of Xerox. The changed to Eastman Kodak subsequently and is now a vice president in charge of sales in another company. Tom and Elaine were soon introduced to parenthood with the birth of a daughter, Jennifer, in 1972 and a son, Victor, several years later. Three houses and several years later, they are now beautifully ensconced in a newly built home on the banks of the Kanawha river in the town of Winfield West Virginia.

Sheldon Sanov on sabbatical leave, after experiencing the monetary opportunities in Los Angeles, decided not to return to Athens and throw his lot with the various film orchestras which paid fabulous salaries. Therefore the violin position was open and director Thompson sought to fill it with a good applicant. The applicant they chose was Howard Bebee, the violin professor at Ohio Wesleyan University at Delaware, Ohio. His wife, Nancy, an outstanding mezzo sopranos was hired to till an open voice position and so began an association with the Bebees which was distinctly delightful. Howard, whose playing I had admired so much, prevailed upon me to write compositions for him to perform and so began the series of pieces mentioned earlier, including the song cycle, "Three Poems from a Calendar" I wrote for Nancy Bebee. If a composer is flattered by good performers who ask to play his words, such interest is a powerful stimulus to get the appropriate notes on the music manuscript paper. Such was the case with my "Integrations" for piano on a quasi commission from George Katz, the artist piano teacher on the faculty. It was written during the Summer of 1973 and premiered very successfully by George on the Artist Series at Miami University on February 14, 1974. Richard Syracuse, a fine artist pianist on the the Ohio University piano faculty, performed it several times at Ohio University during the Spring of 1975. Later performances were by George Katz on a European tour and by Stefan Moeller a German concert pianist on an American tour. My "Concerto" for Oboe and Strings came about as a direct suggestion from Adrian Gnam, a fine oboist and conductor of the Ohio University Symphony Orchestra. It was a kind of "made to order" piece because he wanted a section of the composition to be for English Horn which he liked to play. Hence, the slow movement is for English Horn and the first and third for Oboe and Strings.

The culmination of recognition of my tenure as Director of the School of Music, teacher, conductor and composer, came in 1974 when I was honored by a Distinguished Award which carried with it a quarter off with pay and a yearly undergraduate scholarship known as the Distinguished Professor Scholarship, the recipient nominated by me. The award was publicly made at the June 1974 commencement ceremony by then president Claude Sowle. It was a trilling moment for me not unlike the recognition one experiences at the end of a well conducted symphony concert. The 1974 commencement was a real one for me because that moment marked the beginning of my retirement as Professor of Music at Ohio University.

In the Spring of 1975 we took advantage of the 'time off' opportunity and made another trip to visit our old European haunts plus this time going to Spain. While there we witnessed in Madrid the ceremonial parade of two heads of state, President Ford of the United States and General Franco the Dictator of Spain. One the way from Munich to Spain we stopped to Cannes to visit Andre Pech and his wife, Marguerite. Andre, now retired, had bought a condominium apartment, and we well placed to enjoy life as he saw fit. In Munich were we spent a month or so in an apartment recommended by our dear friends, the doctors Babnik, we enjoyed a number of Chamber music evenings and a visit to the Babnik country home. Also, we had the chance to see our old friend, Irma Hunefauth, the artist. In no time at all we had to show up at Luxemburg to board our plane of the Icelandic line for the return trip home. The flight from Iceland was remarkably free of incident.

Upon our return to home base I found myself also free of responsibility for earning a living, having 'graduated' to the status of Distinguished Professor Emeritus with all the rights and privileges pertaining there unto. I moved out of my very large and attractive studio in the new building to a small cubical-like room, designed for a graduate assistant office just large enough for a small upright piano, a desk, a chair and a small table. This was to be my "home" for the next few years in which to read, write and compose as I might be so inclined. From that vantage point I could still feel a part of the life of the Music School which had been such a major part of my life. For such a dispensation from director Thompson I am deeply grateful. He confided to me shortly after he took office that he felt a little uneasy to have the former director figuratively 'looking over his shoulder." The truth of the matter was that he couldn't have had a more ardent supporter than I. He soon was able to realize this and we became very good friends. In 1980, due to ill health, Dr. Thompson had to retire and was followed by Dr. Jerry Lloyd from the directorship of music at Capitol University in Columbus, Ohio. After three Years, Lloyd left for a more lucrative position as head in an Eastern university. During this time I sadly report that we lost our former esteemed director, Clyde Thompson, to a heart attack in Florida, where he and his wife, Helen, had gone to spend their retirement years. The next director was from our own faculty ranks, Dr. James Stewart, who, in the Fall of 1987 decided to accept an appointment as Assistant Dean of Fine Arts from the Dean of that college. The Dean, having arrived on the Ohio University scene just a couple of years previously, was a black woman with charm and recognizable leadership abilities. He name, Dora Wilson, with a doctorate in music. All to the good from our standpoint. Now, the directorship of music is up for grabs with an acting director appointed from the faculty, Dr. David Lewis, and outstanding clarinetist and teacher of music theory.

In 1975, to back track a bit, we had an insidious visitor, really more than a visitor, it was a permanent guest in our home. The guest's name was PARKINSON's Disease. It chose to attack my darling wife, Chris, at first lightly, and then progressively more intense. There was, at the time, no neurologist in Athens so we explored the possibilities in Columbus, finally having Dr. George Paulson take the case. He, being particularly interested in the area of Parkinson's Disease, prescribed the usual medication for the early stages of this malady which eventually led to the taking of Sinemet. The tremor, usually associated with Parkinson's was certainly operative in Chris' case. This led to the eventual abandonment of her art practice and violin playing. The disease, being a nerve ailment, caused her to be sensitive to any pressures, even visits and conversations with friends. So began a gradual decline of her social life which, of course, included mine as well. Cooking became an impossibility and I found myself having to take over that responsibility. I wasn't bad at it either. However, it made me realize how much I was indebted to her for having filled that role all the many years of our marriage. The least I could do was to take over and do as well as possible. I liken our situation to an army command post where the officer issues an order for the mess sergeant to carry out. Chris told me what and how to cook and I did my best to follow "orders." Sometimes I carried out orders by patronizing the carry out counter of the local pizza restaurant. The situation caused a slack in visits with Elaine and her family since Chris could not weather the pressure of the trip to West Virginia and we could only depend on their driving up to see us and then their visits were of short duration. What a shame that during those important formative years of our two grandchildren, we should be deprived of that meaningful contact. Nevertheless, we did keep in tough via the telephone.

A phone call did precipitate a relationship which had all the earmarks of an exciting soap opera. Elaine found her birth mother. Through a dint of great curiosity she set in motion, aided by her husband, a search for her birth mother. This was in the early 1980's, he children were growing up and she was concerned about her heredity in terms of health. I had given her all the information I had, including a few receipts from the Moline Lutheran Hospital where she was born and a few sheets of paper which referred to her as baby Browning and a half crossed out name of a town in northern Illinois which could barely be made out to be Sandwich. First they tried official sources, including the hospital which sent then a copy of all they had, just a paper or two which again mentioned Sandwich. They then used the telephone facilities to check on the name, Browning, in Sandwich and some of the surrounding territory, finally asking the operator for the number of the name, Browning in Sandwich The were one and a call was put through. A man answered who said he was Robert Browning "How old are you" they asked. To which he replied he was in his early thirties. That was too young for their purposes said they. Then came the clincher. "But," said he, "My father name was Robert, and he is no longer alive." That news fitted the mold perfectly and Elaine felt excited that she was talking to her own blood brother. One can only imagine the excitement which must have reigned in the Browning clan in that small town in northern Illinois. Her mother was immediately called in a nearby town and she quickly called Elaine. I can only try to imagine what her emotions were in getting acquainted with her birth mother via the telephone. One of her mother's first questions was, "What took you so long?" Elaine discovered that her father had married her mother shortly after she was born and subsequently had two children both boys, mow married with families of their own. He father had died of a heart attack shortly after the birth of the boys and later her mother had remarried and welcomed a baby daughter in their midst. Suddenly, Elaine realized she had two blood brothers and a half sister as close relatives. They arranged to visit and it was on a Thanksgiving holiday, first stopping by our home in Athens to relate the details of their unbelievable "find." Elaine confided that she was worried about how we would react to this new state of affairs, not wanting to hurt us. She needn't have had any qualms because we felt we had done our bit in her life and only wanted her happiness.

It grieves me to relate the fact of my mother's death. She was the kind of person who had lived valiantly all her life and in her later years had provided for herself all by herself. I was proud of the way she had carried on, even recovering from a broken hip in her ninety plus years. She lived alone in her Forest Avenue home in Toledo and I kept close track of her weekly by letters and the telephone. One her 95th birthday, October 22nd 1973 I was informed she was in the hospital in Bluffton, Ohio about 50 miles south of Toledo. She belonged to a bible study church group and one of the members was a doctor in this hospital. He called to let me know that my mother was seriously ill. Consequently Chris and I bundled up and headed for Bluffton. There the doctor informed me she had a melanoma, a bad form of skin cancer. He said further that it was an inoperative situation because the cancer was too far developed. Our visit was a good one, but I somehow felt that I was going through the motions of a Greek play with the inexorability of Fate bearing down on us. We parted and drive the final 50 miles to Toledo and mother's house where we had the straightening out process to perform in the knowledge that mother would never return and we would have the responsibility of settling the estate. All this was in the midst of the 1973 oil crisis when gasoline demand greatly overshadowed the supply. Long lines formed at gas stations in the vain hope of getting the necessary fuel. So we had to be careful of our use of this precious stuff. We applied ourselves to the exhausting effort to straighten mother's household belongings which took days, including one trip to the city trash dump with our station wagon loaded to the top with non-savable items. Suddenly one evening I received a call from the Bluffton hospital that mother had sunk into a coma and that death was expected at any time. Before we had time to plan any trip to the hospital, word came that dear mother had passed away. This was not unexpected, but when the time comes, the emotional wrench is great. What a wonderful woman. I felt that, had she had the necessary education, she could have been a second Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt. The essential was there and carried her to an unusual length of life. She lived to be 95 year young.

I want to pay homage to the memory of the couples who have influenced and enriched our lives. Chief among them are Sherwood and Marguerite Hall, mention of Sherwood's fine contributions having been made in the foregoing pages. After retirement in the early eighties, they decided to move to Carmet, California to be closer to their two married children. It was a sad day for us as they left Athens with it's many memories to try their luck in that far off land. The Dayton, Ohio area furnished a number of good candidates for recognition. The Velseys, Seth and Eleanor, he a sculptor and she an artist-bent very interesting person. We often visited them in their home in Yellow Springs during most of our time in Athens Until their untimely deaths of strokes. Seth was on the faculty of the Dayton Art Institute until his disagreement with the directorship over policies concerning modern art. The same fate befell Paul Wilhelm, an artist teacher at the Institute who supported Seth in his conflict with the top administration and the board of directors. He and his wife Juanita, also an artist, eventually moved to Cincinnati where they carved out a satisfying niche for themselves. Many were the art discussions we had with the Velseys and the Wilhelms. Unhappily the Wilhelms met the same fate as the Velseys - an early demise. Still in Dayton there were Douglas and Mary MacCash whom we often visited. Mary, at one time before our marriage, was Chris' accompanist and Doug a fine professional caliber baritone. They settled down in Dayton and built an enviable reputation as teachers of piano and voice. In the early 1950's I featured Douglas as soloist with the Ohio University chorus which I conducted, in a performance of Mendelssohn's "Elijah." In 1985 we received word that Mary had died suddenly of a heart attack, thus breaking up the outstanding team of music teachers in Dayton. The well of our couple associates in Dayton is not empty. There remains Alvin and Mildred Raffel. Al, an artist, taught for many years at the Dayton Art Institute where Mildred was the secretary to the director. Al was a multi talented individual who converted almost single handedly an old historic log house into a comfortable, fascinating place in which to live. Both he and Mildred were devoted members of the Associated Bible Students which church Chris' mother attended. For the last years of his retired life, Al edited the National Bible Study Newsletter. Also somewhat attached to our Dayton connections was Fred Funkhouser who was born there. I first met him in Paris where he studied with my teacher, Andre Tourret during my second year there. He had attended Oberlin College and took a year off to study in Paris. He was the violist in our quartet and continued with that instrument the rest of his life, becoming a member of the viola section of the famous Cleveland Orchestra, a post he held until his death of cancer in the Fall of 1986. To have been asked to stay on in first chair with the principal several years after retirement age in that prestigious orchestra speaks volumes for the professional regard in which he was held. It was he who introduced me to the beauties of the Chartres cathedral in our student days in Paris.

Looking back on our Tallahassee days, there were a number of couples to whom we became particularly attached. Owen and Helen Sellers were among them because of an earlier acquaintance at the Cincinnati Conservatory. Owen, a fine 'cellist, assisted Dean Opperman in some of the chores of running the school of music, particularly at registration time. Together with Mary Winslow, the head faculty pianist, we were the faculty trio, playing concerts throughout the state as well as in TAllahassee. Bob and Janet Miller figured prominently in our social group. He taught Philosophy in the college and we helped him celebrate his having earned his Ph. D. degree at Duke University. Another celebration was on the occasion of the christening of their first child, "Little Rob," for which event I was asked to be one of the godparents. Another godfather was Christian Heinlein, profession of Psychology who, with his wife, Julia, we had a most interesting relationship. A particular relationship existed between us and Gulnar and Gerry Bosch. Gerry was a talented artist and Gulnar came to Tallahassee to teach art history, she having the position and he, thinking it would give him the opportunity to develop as an artist, went along with such an arrangement. Gulnar was the type person who could galvanize a community in art consciousness. This she did for us and we were the better for it. She formed the sketch group which met weekly. For our last year in Tallahassee, the Bosches left for Chicago where Gulnar started work on a doctorate at the University of Chicago. They were sorely missed by Chris and me. Later they became faculty members at Wesleyan College in Macon, Georgia. There their son, Jarir, was born and I was asked to be a godfather, my second such appointment. The Bosches eventually returned to Tallahassee where Gulnar became the head of the School of Art. Jarir was sent off to prep school. Tragedy struck a few years later in that, as a result of overexertion in bad weather, he caught a cold which worsened to a pneumonia condition, causing his death. What a bitter pill for poor Gulnar and Gerry to take. It ended in their separation and divorce.

Not apart from our "couples companionship" was a unique personality, Hal Cox. He deserves to have a personal paragraph all by himself. He appeared back stage after one of our concerts in the Tallahassee days. He was still in High school, lived alone in a small cottage and ran a bicycle repair shop there. Furthermore, he was a music biff and had a large record collection in the days before L. P. s. Listening to classical music radio broadcasts occupied much of his time. Concerts he considered more important than his school attendance. Although he eventually graduated from high school, he never did learn to spell properly even though he had a great interest in both music and philosophy. He revealed this interest in his letters later on, but his spelling was atrocious. The was was on and he was drafted into the service and stationed at the naval station in Pensacola, Florida. The story goes, from his lips, that he saw a girl walking on the grounds carrying a violin case. The attraction for him was the violin case, not the girl. To make a long story short, he found out she was a professional violinist. The common denominator for them was MUISIC and they were eventually married. They settled on the West coast after the war. He had studied electronics on the G. I. Bill and opened up a hi fidelity business, ending up in the San Francisco area where he still resides. From there he has carried on a continuous communication with us via letters and long distance telephone. No more faithful friend could be imagined. He regards us as role models and is ever appreciative of our having paid attention to him when he was but the barefoot boy from the North Florida swamp.

At this point I should like to mention particularly a favorite couple of ours, Alfred and Martha Bartles. Both had done their undergraduate study at the University of Mississippi and came to Ohio University for masters degrees, he in composition and she as a piano major. The were recently married at that time and, after graduation, went to New York to try their luck. Al had started 'cello lessons with Leighton Conkling and soon became quite proficient, a skill he further developed under Claus Adam of the Juilliard String Quartet. This led to a kind of career as a pit musician in Broadway shows. He was to make a road trip with Montavani and still later several seasons with the St. Louis Symphony. A teaching career dawned when he took a position on the faculty of an American University in West Germany for American soldiers stationed there, finally leading up to an affiliation with the Rudolph Steiner School in Stuttgart. Their daughters, Isobel and Juliana are on their own now as professional musicians, Isobel, a violinist in the Innsbruck Austria Symphony Orchestra and Juliana, a 'cellist of good promise. When Isobel was born, I was asked to be her godfather the fourth such designation I experienced. Alfred and Martha will always be close to us in Spirit.

In conclusion, a few observations may be appropriate. For instance, there seems to be no past or future. All we have is the complete, compelling Present. The Present is always with us, giving one the feeling of static motion. Religion has always been with us. Civilizations had their gods and supreme beings and we are no exceptions. I have noticed that religious groups seem to divide into two camps. The Mohammedans have behaved this way as well as Christians. The Catholics and the Protestants are good examples, even going to war with each other over their convictions. Eternal life is in the eye of the beholder. The ability to procreate is the salient feature of that life. As an armchair philosopher, I composed the following lines for a song which I called, "Philosophy." I was looking for a text for this song and always came up empty in my search. Finally, in desperation, remembering the words of that popular commercial of a few years ago, "Mother, I'd rather do it myself," I decided to write my own. Here it is:

I'm supposed to feel as free as a bird.

Yet, I feel encaged in the pull of circumstance.

The mysterious substance of which we are apart,

Has it's own point of time and reason.

May we bend in the direction of it's goal,

Imbued with a sense of complete liberation.

Athens, Ohio

October 28, 1987

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